V.I.Pod

In this episode Sadiya Wani  guides us on a tour of Sheffield's own Pete McKee autobiographical  art exhibition called "A boy with a leg named Brian". The exhibition is at Western park museum 

Journalism students, Emily and Joe, are back in the studio and today, they’re talking about guide dogs! Joe asks Emily some of his burning questions about the do’s and don’ts of interacting with guide dogs. Emily, as a first-time guide dog owner to her golden retriever, Garth (who features in the background), shares her personal experiences of life with a guide dog. 

In this episode, Claire Bland and Carol Adams chat about air fryers and Carol gives a demo of her talking air fryer from Cobolt Systems. Carol also shares some tips of how to cook various foods in the air fryer. 

Today’s episode is a chatty one! Journalism students Emily Lamb and Joseph Murphy compare their experiences of starting university. Emily shares her insight as a visually impaired student, while Joe explains how he found university as someone who is fully sighted. Find out how their journeys compare and hear how you can make the most of uni life, whether your visually impaired or sighted. 

George Williams is a visually impaired student at the University of Sheffield who has had a lifelong passion for playing sport, particularly football.  In this episode George talks to fellow student, Jake Heasman – who is also visually impaired – about playing football with impaired vision, and how an encounter with a visually impaired England Futsal player got him into the England partially sighted Futsal squad.  

Today's episode of V.I.Pod has a distinctly horticultural flavour where Alan Thorpe talks to the appropriately named and accomplished gardener, Frank Gardener. Frank is visually impaired, but that doesn't interfere with his skills in nurturing plants. Frank describes a life in gardening as well as giving valuable hints and tips from his garden and potting shed. Lucy Wilcox then follows with a list of events happening in and around Sheffield throughout April.

In this edition V.I.Pod we look to the world of braille, particularly to the work of Sheffield Talking News’ Alan Thorpe who not only teaches braille but is the only certified repairer in the UK of the Perkins braille typewriter, the world’s most widely used braille machine.  Here, we run an interview that our colleagues at Doncaster Talking Newspaper did with Alan just a few weeks ago where we learn of the continuing importance of braille, even in the digital age.

In this edition of V.I.Pod we join our visually impaired reporter, Alan Thorpe, at the Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind’s sensory garden in Graves Park.  After a tour of the garden with Alan and Sheffield Talking News’s Kerry Moon, we hear from two of the movers and shakers behind the project.  The podcast ends with a round up of many of the things happening in Sheffield in March, including warnings of travel disruption due to the Sheffield half marathon on 23rd.

We have an international round-up of Chinese New Year. Tianu Li, a Chinese student in Sheffield and editor with Sheffield Talking News, brings a report of celebrations in China In Sheffield, Sandra Thorpe capture the ceremony that kicked-off Sheffield's celebration of Chinese New Year.  Next day Kerry Richards and Alan Thorpe watched the amazing acrobatic feats of the Chinese dancers as they animated their lions to leap and dance from platform to platform in Fargate.  

In this episode of V.I.Pod, a media student from Sheffield College, Heidi Clark, visited the Granelli shop on Broad Street to dive into its history and give us an intriguing report.  Tempted by her report of chocolate covered brazil nuts and their special Yorkshire mix, our visually impaired contributor, Alan Thorpe, set off from the tram stop on Fitzalan Square with his assistance dog Velvet to walk to the shop.  Alan provides a recording of his walk.

In this the first episode, V.I.Pod talks to a group of actors at Sheffield's Crucible Theatre whose aim, through a creative approach to audio description (AD), is to make live theatre as vibrant and exciting for visually impaired audiences as it is for their sighted counterparts. The show we'll be looking at is their take on Crucible's Christmas musical, Little Shop of Horrors.  We then talk to a visually impaired person who experienced the AD  - was she shocked or not?'

Trailer for the launch of V.I.Pod on 17th January 2025.