Adaptive Baseball for the Blind and Visually Impaired

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It was an unusually picture perfect summer day in New York City with temperatures in the mid-70’s, blue skies, and none of the humidity that had been plaguing the city in the prior weeks. It was a perfect day for baseball.

Only the game taking place at Field #4 in Central Park’s Great Lawn was quite different than most as the players were all blind or visually impaired.

“We like to come up with recreational activities for the blind and visually impaired so they can go out and socialize, be physically active and integrate with sighted people in different games,” said Ed Plümacher, Co-Founder and Director of AccessQuest, an organization that empowers the way blind and visually impaired people live, learn, work and socialize.

Plümacher, who is legally blind, recently discovered an adaptive form of baseball for the blind and visually impaired that is popular in Italy and organized the clinic in Central Park.

Two coaches, Fabio Giurleo and Lele Crippa, traveled over from Italy to help run the clinic, as did two players from the AIBXC league (Italian Blind Baseball Association) – Matteo Briglia and Flos Venetiae.

They were joined by Hall of Fame Baseball Coach Don Landolphi, who discovered this form of adaptive baseball while coaching in Florence, Italy in 2007. “To me it’s real baseball. They have to have many of the skills that are required for baseball and they have to implement them on the field.”

More than a dozen blind and visually-impaired participants were ready to take the field as they practiced drills, which included running towards bases using sound (whistles and clapping) as a navigation device, self-batting (no pitcher is involved), and catching the ball, which has a jingle-type bell enclosed in it.

Baseball for the Blind

A player is coached to call for first and third bases (which will make a noise such as a whistle) in order to orient himself while at bat.

According to Landolphi, the only non-challenged player is the individual at second base who catches the ball from the defensive team when they throw it. (Rules for this type of adaptive baseball are much different from the game known as ‘Beep Baseball’, which is more popular in the US.)

One of the hopes is to get more countries involved with the sport so that it can be accepted into the Paralympics. Currently there are leagues in Italy, Cuba, Austria, Hungary, Germany and France.

“Hopefully in September we will kick off some more clinics,” said Plümacher. “Our goal is to put a team or two here in New York City so that we can compete and maybe go over and play the Italians.”

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Navigating NYC While Blind

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Navigating NYC can be tricky for just about anyone – but imagine what it’s like for the visually impaired?

Here are some insights – or  ‘Film Facts’ – that we’ve gained since starting this project.

Perpetual Construction in NYC
This photo features our subject, Daniel Aronoff, attempting to cross a street with major construction happening. As he approaches a ditch, a construction worker helps to guide him around it. As Daniel says “NYC is a place of perpetual construction. You never know when you’re going to find scaffolding, a manhole, ditches…”

After the winter we had, there is certainly a lot of work happening to help fix the many potholes around the city, making it tricky to navigate for just about anyone.

And there is also the matter of knowing when to cross a street safely.

In the video below, Daniel is crossing 23rd Street in Manhattan towards Eataly – one of the few audibly cued crosswalks. Did you know – out of 12,460 intersections in NYC, only 99 have audibly cued crosswalks?

Another #FilmFact – at the time we began production (and this video was shot), there were just 77 audibly cued crosswalks. But thanks to Councilman Mark Levine and Mayor DeBlasio’s “Vision Zero” initiative to improve pedestrian safety in NYC, that is changing. With the introduction of Bill 216-B, the number of accessible pedestrian signals installed will triple each year from 25 to 75.

Please spread the word about our project by sharing across social media using the hashtag #nyafterdarkfilm

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Next Steps and How You Can Get Involved

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Now that we’ve had the opportunity to share our first visual samples of what we’re working on, via our New York After Dark trailer, we wanted to talk to you – our community – about what comes next. Since we first launched our initial friends & family Kickstarter campaign (almost a year ago), we’ve been focused on getting our trailer filmed, cut and distributed. But now what?

In our newest production diary, we’re sharing our next steps and give you some insight into what the journey has been like up to this point. And, there’s even something very simple that YOU can do to get involved and make the next phase of production even better. (Though, you’ll have to click play to get all of the latest info!)

Are you an aspiring filmmaker? Is there an element of the production process you would like to know more about? Let us know and we can produce one of our production diaries that speaks directly to you!

Want to get involved and help back the film? Check out our sponsor levels.

Who Knew Our Trailer Would Be So Provocative?

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Last week, we were thrilled to officially share our trailer for New York After Dark.

We knew that — for most of you — it was a first introduction to our subjects and some of our themes; and, we were honored (and a little nervous) to finally put some of our content into the world to be viewed and critiqued.

This week, we’re really excited to report that there’s a bigger conversation our provocative trailer has prompted with some of you, and we want to keep it going. Check out this new video with our filmmaker, Ilana, where she touches on some of the reactions we’ve received so far and what she thinks about it.

Are you an aspiring filmmaker? Is there an element of the production process you would like to know more about? Let us know and we can produce one of our production diaries that speaks directly to you!

Want to get involved and help back the film? Check out our sponsor levels.

Our First Edit Session

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It’s an exciting time as we sit down for our very first edit session. Get a peak behind the scenes and hear about some other items in the works!

Are you an aspiring filmmaker? Is there an element of the production process you would like to know more about? Let us know and we can produce one of our production diaries that speaks directly to you!

Want to help back the film? Check out our sponsor levels.