#blind beta

Today in our resources Wednesday we want to keep on the discussion about Images Descriptions, and why they are so important - and more importantly, how you can make your own, to help make our internet experiences better!

We want you to check this resource from the American Foundation of the Blind in particular, from which we can highlight some ideas like:

- Provide text alternatives for non-text elements for screenreaders. This also helps sighted users in case the image doesn’t load.

- When doing image descriptions, keep it brief, show the most important information first, consider the elements that are important in a given context, particularly in contrast with other similar images.

- Try to avoid using images as links.

We also want you to check this resource from the American Antropological Association. It offers examples that we think might be particularly relevant if you don’t know were to start from.

Finally, we want to give a general shout out to @blindbeta who answers questions/offers beta services for blind characters. They also have a great amount of information already in their blog, so please make sure of reading their pinned post and resources before sending an ask!. They also did this great post about how to make your content accessible for the blind. We invite you to read it in detail but some ideas that might be important to complement the previous articles are:

- Add an ‘End of Description’ at the end of your text for clarification. More about this is going to be discussed in tomorrow’s post.

- Describe what’s important in an image. This might include emojis, colours (you can use the guide from writing with color to describe skin tones, for example), expression, context and other information relevant, including elements that make an image funny.

- Add a ‘NSFW’ at the start of an explicit image - and then describe it!

- For hashtags (yes, your tumblr hashtags too) and screen names, capitalize the first letter of every word, particularly when they are merged together (write WolfstarInColor and not wolfstarincolor). This applies also to ‘chat fics’. If it’s on the ‘style’ of a character to not capitalize, you can use hyphens (wolfstar-in-color).

- Include alt-text for images in stories and comics. Alt text are like image descriptions, but the screen reader directly goes to the description when encountering an image with it. A note from Mod Moth here: this is super easy to do on AO3 - as you upload an image link in the rich text editor, the page for uploading the image includes a place to add an image description.

- You can use audio descriptions for your content, like podfics, or descriptions of videos. Be sure, in the case of videos, it doesn’t overlap with the videos’ audio to create more confusion. In podfics, add the descriptions of images. It’s ideal that the authors make the audio description of images/videos since they know what’s more important in it.

Aside from this amazing resource, that includes some very important considerations for making different content accessible, we invite you to check the blog and asks, and think of more ways of making your content accessible, but also how you could write our favorite boys being blind or having low vision!

Some posts we think might be of interest in the fandom:

On the trope of the blind prophet/seer

Service animals, guide animals and creating one in a fantasy world

Magic, temporary blindness, and describing a blind person’s eyes as “unfocused”

Wow... I took a long ass time to answer you ey? I'm so sorry. It's more than likely that this answer has no use to you anymore anyway lol but I'll answer it regardless since I'm trying to clean my inbox. I'll also assume that the beta in the middle of the question is a "if the body guard was a Beta instead" type of question. So here it goes:

Alpha:

- He/She would certainly become more irritable and sensitive emotionally and physically. They'd take offense to the Omega suggesting or implying that they cannot protect them as well as before.

- They'd try twice as hard to be the best bodyguard they could be for the Omega, maybe even to an unhealthy degree. They'd strive to prove to others - and mostly themselves - that their new acquired disability does not impair them from doing their duty.

- They'd maybe become a little less physical. less scenting and less touching. Not because they don't want to, but because one's scent is not as perceptible - if perceptible at all - to themselves as it is to others, so scenting the Omega would make it more difficult for them to "find" them.

- Maybe if they're not as prideful they'd suggest the Omega wear something that makes it easier for them to identify them. Like bells in their wrists/ankles/neck, so when the Omega moves they can find them better. I think some sort of scent enhancer would do the work just as well.

- I don't think Alphas are likely to begrudge the Omega for their loss of sight. If anything they'd likely seek forgiveness of the Omega for having made themselves less useful while doing their job.

- They'd probably not like open spaces very much as a result. It riles their natural Alpha insticts to be in a space with so many variables and scents coming and going (cause of the wind) when they're already in disadvantage, and it makes them anxious to not be able to "see" as well in uncharted territory. It is their job and they'll try and cope with escorting the Omega in and out of their house/den, but it doesn't make them any less nervous.

- As a result I believe they'd turn to be more reclusive in their spare time. Maybe even take upon behaviours similar to nesting. They'd enjoy staying in familiar small places with familiar scents is what I'm saying.

Beta:

- I think the Beta would be sensitive emotionally at first too. They know that their status already puts them in a "lesser light" when it comes to protecting others, so losing their sight would kinda feel like puncturing an open wound.

- However I think they'd turn to physicality a tad more as a way of coping. In my verse Betas don't have as good of a olfactory sense as Alphas, so Betas woupd ask the Omega they protect to scent them more and be closer so they can print in their memory well enough how they smell and how to not mistake it for anyone else's.

- They'd also ask for something scented to always be in their possession. Like a wristband, so whenever they feel that the scents around them is starting to mix together, they can smell it again like people do with coffe in order to rid their senses of "irrelevant" smells.

- I think that the bell thing would also work well here since Betas' auditory senses would inevitably get "better" as a way to compensate for the lack of sight.

- I do think that they'd also work to improve their service in light of their new disability, but unlike Alphas that'd go with "if you hit the same spot enough times at some point it will break" type of philosophy, Betas would chose to adapt and reconsider their approach to things. They'd definetly take the "work smarter not harder" approach to this.

And that's it I think. I hope this is still useful to you or anyone else dispite the time I took to answer. Again like always, this is all according to my own personal verse (ptpverse), feel free to disagree, agree, make addictions, comments or alterations, and make usage of in any fic/fan art/rp section of yours. You can also check other blind Alpha headcanons of mine right here.