Since you've mentioned that blind eyes look like normal eyes, would it be offensive to draw a character's eye in another color to indicate blindness (even if it is to differentiate between a blind eye and non-blind eye in a character with partial blindness)?
From an artistic and character design perspective, I think it'd be best to first focus on what causes the character's blindness and if the cause fits the backstory you want to give them. Then, you should draw their eyes to as closely resemble the condition as is realistically possible.
If your character is elderly, then cataracts is a perfectly reasonable cause for their blindness. In which case, I would recommend giving them a normal eye color and then adding white-grey-blue blurred spots that only partially obscure their eyes. Cataracts rarely cover the entire eye, let alone both. However glaucoma and macular degeneration are also super common causes of blindness, and their eyes would not appear any different from a sighted person's, so you would need to be more creative with visually indicating they're blind.
If the character is a warrior who lost their vision in battle, then scars around the eyes are the most straightforward and appropriate indicator of their backstory.
One thing I don't often see in blind characters is characters who are cross eyed or have a lazy eye. The medical term for "lazy eye" is amblyopia and it's very common, especially in people who have been blind for many years and in children and teens. I think that's partly to blame on ableism teaching us to feel uncomfortable at visible differences--which is why villains/antagonists were sometimes made disabled to other them to the audience. Whereas protagonists were described/drawn to be beautiful as a way to tell the audience they should like the character.
Nystagmus is another visible difference but that's very difficult to convey in art unfortunately.
Outside of what a character's eyes look like, there are design choices you can make to indicate/remind the audiences that the character is blind-
For example:
including a cane or guide dog in character design
having the character wear sunglasses but only sometimes, usually in brightly lit places or perhaps in situations where they're tired from recent story events and their eyes might ache
having a character rub their eyes when they're tired. This isn't something I expect sighted people to get, but it's relatable.
having the character hold things close to their eyes to better see, turn their ear to a sound instead of their eyes (especially of there are sighted characters on page looking towards the sound) and touch objects of interest
wackus helpppp how do you decide which enneagram characters are you're the enneagram person help meeeee
hello empress you have come to the right place!! you know i cannot shut up about the enneagram esPECIALLY when it comes to fictional characters hehe!
it's actually pretty straightforward imo. a character needs 3 key elements to be good; a desire, a fear, and a flaw. the enneagram gives us all of that, making it a perfect tool for character building.
type 1 - the reformer (marinette & kagami)
core desire: to be good, right, better, perfect
core fear: being evil/ corrupt/ wrong
flaw: judgemental, critical (esp of themselves)
type 2 - the helper (nino & sabrina)
core desire: to be loved
core fear: being unwanted, unloved, unworthy
flaw: manipulative, coercive
type 3- the achiever (chloe & lila)
core desire: being valuable, worthwhile
core fear: being worthless
flaw: exploitative, deceptive, narcissistic
type 4 - the individualist (gabriel, zoe)
core desire: identity, significance
core fear: being insignificant, oblivion, the void
flaw: dramatic, melancholic
type 5 - the investigator (felix, max)
core desire: knowledge, understanding, being competent
core fear: being incapable or incompetent
flaw: reclusive, unemotional
of course a character can have more desires, fears, and flaws than just these! the enneagram will just be a jumping off point for you. for example, knowing a type 9 character yearns for peace with everyone, fears separation, and can't say no to anybody can also extend into further study. they can't say no, so they become detached from their friends and family so they don't HAVE to say no, then end up not being there for them when it's important. and boom there you go, character conflict 👉🏼👉🏼thank you enneagram!
i hope this helps you and makes your characters sparkle off the page 💖 please don't ever hesitate to send me more enneagram asks 😍 you know i am obsessed.
would writing a character with sight in only one eye have differences from writing an abled person?
Yes. The character would experience issues with depth perception and limited visual field. They could still drive, could still have good aim, but it wouldn't come as naturally to them as someone who has both eyes to map out distance and angle.
Losing an eye is a type of amputation, and the cause/event might be traumatic or emotionally difficult to talk about. Or they might be the gallows humor type and making jokes about it left, right, and center.
Prosthetic eyes require maintenance and care the same way any mobility aid or prosthesis does. That's a step of daily care that fully sighted people will never experience.
Some people choose unusual, non-matching prosthetic eyes for fun the same way someone might choose colored contacts. Others choose not to wear a prosthetic eye.
I’d really like to work the height and weight of my cast out, because the story I’m writing is about quite a physically diverse little group, and it would be really fun and cool to work out the little differences in the ways they all interact with the world (for instance, in a kitchen how many of them can’t reach the top shelf, how many shelves is the shortest off by, does the tallest have to worry about the doorframe?) Plus every character sheet has height and weight to fill in for some reason, and it would be really satisfying to complete a full one for once.
People keep talking about BMI charts, but I’m either too stupid to be able to use it properly, or it’s only helpful if a character has an average build. Some of my characters have a lot of muscle, some of them are fat, some have a fair amount of both and others have neither. One of the cast’s a teenaged late bloomer, and another stopped growing when she was 15 due to malnourishment but’s a healthy weight now as an adult. I’m not sure how helpful this information is to you, but I thought it might help you to understand where I need advice.
Anyway, do you have any tips or advice or tips for working out my characters height and weight?
I like that you're looking to make diverse body types!
So some reasons people might want to know the height and weight of their characters-
to accurately describe physical interactions like hugs between different heights.
for comedic purposes like you described
romantic shipping purposes, depending on if you prefer the big height difference trope or the no-height difference trope (the latter for me personally).
to determine if an action is physically possible for a character. Can they jump this far or climb that fast or throw someone off balance if they rammed into them like a football player.
For height, I like to think about my friend's heights relative to me and each other. I also think back to any short jokes or tall jokes I remember being made that landed well.
You can also look up average heights for different races and different countries and let that guide you. No group is a monolith so lots of people fall outside of 'average' but it does help to consider.
I wouldn't worry about exact weights if I were you. The weight number is so subjective to height and muscle to fat ratio. I'm also personally of the belief that BMI is useless, and 'obese' is a term made up by the diet industry to perpetually generate profit.
Also just because a character is fat, doesn't mean they can't be incredible athletes. There are fat ballerinas, gymnasts, and weight lifters who are incredible at the their sport.
(also for anyone made uncomfortable by my word choice- fat isn't an insult if you view fatness as a positive and/or neutral thing. It's something that just is and weight makes no impact on someone's worth.)
I love body diversity. Beyond height, weight, and athletic ability, may I suggest considering characters with
mobility aids
general joint pain or pain specific to an old injury
hypermobility
scarring
patches of different colored skin.
Did you know Vitiligo isn't the only condition that causes skin to change its pigment? Addison's Disease is a serious chronic illness with a trademark symptom of skin pigmentation increasing in hot spots like the face and joints the same way Vitiligo does. Skin grafts also look red and inflamed during the healing process
Hello. I found your blog today and it is fantastic. Thank you very much for the content but reading it made me wonder something and I hope you can help me. I have two characters, they are twin sisters and one of them has a lazy eye + strabismus (which I myself have!) and another blindness (before it was total blindness from birth but now that I have investigated I am changing her type of blindness) but before to do that I need to know if that is possible? This could be a dumb question but I mean can two twins have visual diagnoses of this nature at the same time? Thanks in advance for any help!
It is possible but very rare. I did a little bit of research and this is what I found:
So you didn't specify if the twins were identical or fraternal twins, but I thought I'd look up strabismus and if it's genetic, and here is a quote from this study:
"The heritability of concomitant strabismus is supported by twin studies, which reveal a concordance rate of 73% to 82% among monozygotic twins and 35% to 47% among dizygotic twins. The higher concordance between dizygotic twins than siblings likely reflects the influence of environmental risk factors."
Monozygotic twins are identical and they happen when an embryo splits in two, resulting in two distinct organisms with the same source DNA.
Dizygotic twins are fraternal and occur when ovulation (creating the egg cell) results in two different egg cells, which are then fertilized by different sperm cells. Fraternal siblings share the same percentage of DNA that siblings from separate pregnancies share.
So it's possible both siblings could have strabismus. You didn't specify what the second twin's diagnosis is, so I can't comment on how rare that is.
However, the likelihood of both twins experiencing blindness is increased if the mother had complications during pregnancy or delivery. Premature birth (which is common in twins, regardless of whether they're identical or fraternal) can cause underdeveloped eyes.
Vaginal birth carries the risk of newborns being exposed to bacteria and developing neonatal conjunctivitis. However, many doctors choose to deliver twins via a C section (cesarian) during delivery.
If the mother has an untreated STD it can result in birth defects, including blindness. Untreated chlamydia can result in Chlamydia trachomatis, in which the baby contracts a bacterial infection during vaginal birth.
Syphilis can also result in congenital birth defects but most babies born to mothers with untreated syphilis are stillborn. If they live, the infants are extremely sickly and will likely have multiple disabilities if they survive infancy. If you're worried about medical realism and you are not writing historical fiction, I would steer clear of this one.
So for you and other authors interested in characters blind from birth, I would consider what science and medical care the mothers had during pregnancy when deciding what path to go with. I hope this helps and thank you for asking :)
Okay, so I'm writing a story where the main character lost his father and is grieving about it. This character talks in a quieter voice, almost a whisper as he responds to people regarding to his loss. Is it repetitive to keep saying "he whispered/he whispered/he whispered etc"? Is there a better way to convey the idea that he's speaking in a lower tone? Also, when a character's voice cracks, what does that indicate? Does that indicate they are on the verge of crying?
Within a few pages you will probably be able to establish that the character speaks very softly and will be able to either replace most of his dialogue tags with says or drop them entirely in one-on-one conversation. Later in the story, when you have a group of characters talking loudly over each other, that might be a good time to interject a "he whispered" to remind readers of how this character sounds in comparison to everyone else.
Voice cracks can indicate lots of things, yes crying, but also when the character is straining their voice to be heard. You might take advantage of voice cracks for tense moments when your character has been talking a lot or has tried to raise their voice.
Writing A Blind/Visually Impaired Character: Canes, Guide Dogs, O&M
Wow, back in June I decided to take a few months break from blogging to recharge and focus on my mental health. About a month ago I began writing this specific post, slowly and in stages because of how demanding, detailed, and long it is.
I’m not sure when I planned to come back. I have about 200 posts with tags and image description in my drafts folder, waiting to be queued, but I wanted to finish this guide before I fully came back.
Come back with a bang, right?
But this blog, and specifically, my Writing a Blind or Visually Impaired Character guide, has gotten so much traffic and support that I felt incredibly motivated to come back now.
So I finished the guide, and now here it is. It’s been a year+ in the making. Since the very beginning of this writing advice series about writing blind characters, I’ve promised to write a guide specifically about canes, guide dogs, O&M, and other accessibility measures the blind community relies on.
In fact, if you look at my master post for this guide (now pinned at the first post on my blog) you’ll find that it was reserved as Part Four, even as other guides and additions were added over the last year.
In this post I’ll be explaining
What Orientation and Mobility (O&M) is
How one learns O&M
About canes, from different types of canes and their parts, as well as how to use a cane.
I will be explaining the sensory experiences of using a cane and how to describe it in narrative.
I will include small mannerisms long-time cane uses might develop.
At the very end will be a section on guide dogs, but this will be limited to research because I have no personal experience with guide dogs, being a cane user.
Disclaimer: I am an actual visually impaired person who has been using a cane for nearly three years and has been experiencing vision loss symptoms for a few years longer than that. This guide is based on both my experiences and my research. My experiences are not universal however because every blind person has a unique experience with their blindness
What Is Orientation & Mobility
Orientation and Mobility (O&M) is the specific skill of understanding and navigating the world safely and confidently with vision loss.
I’m going to quote Vision Aware’s specific definition [link]
"Orientation" refers to the ability to know where you are and where you want to go, whether you're moving from one room to another or walking downtown for a shopping trip.
"Mobility" refers to the ability to move safely, efficiently, and effectively from one place to another, such as being able to walk without tripping or falling on steps or elevation changes, crossing streets, and using public transportation
O&M can involve :
-learning how to use a cane, as well as what cane works best for you
-safely navigating obstacles with your cane, including stairs, ramps, elevators, uneven or curved sidewalks, through crowds, around furniture
-learning safe strategies for crossing the street
-planning routes to new or recurring locations
-using technology enroute, including GPS and apps like Uber and Lyft
-safely accessing public transportation
-how to ask for help when needed
-working with human sighted guides
A Note on the Blind Community and Their Relationship with Canes
The Perkins School for the Blind estimates that only 2-8% of the blind community rely on canes for navigation. The rest rely on remaining vision, guide dogs, and sighted guides. Only about 2% of the blind community relies on guide dogs however, and to get a guide dog in the first place, a person must go through O&M classes and use a cane for six months before they can sign up for a guide dog.
What this means is that 90% of the blind community don’t use a cane.
I didn’t know this fact until I begun research for this guide, and that number astounds me.
Truth be told, while I have navigated my life without a cane before, I can’t imagine going back to the way it was before I got it. Even if I only need my cane some of the time, I can’t bear to not use it in the situations I need it. Having a cane made my life a lot easier, a lot safer.
I don’t know what to attribute this number to.
I might attribute it to the concepts of invisible vs. visible disability, internalized ableism, or the feeling of ‘not being blind enough’ for a cane, as well as accessibility to the blind community and knowledge, and access to buying a cane in the first place. I could write a thing about it, but if I try it’s gonna be its own post.
Onward~
How Do You Learn O&M? How Will My Character Learn?
You will have to find an Orientation and Mobility instructor and have them personally teach you O&M skills.
The O&M Instructor is a sighted adult who has gone to school for a bachelor’s degree and gone through O&M training themselves while blindfolded, usually fulfilling a certain requirement of hours (one program required 400 hours of O&M practice blindfolded before you could become certified), and apply for certification to teach O&M.
(Or, as is the process to become an instructor in the United States, where I am from. Becoming an instructor would vary in other countries, I’m sure)
To find an O&M instructor, you would reach out to your local school or foundation for the blind. Finding your nearest school for the blind could be done through…
Google search
Your Ophthalmologist (eye doctor) referring you to a school for the blind
A Social Service Worker reaching out to you and helping you contact the school
Possibly your school (as in grade/primary school, high school, university) reaching out to the nearest school for the blind on your behalf.
Unfortunately, there is not an abundance of schools and foundations, so your nearest might still be a far travel distance. My local school is a 45 minute drive away. For some it might a few hours away.
This is, again, a U.S. experience, because our land mass is spaced out, and something like a six hour drive feels like nothing to most people (although is highly impractical and very difficult to a blind person who cannot drive themselves), but in other countries a six hour drive would mean crossing several borders, and other countries have different social programs.
There is not a full and complete database of every available school for the blind either, no one website to find every possible option. For example, the school I went to wasn’t listed in most of the website resources I found, even though it has seven branches and locations.
This is more a complaint at the real life struggle to find disabled services, that there are few comprehensive resources out there. If you ask me, it should be made significantly easier to find and access your local blind communities. Accessibility and disabled services should be easily available everywhere.
If your story is based in a real world location, googling ‘school for the blind (city/county/country)’ should suffice in finding the one most local to your setting.
What might a school for the blind provide for your character?
Well, on top of helping your character connect to an O&M instructor, a school for the blind might provide other rehabilitation classes and access to additional resources.
Those rehabilitation classes could include lessons on:
-Reading/Writing Braille & using brailling machines
-Technology classes for screen readers, magnifiers, etc on your computer and smart phone.
My local school has separate classes specific to Andriod, iOS, JAWS, Zoomtext Fusion
-Independent Living skills (cooking, cleaning, organizing, planning how to get groceries and medications)
-Self Improvement (dancing, art, music, self defense. These were classes my school taught)
The additional resources form these schools might include-
Referrals to counselors for coping with vision loss
Access to their audio-book and braille library
Access to magnifier devices, brailler machines (think of a typewriter for writing braille)
Some schools also offer grade-school or high-school education, meaning blind children/teens learn there instead of a mainstream school.
Some schools have lodgings for clients to stay at while going through rehabilitation, especially if the vision loss is sudden and severe. They live on-campus and take part in classes. Other schools only have day classes offered and you need to find transportation for every visit. Many schools might have a rehabilitation specialist or O&M instructor visit you in your home.
My local school did the last two. They had on site classes, but the school is a 45 minute drive from me, so I only visited a few times. They were able to send an O&M instructor to me.
On Wednesdays at 3 pm she would drive to my house and give me lessons on using my cane. Those included her driving me to different locations to practice certain skills (like using stairs and escalators at the mall, or crossing a moderately busy intersection, or visiting a bus station to practice boarding a bus safely and communication with a bus driver where my stop was).
She also brought multiple different types of canes for new students to try out and determine which felt best for them.
The Many Types of Canes
Long Canes are used to sweep the immediate area in front of the cane user as they’re walking. This is the cane type that the general public is most familiar with seeing. There are several sub-types of long canes. They can also be called white canes or probing canes.
[Image Description: Man in business clothes traveling on the side walk with a white and red cane. End Image Description]
White cane can be a misnomer for two reasons: One, the concept of the standard cane for the blind can look different in different countries. In America, the standard is white with a red tip. In some countries the standard is an all-white cane. In some countries an all white cane might mean the user is blind while a white cane with a red tip means the user is deaf-blind.
Two, some companies like Ambutech allow customers to customize their cane colors and tips. Example: Molly Burke’s hot pink cane. My white cane with a purple tip. An all black or all sky blue or all red or all purple cane. A black cane with a blue or purple tip. Ambutech also allows customers to request neon-colored reflective tape to make their canes more visible at night.
Probing cane is not a term I’ve personally heard before, but it is a term Vision Aware uses on their website.
There are three main types of long canes:
Non-folding Canes: a cane that has no sections, cannot be folded or collapsed.
[Image Description: stock photo of man in business suit with a non-folding all white cane. End Image Description]
Folding Canes: The cane has 3-6 sections depending on its height. The taller the cane, the more sections it has. The sections are separate pieces that are made to snap together and are held together by a strong elastic rope inside the sections.
[Image Description: a folding cane with four sections, white with a red tip, and a rolling marshmallow tip. End Image Description]
Telescopic Canes: in which the sections slide into each other, similar to a telescope/spyglass, rather than pulling apart and folding. The handle is the widest section, and the tip section is the thinnest.
[Image Description: Three stacked images of a blue telescopic cane. First is of the cane completely collapsed. Second is of the sections partially sliding out. Third is the cane sections completely out and locked.]
Beyond that is also the Identification Cane. The function of this cane is to visibly identify the user as blind. It’s not used for O&M the way long canes are, there is no sweeping out the next two steps. It can be used as a support cane, however.
It’s appeals most to the elderly who not only make up a huge percentage of the blind community, but might also benefit most from having both a support cane and an identifier for their blindness, in case they need assistance.
[Image Description: identification cane with curved handle. All white with red tip. End Image Description]
A note: From what I’ve heard in the blind community, some people prefer solid/non-folding canes over folding or telescopic canes. The reason for this is that solid canes transfer vibration better than folding or telescopic canes. It’s said that the more sections a cane has, the less precise the vibrations are.
Some cane users train themselves to understand the vibrations of the surfaces their canes are touching. It tells them what kind of surface they’re on (wood vs. marble vs. concrete), if there are nearby objects to their cane. While I rely somewhat on cane vibrations to tell me what surface I’m walking on (more on that later), it is beyond my current O&M abilities to use cane vibrations to sense nearby walls or objects.
Cane vibrations are just an additional information-sense to add to the others in use, and extra bit of data input.
Parts of the Cane: Materials, Handle, Tips, Sections, Elastic Band
Material
The three most common types of materials used to make canes are aluminum, carbon-fiber, and fiberglass. Each material has some drawbacks and benefits.
The ideal cane is lightweight and durable. It should be strong enough to withstand hitting something solid without bending or splintering.
Aluminum is strong and durable, but heavy. If it’s damage, it’s more likely to bend than break entirely. A bend can be straightened out, but it takes considerable strength.
Carbon-fiber is lightweight and durable. It’s stronger than fiberglass, and it can bend out of shape rather than splintering.
Fiberglass is lightweight but a bit rigid. If it breaks, it splinters.
Handles and Elastic Bands
While some canes can have specialized grips (plastic, wood, corkboard) the most common handle material is a black rubber handle that is about ten inches long, give or take. In the previous photos you’ve seen, the canes have had black rubber handles.
Here is an example of a cane with a wood-mesh material used as the handle.
[Image Description: a four section white cane with a red tip and a orange wood mesh handle, with black elastic band attached. End Image Description]
The benefits of black rubber handles over others are that it’s easier to hold onto, especially if your palms are wet or sweaty, than a plastic or polished wood handle. It also wouldn’t show the indents or scratches from wear and tear daily use. I’m guessing that is cheaper to make on the manufacturing standpoint, and thus is conveniently the standard.
Pay attention to the black elastic band attached to the handle in the above photo. Notice how it has a tied off loop? That is so that when the cane is folded, that loop can be stretched over the folded sections to hold it together.
[Image Description: a four section folding cane folded up with the black band around them. End Image Description]
Additional benefits or functions of the elastic could be to use it as a wrist strap while using the cane, or hanging it up on a hook while not in use. I tend to have my cane folded up and tuck my wrist under the strap to hold it more securely while carrying it. Images of that ahead in my cane-isms section.
Cane Height
Ideal cane heights depend on the user. For most users, you want your cane height to be to your shoulder, give or take a few inches. You might need a longer cane if you are a fast walker with long strides, or a shorter cane if you prefer to hold your cane at a lower angle than is traditional.
What I mean when I talk about holding your cane at a certain angle is that the standard is to hold your cane handle in your dominant hand and position it in front of your belly button, moving it side to side with each step. Traditional grip methods are holding your hand palm side up with your cane in hand, or to hold the cane at the section joint closest to the handle with what is called the pencil grip, holding the cane like a fat pencil.
Depending on the height, a cane can have anywhere between three and six sections. Longer canes have more sections. The top section includes the handle, and the last section includes the stripe color (traditionally red, unless customized) and the tip.
The sections of the cane are generally slightly reflective, regardless of color. If you hold a cane up to the light you’ll see tiny specks of light reflected back, almost like very fine, tiny particle glitter paint. This detail is important in cane production because it makes the cane more visible at night, especially if something like car headlights reflect off it while someone is crossing.
Additional visibility at night can be added by wrapping stripes of reflective tape along the shaft.
Cane Tips
There are several different tip options for canes.
[Image Description: four different types of cane tips on a blue background with labels. From left to right: marshmallow tip, ball tip, pencil tip, glide tip.]
[Image Description: a rolling marshmallow tip with a blue background. End Image Description]
[Image Description: Bandu basher tip with a white background. For anyone not familiar with the name, the long, curved cane tip that looks like a hockey stick. End Image Description]
Some of these tips are better for the tap-tap method of cane travel, as in tapping the spots where you plan to step. They can also be used to feel out the shapes of objects, stairs, etc.
marshmallow tip, pencil tip,
They should not be scraped over surfaces, the tips will wear down much faster than they should. There are better tips for rolling over surface
Some tips are better for the rolling method of cane travel, which is the method I use. They aren’t great for tapping, but it can be done in a pinch.
rolling marshmallow tip, ball tip, glide tip
The Bandu Basher tip, the hockey stick shaped tip, is best for hovering an inch off the ground and lightly tapping objects. It could be tapped. It should not be scraped over the ground like a rolling tip. It hovers.
After enough use, the tips will wear down and need to be replaced. The part of the tip that has the most contact with the ground, usually the edge of the shape, gets scrapes, sands down, and eventually begins to look like it was shaved off while still having bits of plastic still gripped to it.
Never fear, cane tips can be removed and replaced when they wear out, replacing the whole cane is not necessary.
Some tips slip on or twist on. Others hook on. By hook on I mean that the elastic that keeps the cane sections together also has a loop at the tip end that a hook onto and stay held into place. Look back at the photo of the rolling marshmallow tip and you will see the hook that attaches to the black elastic.
Cane tips sell for about 5 - 10 U.S. dollars, plus shipping, so it’s advised to buy several back up tips with your cane. I replace my rolling marshmallow tips once every six to twelve months. I don’t know if that’s considered too much or too often. The last time I needed to replace mine was June 2019 (It’s July 2020 at the date of writing this, but I’ve hardly left my home for the last six months because of COVID-virus related quarantine/social distancing.)
Sensory Details/Describing What Using a Cane Feels Like
Every surface type feels and sounds different when tapping or rolling a cane over it. It’s this difference that tells us a lot about our environment.
It tells us when we stepped off the side walk onto the grass, when we’ve walked inside because the concrete changes to wood or carpet flooring. These little details become trail markers too, useful for places we anticipate traveling to a lot.
Example: A week before every semester in college, I would travel to each of the classrooms and learn necessary routes. I learned that certain paths had giant cracks in the sidewalk that would be distinct enough to use as a trail marker to where I was on a path, or that certain paths went from cement to gravel, or cement to brick.
Carpet: The sound is very soft, and if you’re rolling your cane across carpet it sounds like a quiet swish-swish-swish. Tapping sounds depend on how thick the carpet padding underneath is, the thicker the carpet the softer the sound. If there’s a lot of padding then taps don’t make much sound, but if the padding is thin or underneath the carpet is tile or concrete then you hear a louder thudding tap. It’s still pretty quiet. If you’re rolling the cane you would feel a little bit of drag, the cane moves slower over the carpet. The thicker or shaggier the carpet is, the more drag it has.
Wood floor: Cane tips make rumbling sounds when rolling over wood floors. The smoother the wood, the less it rumbles. There’s a little vibration moving from the cane tip, through the cane and into your hand as you roll over wood planks. Very small. The more sensitive you are to vibrations, the more you feel it. Tapping makes hallow, thudding sounds on the wood. Sometimes they sound a little snappish if you’re tapping harshly. You feel stronger vibrations when tapping. Older wood feels softer, with more give. New wood is stronger, more vibrations in the cane.
Tile:It depends on the size of the tiles and the wideness of the grout lines, but it’s not a pleasant feeling. Tiles have grout lines, which are little divets between the tiles. The smaller the tiles or rougher the grout lines are, the more the cane vibrates in your hands. Every bump is felt running from the cane to your hand. The sound is a little grating too. Imagine fifty sets of stiletto shoes walking on tile, that’s what it sounds like when you roll your cane over rough, small tiles. Larger tiles with smoother grout lines aren’t so bad. Tapping the tile with your cane sounds like one really loud step of a stiletto heal, one step for each tap. Tile floors are usually found in bathrooms, kitchens, and industrial locations where the room is going to have harder walls (more tile, concrete, etc) and few furniture, so the room echoes more.
Linoleum: is a smooth even surface. It feels like your cane is gliding when you roll it, barely feeling any vibrations. The rolling sounds are very soft because of the lack of bumps, however tapping sounds are a bit louder. Not as snappish as tile or marble, but almost.
Marble: is similar to linoleum in its smoothness. Your cane glides when rolling. Tapping sounds are sharp. Because marble floors are common in high end malls, luxury homes, and fancy office building entries, places that usually have high ceilings and hard walls with minimal decorations and minimalist furnishing, those sharp tapping sounds may echo. Assuming there isn’t too much noise and the environment is relatively quiet.
Concrete: (I’m referring to concrete found in parking garages and industrial buildings, not sidewalk) It depends on the age of the concrete and how it’s maintained. Old concrete with lots of cracks and mini-craters feels very different from smooth concrete that was set less than a year ago. With old concrete there’s a rattling sound as your cane tip rolls over the bumps and those vibrations travel up your cane. New concrete can feel similar to marble or linoleum. The taps are loud thuds on dull concrete and sharper on new concrete.
Sidewalks: are made of concrete, but in my experience they feel a little different than the above example. Sidewalks have a grittier surface, they’re slightly rougher, more dry. There’s a bit more rolling cane vibration with sidewalks and the taps have more of a thud sound. And because they’re outside, you’re unlikely to hear any echoes unless you’re walking in an alley or between buildings.
Asphalt: is one of the worst surfaces in my personal opinion. Asphalt is the material used in roads and it’s made to be rough and gritty so that car tires can grip onto it and not lose traction while driving. The older and more damaged it is, the rougher it is. Because it’s rough the vibrations are much stronger, sometimes irritatingly so. I can’t roll my cane over asphalt because the bones in my hand can’t handle those kinds of vibrations, so I almost always use the tapping method instead. The sounds are gritty and dull. Unfortunately, asphalt is an unavoidable surface, unless you can find a way to never need to cross a street or walk through a parking lot.
Note: the white or yellow lines that have been painted into asphalt sometimes feel smoother because of the material they’re made of and because they’re added after the asphalt has been laid down.
Note: There’s something called tarmac which is similar to asphalt, used for a similar purpose, and more common in the U.K. (I believe) but I can’t say that I’ve ever knowingly walked on it so I have no personal experience to give you.
Gravel: Another one of those evil surfaces. Gravel is just loose rocks and they’re common in rural roads, driveways, some landscaping. The looseness of them is what makes them untrustworthy. It makes a crunching sound. If you roll your cane, you’re likely to end up tossing small bits of rock and dust here and there. If you tap, you’ll hear the crunch but your brain might not translate that into “it’s gravel” until you’re walking on it and only realize when you walk over it and the sharp rocks begin digging into your shoes.
Wood Chips: I don’t have any experience with this since vision loss and getting a cane, so I’m using my memories of being on the playground in grade school because the surface on the playground was wood chips. I’d say wood ships are a love child between gravel and wood floors. The surface is loose and rolling your cane over it would kick up loose chips and dust. It would probably sound similar to walking on sand I think, because wood chips are much softer than gravel but not as consistent as wood. If it’s rained recently, then the waterlogged wood chips sound even softer.
Hard Dirt: I’m thinking dirt roads here, which are a lesser evil to asphalt and gravel. They can be rough like all roads, but the material isn’t has hard and solid. Rolling your cane will kick up dust on a dry day, but if it rained a few days ago you might hear a soft crunch as you roll over wet dirt. Tapping will have a very soft thud.
Soft Dirt: Think gardening dirt. Because it’s so soft, it makes very little sound and is easily kicked up. There’s a bit of drag, about the same or slightly more drag than grass or sand. Tapping has almost no sound but you might feel a slight give as your tip lands in the dirt, a slight resistance as it sinks in.
Mud: Yuck. I’m imagining this getting in my cane tip and how gross it would be after. Sound and feeling depend on how wet the mud is. Wet mud sounds slurpy. There’s more squish if you roll or tap your cane. Your character might not identify it right away until their shoes begin slipping as they walk over the mud. This is a personal experience. Drier mud sounds soft and feels almost solid underneath your cane. Wetter mud has more drag for a rolling cane. Muddy areas are also generally uneven because top soil has been displaced, so muddy hills and fields have unexpected but usually subtle changes in elevation.
Puddles: have both a slurpy and splash-splash sound. The slurpy sound is more common with rolling cane techniques. The splash sound is more common with tapping. The deeper the puddle, the louder is sounds and the more drag you experience. I am not fond of this texture/experience.
Snow: I have zero experience with snow since the development of blindness. So no experience of what it’s like to walk through with a cane. This is something I hope a blind reader can inform me on so I can edit this at a later date. My best guess is that it has a soft crunch, softer than the crunch of shoes in snow. A lot of drag too. Rolling through snow would probably be near impossible, especially if it’s deep snow or hard packed. Again, my best guess. The last time I experienced snow was when I was twelve.
Grass: One of my least favorites personally. Too much drag. Worse than shag carpeting. It’s very soft and doesn’t make much sound either. Like a crisp crunch you can barely hear. If the grass is wet or frosty you hear it a bit more crunch.
Surface with fallen Autumn leaves: Leaves everywhere! This is a bit dependant on whatever surface the leaves are on. It would soften the sound of cement, but there would be a louder crunch on grass. If the leaves are big and very curvy/pocketed then they’re easy to push aside. Smaller, flatter leaves don’t push as easily. The driest ones will crunch under your cane. It’s fun sometimes, if you’re the kind of person who likes stepping on leaves on purpose, but if you can’t see the leaves it might lose some of its fun and be more unexpected.
Sand: I’ve never personally taken my cane to the beach, despite living so close to the coast. The reason is because beach sand is so squishy and loose that it’s already impossible to stay steady on your feet. The sand is always sinking under your feet, unless you’re next to the water line and the dampness has made it firmer. So a cane isn’t very useful to me at the beach. Not to mention that sand isn’t something you want inside your cane joints if you want the cane to last. Sand will erode and damage the joints, regardless of if they’re metal or plastic. If I were to take my cane to the beach, it would make the softest crunching-swishy noise of sand sliding over sand, similar to what your footsteps sound like on sand, but possibly even quieter because canes are lighter.
Side Note: My mother sarcastically asked about rolling your cane through dog poop or gum left on the floor. Can’t say I’ve ever rolled through it, so couldn’t tell you. Use your imagination I guess, Mum
The Invention of Tactile Paving
These are amazing! Tactile Paving are those yellow (or sometimes grey) bumpy squares you see on ramps leading into parking lots or when crossing the street. In 1965, Japanese engineer Seiichi Miyake used his own money to develop a tactile brick that you could feel even when walking over it with shoes, and he designed this because a friend of his was losing their vision and he wanted to help. These are amazing, and accessible to everyone, even the blind who don’t have a cane or guide dog. These are literal life savers. Before I got my cane, if I felt those bumps under my shoes I knew to immediately stop because I was about to walk into the road. Because less than 10% of the blind community uses canes or guide dogs, this is the most accessible form of blind aide available.
[Image Description: a yellow rectangle of tactile paving in front of a ramp leading into a parking lot. End Image Description]
Note: similar detail, most doors in commercial buildings (in my localized experience) have a metal plate on the threshold to hold the door in place so there are no cracks underneath. The metal scraping sound when you roll or tap your cane on it is distinct but temporary and non-repeating, so it’s a good indication that you’ve reached and passed the threshold.
Blind-isms
I have a section in this guide about blind-isms, but these ones are focused specifically on cane use.
-Do. Not. Touch. My. Cane. Don’t. Just fucking don’t.
-The above ism comes from the fact that our cane is our safety net, an extension of our body, our eyes, the one thing that makes sure we’ll get somewhere safely. For that reason, blind people hate having their canes (or their on duty guide dogs) touched by strangers, acquaintances, friends we’re not very close to, some family members.
Important Note: That is a universal thing for disabled people. Don’t. Touch. Their. Mobility Aides. It’s assault. Touching someone’s wheelchair or pushing them around without their expressed permission is assault. Moving their wheelchair while the user is currently standing is assault. (Most wheelchair users are not paralyzed, but they still need the wheelchair because of their medical condition, which is not your business to know). It doesn’t matter if the wheelchair is in the way, the disabled person needs it right there, do not touch it. Touching or grabbing someone’s support cane or their long cane is assault. Touching or moving someone’s walker is assault. Touching, poking at, or tampering with someone’s hearing aids is assault. Touching their oxygen tank or cannula is assault.
Back on topic-
-Idle motions with your cane while waiting in line. I often rest my chin on my cane or lean on it
-twirl my cane like a staff when I’m alone and no one can see. I would not ever do this in front of anyone because I don’t want anyone thinking it’s a toy or they can just touch or grab it. I’m just a little childish and bored sometimes and idle motions are a common thing for people with ADHD.
-When carrying my folded cane inside (like say a store) I hang it from my wrist by the strap.
-Keeping my cane within arms reach at all times, even in situations where I don’t need it currently. Example: if we’re doing a classroom assignment where I need to leave my desk, I know the classroom well enough to not use my cane, but I won’t leave it at my desk, ever. (This does not apply at home. And in the homes of a very few, very trusted friends I will leave it somewhere I deem safe.)
-Having a set, specific place in my home (living with my immediate family, who almost never have guests) for my cane. In my case, it’s the top of an antique dresser in the living room, across from the door. It has a little bowl for my sunglasses as well. If I move out and have roommates, my cane will be in my room.
-Love me a bag or backpack that has enough space to discretely store your cane, but most of my bags cannot do that.
-People with folding canes develop a muscle memory for folding and unfolding their cane, so they can do it without really thinking about it.
-Unfolding my cane: I hold the black handle between my thumb and palm with my other fingers folded over the remaining three sections, cane tip pointing up. I slide the elastic over the tip, loosen my four fingers and roll my wrist to the side. The red colored section unfolds first and snaps into place with its neighboring section. I roll my wrist in the opposite direction so the next white section can unfold and snap into place with it’s neighboring section. Roll it back in the first direction and the third section snaps into place with the handle. My four section cane is now unfolded and straight.
-Sometimes I just grab the black handle and let the sections fall and unfold as they will, but this is less controlled and risks your cane bumping into something or someone.
-Folding my cane: I start with the black handle, lifting it up so the joints unlock. I fold it down, grab both sections in my hand and lift the second section away from the third and fold it over. Wrap my hand over all three sections and unlock it from the red section.
-Because I have a four section folding cane, the cane tip and the handle are on the same side while the metal joints are on the opposite side. Those metal joints are what my elastic slips over.
-A three or five folding cane will have the head of the handle (and its elastic) on the opposite side of the cane tip, and you will be folding the elastic over the cane joints and tip.
-A six section cane has the tip and handle facing the same direction like the four section cane.
-People with non-folding canes like leaning their canes up against walls and other objects when not in use. Corners are popular, the corner of a desk up against a wall too.
-But oh god the frustration when the cane randomly rolls out of place and hits the floor, it’s a combination of “Not again” and “did that really just happen” and “you had one job. one job.”
-Sitting with our cane tucked between our legs. Picture a bit of man spreading, the cane tip leaned against the side of our foot to keep it stable and the cane leaning against our shoulder or opposite knee, possibly also held securely with our fingers too.
-The no-manspreading alternative of that is with the cane leaning against our shoulder, cane tip resting on the toe of our shoe or the outside of it, held securely with our fingers or our arm wrapped around it, elbow hooking it.
(Okay, a while back I was looking for photos of someone using a cane to use as a reference for drawing Ulric. I only found three, and two of them were Daredevil promo photos. Which, no offense to Charlie Cox, but he is not blind and he does not use a cane in his daily life, he does not have that relationship a blind person has with a cane and the concept of a fifth limb, and it shows. So the photos were stiff and unusable, so I had to like use several photo references of different poses and Frankenstein them together to get what I wanted.
And I still haven’t finished the painting... fuck)
-In a car with a non-folding cane:
-Right passenger seat- The cane tip goes all the way into the corner of the foot well to the right of my feet, with the handle resting over my right shoulder or on the seatbelt. It pokes a bit past my headrest. The longer the cane, the harder it is to tuck into a car.
-The U.K. / Austrailian / New Zealand / Japan version of this (because they drive on the left side of the road with their drivers seats on the right side of the car) it’s like this: Cane tip in the foot well to the left of my feet, handle on my left shoulder or on the seatbelt.
Backseat: the absolute worst. There’s less foot well room, and if you’re in a sedan there is almost no room behind your shoulder for the handle. I position my cane diagonally with the handle on the shoulder closest to the door and the tip next to the foot closest to the middle.
-For this reason, no one with a non-folding cane will want to be sitting in the backseat.
About Guide Dogs
While my knowledge of guide dogs is limited only to what I can research and not personal, I will give you some basic facts and practical knowledge from said research.
Guiding Eyes for the Blind estimates that there are 10,000 guide dog teams out there in the world. That makes up 2% of the blind and visually impaired community.
Guide Dog Training
Becoming a guide dog is the most difficult form of dog training there is. The majority of dogs who enter guide dog training wash out and either become family dogs or go into a different type of service dog training, like medical response or PTSD/anxiety response, or possibly become therapy dogs, which is a career altogether different from being a service dog.
Guide dogs go through two or three years of training, which includes puppy training, basic socialization, proper behavior when on duty and actual guide training. Most service dogs only go through a year to a year and a half of training before they are partnered with a disabled handler.
Between the cost of training, the cost of housing and feeding the dog and the cost of vet bills from birth until being partnered with a blind handler, the overall cost of a guide dog is something like 30k to 40k. While most service dog training organizations require handlers to fundraise and pay for the cost of training (usually something like 15-30k), guide dog organizations give their dogs to qualified blind clients for free. These organizations pay for the dog costs through their own fundraising and charities. Fortunately for these organizations, guide dogs are a highly respected field and have a lot more charity directed their way, while other service dog types have less public interest when it comes to charity.
Guide Dog organizations have an application process, requirements, and a wait-list before you can be partnered with a guide dog.
Requirements to get a guide dog are (usually) as follows:
Must be legally blind (as in not visually impaired, but legally blind) and have had at least six months of O&M with a cane and demonstrate enough O&M stills to navigate by oneself. They also require you to be responsible enough to independently care for a dog, able to keep up with training and retraining of the dog, as well as financially able to handle food and vet bills (which are at least a few thousand dollars every year).
The reason for cane training before getting a guide dog is because the dog cannot do everything for you. You, the dog handler, are responsible for knowing where you are and how to get where you need to be.
The dog can’t read stop signs or tell when a light is green or red, nor do they have GPS to find a brand new location nor can they learn that route on the first try, nor will they know exactly where you want to go when you say “Starbucks” or “library” or “school” or “mom’s house” and guide you all by themselves. That falls on you, the dog handler, having enough orientation and mobility skills to know when a street is safe to cross and knowing how to learn new routes and how to keep on route and make sure you make the correct turns. A guide dog can’t communicate with bus drivers for you either, they don’t know which number bus to use or what stop to choose. That falls on the blind person’s own skill.
Other Guide Dog Resources
Molly Burke is a guide dog user and has made several videos about what kind of work guide dogs do, her personal experience being a guide dog user for over ten years, how she got a guide dog, specific commands, unique experiences with things like travel, etc. She has a playlist all about guide dogs, but here are some of my favorite videos.
How Guide Dogs Guide A Blind Person
Guide Dog User Answers the Most Googled Questions about Guide Dogs
How I Met My First Guide Dog
Final Thoughts:
There is a lot more to be said about Orientation and Mobility, such as:
How do you safely cross the street with a cane?
How do you learn new routes?
How does getting a cane significantly change your life?
How do family, friends, and strangers react to you “suddenly” having a cane?
I could also write a ton on other tools the blind community relies on so strongly, such as screen readers, magnifiers, etc. In fact, I originally promised to include those in my master post when Part Four was titled Part Four: What Your Blind Character Needs to Survive and Not Die. However, this guide is ages long and it feels better to focus on this specific topic for here.
Did you like this guide?
Consider checking out my other guides, links of which can be found on the master post here.
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