Hi Carla,

Sorry, but offhand I don't know of any services that make tactile images.
On the other question though, I would say, "it depends" -- meaning how good
is the quality of the raised line images made using swell paper.  It
depends on many factors like what quality of paper you use, how experienced
the person who is making the images is, and how complex/detailed and "busy"
the diagrams themselves are.  In many situations, the swell paper images
are quite adequate, but for more technical, mathematical, and highly
detailed images they may fall short.  I have seem some very crude images of
simple diagrams and statistical plots that were fine for my needs, but have
also seen some others that were too detailed, or too busy to be effective.

Right now, for my money (or as the case may be, my university's money), the
most versatile and best solution for a wide variety of applications is the
Tiger printer made by ViewPlus Technologies.

http://www.viewplustech.com

It is fast, produces extremely high-quality and high-resolution tactile
images and can also print standard braille on the diagrams (or without the
diagrams).  Source material can be in many of the popular drawing/word
processing programs, so most of the material yu already have can probably
be used without too much fussing.

I have one and love it, but I still don't have the necessary resources to
actually produce the source diagrams for me, and without that it is much
less useful than it could be.

Hope this helps,

Jim

------------------------------
James A. Rebman

Cognitive Levers Project
Center for Life-Long Learning and Design
Department of Computer Science
University of Colorado, Boulder

"In times of change, the learners will inherit the earth while the learned
will find themselves beautifully equipped for a world that no longer exists."

- Eric Hoffer