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Short Form Captioning, YWKIS?

Posted by Emma on August 25, 2010 at 9:19 am. Captioners, Captioning, Subtitling

by Kati Stevens

Preface: The software we use to caption allows us to write in short forms. After typing in those short forms the software “auto corrects” and fills in the real phrase. This is an amazing time saver and one of the reasons we are so efficient and quick with our captioning! Just check out Kati’s list of most popular short forms.

The English language is rich and heavy with over 170,000 words in current use (according to the Oxford English dictionary), not counting the words made up by certain residents of the Jersey shore. Despite the great breadth of possible word combinations possible, people on TV, especially reality shows, tend to use the same expressions a lot. This is not so surprising when you think about it, and as caption editors, we like to save time by short-forming (creating an abbreviation that, when typed, compels the whole phrase to appear in the file) some of the most popular phrases.

A selection of short forms I currently possess:

YKWIM – You know what I mean?
YWKIS – You know what I’m saying?
YK – You know
WELB – Welcome back (great for game shows)
ATP – at this point
IDK – I don’t know.
TYG – There you go.
TYVM – Thank you very much.
WDW – What do you want to do?

We also have show-specific ones that include catchphrases, audio descriptors (ex: capple for [cheers and applause] is my most frequently used audio descriptor short form), titles, and names. Also helping to make captioning faster and more accurate are short-forming typos and common misspellings. I’ve typed “your’e” more times than I can count when I’m going at lightning speed, and my short form automatically corrects it. Even those chevrons you see in roll-up captioning have been short-formed since hitting two periods in a row is easier and faster than hitting those chevrons while holding down a shift key.

The one drawback of short forms is that, when I’m typing in other situations, like Gchat or in Final Draft, I often type “yk” and am frustrated when “you know” doesn’t show up. If only the short form were more widely available in all life’s practices. YKWIM?

HDMI and the Missing Closed Captions

Posted by Emma on August 11, 2010 at 8:21 am. Captioning, High Definition, Techy

Has this happened to you: you scrounge and save and finally get an awesome TV (flat-screen, LCD, the works). Now that you have the sweet TV you want to hook-up your receiver (Comcast DVR, TiVO, DirecTV DVR, etc) with the HDMI cable for maximum viewing quality. Finally it’s all hooked up and the picture looks stellar but the closed captions have disappeared. Where did they go? You didn’t really change anything so why can’t you turn them on with the TV?

The problem isn’t with your TV or DVR. The problem is that the HDMI and componenet cables cannot carry closed caption information. The TV won’t be able to read closed captions because none will be transfered from your DVR to you TV. Yikes. Therefore, if you connect any device (Comcast’s DVR, Tivo, etc) by HDMI/component, you must use that device’s menu to decode the closed captions. Your TV’s closed caption button will never show captions when connected this way.

Why?? The TV’s closed caption button only works for the analog input, when the caption data is embedded in the signal. In this new fangled digital world, the receiver (aka DVR or set-top-box) must generate captions for the screen. Including closed caption info. on an HDMI cable has not been defined or agreed upon by the TV makers. Closed caption data is only well defined on the standard TV format. The closed caption information does not get transmitted by the HDMI cable.

The solution is to use that device’s menu to turn on the captions. Every DVR is different but we can give you a few tips and tricks here. Please comment and add more information if you’ve done this testing, too. The trick is to fool the TV into thinking that you’re setting CC for the coax input, then leaving it set to ON after that. It may be that what’s really going on with these TVs may not be that CC isn’t available in non-coax inputs, but that you can’t ADJUST CC in those inputs.

First, start by enabling the closed caption data in the general menu of the DVR. See our handy guide for more information on finding the closed caption menu on your DVR.

If this doesn’t work, then try to find your DVR’s “hidden” menu. (It’s not that spooky but it is tricky to find.) Most of the time, you’ll need to turn off your DVR and then press the Menu or Power button on the front panel. Here are a couple how-tos for Comcast, Motorola and Verizon. Send us more so that we can all help each other. Note: The digital captions will always be enabled! You need to repeat these same processes to disable the captions!

Comcast Hidden Menu:
1. Turn on your TV
2. Turn off the DVR
3. Press the Menu button
4. You will see the USER SETTING screen on your TV
5. Move down to the CLOSED CAPTIONS entry using the arrow buttons
6. Press the right-arrow to switch between ENABLED and DISABLED
7. Press the Menu button
8. Turn on the DVR
To turn CC off you have to use the same method!

Motorola DCH3416
1. Turn off the TV.
2. Press the Power button on the front panel of the DCH3416 unit to bring the unit into Stand-By mode.
3. Unplug the power cable from behind the unit to truly power-off the unit.
4. Turn the TV back again (should just be blank screen)
5. Connect the power cable to the DCH3416 unit and quickly press the Menu button on the front panel of the unit.
6. If all goes well, there will appear a rough looking screen on your TV titled “User Setting Status”. NOTE: If this does not work immediately, try steps (3) to (5) a few more times.
7. Notice that item “Closed Caption” is Disabled.
8. Use the Remote of DCH3416 unit to scroll down (using up/down buttons) to the “Closed Caption” line. Press the right arrow on the Remote to toggle this item to be “Enabled”.
9. Then press the “Menu” button on the front panel of the DCH3416 unit to get out of the “User Setting Status” screen. This saves your settings.
10. Press the “Power” button on the front panel of the DCH3416 unit to bring the unit out of Stan-By mode into full operation. The close caption should now work.
To turn CC off you have to use the same method!

Verizon FIOS HD DVR STB Model #6416 (and #6214)
1. Press power off
2. Press Select button
3. Press menu button to get this display. (not easy to get—there may be a specific amount of time required to hold down the button)

Verizon FIOS HD DVR STB Model #6214
1. Press power button off
2. Press menu button to get this display.

Good luck! If you find any more information, send it our way and we’ll continue to update this post.


What’s Wrong with My DVD Captions?

Posted by Emma on August 4, 2010 at 8:53 am. Captioning, Techy

Another techy blog for those of you adding .scc closed captioning files to your DVDs.

First, the Scenarist Closed Captioning format (.scc) is used by several DVD authoring programs to encode line21 closed caption data into your DVD video. Virtually any problem with a .scc file is either a timing problem or a monitoring problem.

How do you know it’s a monitoring problem?
- Q: Are you are trying to preview the captions before you burn the actual disc?
- A: You won’t see them. The “simulator” in most DVD authoring systems does not decode the closed caption data.  You must burn a physical DVD to test your captions.

- Q: Are you playing a disc and still don’t see captions?
- A: Make sure your television set has closed captions turned ON in the setup menu.  If you still don’t see captions, your DVD player might be stripping the CC data or not properly decoding the CC data.

- Q: Are you trying to play roll-up captions in the Apple DVD Player?
- A: You won’t see them. Apple DVD Player does not support roll-up captions.  Roll-up captions are best viewed using a DVD player and television.

How do you fix a monitoring problem?
- Make sure your television set has closed captions turned ON in the setup menu.
- Try playing the disc in a different DVD player that you are certain can play closed captions.
- Try routing the signal differently, using different cables, player modes and monitors.

How do you know it’s a timing problem?
- The captions will be out of sync with the sound, and it may get worse towards the end of the program.
- If the timing is drastically off, you will  likely receive an error message when importing the .scc file in your authoring system.

It’s usually a difference in timing between the MPEG-2 video asset and the proxy video you gave your captioning company.

- Check: Did you make any edits to your MPEG-2 video asset after you sent the proxy file? Are the start times the same? Are the frame rates the same? If the timecode of the proxy video and your final video do not match, you will have timing problems.

How do you fix a timing problem?
- Send the captioning company a new proxy video with burned-in timecode that matches your final MPEG-2 video asset.  Be careful to note Drop-Frame versus Non-Drop Frame timecode.
- Email your project manager the first timecode, last timecode, and frame rate of your final MPEG-2 video asset; they may be able to do an offset and send you a new file.

We hope that these help you fix any problems you have with a .scc file. As always, contact us if you have any more questions or need some help!

Captions or Subtitles…How do you choose?

Posted by Emma on July 28, 2010 at 8:55 am. Captioning, Subtitling, Techy

Thinking of adding accessibility to your YouTube video, broadcast program, DVD, etc? There are two main choices: captions or subtitles. But how do you know which one to use?  Keep this list handy so you can get what you need.

Is this program for television, the web, or DVD?
Broadcast television, choose captions.
- Captions are sent with the broadcast program master tape.

Web, it depends.
- Subtitles are the most reliable in software players because they are time-cued graphic overlays.
- Captions that are formatted for the web work well in YouTube and other common players. However, they can have reliability issues.

DVD, it depends.
- Captions are best for “autoplay” DVDs (DVDs without menus). However, some DVD players do not support them.
- Subtitles are much more reliable and stable but they require a button or menu system. So, if your DVD already has a chapter menu why not add a subtitle button?

Do you want control using the TV menu or the DVD menu?
Using the TV Menu, choose captions.
- Captions are turned on and off using the setup menu in the TV.

Using the DVD player, choose subtitles.
- Subtitles are turned on and off via a menu on the DVD.
- This menu is programmed by the DVD author.

Are you creating a NTSC, PAL or Blu-ray DVD?
Captions
- NTSC only.

Subtitles
- Compatible with any type of DVD.

Is the support different for captions versus subtitles?
Captions
- Most computer DVD players do not support them.
- Here’s a list of software players known to support closed captions:
1. Paid version of WinDVD.
2. Paid versions of PowerDVD.
3. InterActual Player.
4. Window Media Player v.10+ (though timing errors are common).
5. Apple DVD Player (does not decode roll-up captions and does not position pop-on captions properly).

Subtitles
- All DVD players and many computer players support subtitles.

Do captions and subtitles look different?
Captions
- The font is determined by the decoder. It will generally be monospace white text on a black background.

Subtitles
- Anything is possible. The usual choice is a sans-serif font, either white or yellow with black edging or a black box.

We think that adding accessible features like captions and audio description is a great way to give your content a wider audience. Overall, we like subtitles because they are more versatile, more compatible and more widely supported. However, they also cost more money. Captions can be less reliable than subtitles but they also cost less. Hopefully these quick questions can help you make the right choice for your program.

Post Production: Making Hollywood Look Good

Posted by Emma on July 21, 2010 at 9:24 am. Captioners, Captioning, Movies

by Elizabeth Rojas

Anyone who has ever been to Hollywood can tell you that it is not everything the movies led you to believe.  It’s dirty, the traffic is terrible, and parking is impossible.  And if you’re trying to get in or out when there’s a show at the Hollywood Bowl, you better budget at least two additional hours into your commuting time.  In other words, it’s not particularly glamorous.  So just who exactly is adding all that glitz and gloss to TV and movies?  Why, your friendly local post production facilities.

Post production is a giant umbrella that encompasses all the work that goes into making a production watchable after shooting is over: editing, ADR, music for the soundtrack, special effects, the transfer of film to video, and, of course, closed captioning are all part of that process.  And since deadlines are the name of the game, many pieces of that puzzle are constructed simultaneously.  You’ve probably seen pictures of a TV set, where a living room only has three walls and no roof.  Well, putting the finishing touches on an episode of TV is kind of similar.

The video that a captioner watches will often have green screen instead of CGI, questionable language, temporary dialogue, and extremely dark un-color-corrected video.  If you’ve ever watched an episode of television where the captions only ID the main character as (man), you can begin to see why.  It’s because when the captions were created, the captioner was probably staring at a near-black screen while listening to an unknown production assistant attempting to recreate the lines that the star will later record in ADR (Automatic Dialogue Replacement, which involves actors re-recording all the lines which were unintelligible during the original shoot).  While this process often leads to some pretty hilarious temporary audio (Shot of Macho male star “I need to get my hands…” Shot over his shoulder as a cheery female voice finishes his sentence “On Aimee’s computer!”), what’s more impressive is the way that all these processes are able to come together for the final delivery.

With tight deadlines looming over everyone’s heads, the last minute details that post production covers are finished and passed on from one facility to the next like a baton in a relay.  Urgent emails are sent at 3:00 a.m.  Line substitutions are communicated over the phone.  A final video may not even be available until the morning of the episode’s airdate.  Final captions will be emailed, messengers on motorbikes (to better navigate the insane traffic) will deliver masters from encoding facilities, and shows will air looking as slick and polished as if they were produced with all the time in the world.  And that final illusion is what makes “Hollywood” so impressive.  Week in and week out, every level of production from the initial story breaking to the captioning, will work crazy hours to deliver a show.  And if you occasionally see a stray microphone or an slightly puzzling ID in the finished project, know that what you’re actually getting a glimpse of is the real Hollywood magic: all the missing microphones and correct IDs.  Which is pretty awesome, when you think about it.

CaptionMax is YouTube Ready!

Posted by Emma on July 2, 2010 at 8:37 am. Captioning, Subtitling, Techy

We are now qualified as “YouTube Ready.” This week, DCMP approved CaptionMax as a YouTube Ready Captioning Service Provider.

We are your one-stop shop for captions and transcripts for YouTube. We can also translate your video into any language you may need. To learn more, check out our “YouTube Ready” homepage. You’ll find video tutorials showing you just how easy it is to add captions.

While you’re here, take a quick tour of our company to see the great people working on your videos. We are so proud of our talented staff!

Captioning…It’s a Dangerous Job

Posted by Emma on June 23, 2010 at 8:21 am. Captioners, Captioning

by Jessica Matelski

Okay, you’ve looked into captioning and decided you’d like to give it a whirl. Before you do, you should know that it’s not all glitz and glamor and stylish head gear. There are dangerous side-effects to this job, which may include the following.

CaptionBrain: (for external symptoms, see CaptionHead) CaptionBrain is a phenomenon wherein the afflicted person captions reality as it happens before him or her. You may be having a conversation with someone suffering from CaptionBrain if you notice a far-off look in their eyes as you talk; they may wince when you stammer or go back and correct yourself. They may even request exact spellings of any proper names you might mention. CaptionBrain can also manifest when listening to the radio.

CaptionHead: Not to be confused with CaptionBrain, CaptionHead refers to the array of outward symptoms, usually bruising, caused by sudden, violent reactions to stupid mistakes made while captioning. Hypothetically, let’s say a captioner—we’ll call her Fessica—doesn’t pay close enough attention during the spell check of a file for a corporate client. Let’s say that she’d absolutely mutilated the word “project” when she transcribed it so that letters were jumbled, extra ones added, and the spell check, having no idea what she could possibly mean by “prstjecion,” suggested she change it to “prostitution.” Fessica mindlessly hits the “accept change” button. When the very forgiving corporate client inquires of Fessica’s project manager whether they might be able to get a file WITHOUT random references to international prostitution, Fessica’s hand might very well fly with great force to her forehead. Thus, the bruising. Patients suffering from CaptionHead should just be left alone. They’ve already literally beaten themselves up, so just quit it with the jokes, okay? On the upside, mistakes big enough to warrant a CaptionHead incident are usually a one-time thing.

The CaptionClaw: After five years of captioning, “the claw” is what I call my right hand. A quick survey of captioners finds a wide array of wrist- and hand-related maladies that we treat with various splints, guards, and ergonomic contraptions. Above is an artist’s rendering of a typical captioning station. Note the state-of-the-art video display and the heavy-duty armored wrist guard with ergonomic spikes for added support. Captioners are also provided with desktop cats to calm the nerves during particularly stressful projects.

Caption Control in the Digital World

Posted by Emma on June 9, 2010 at 8:04 am. Captioning, Techy

by our very own Tom Hinckley

About once a month, usually about mid-evening, I get the same call. It usually starts with something like, “How do I turn the [argggg] captions off??!!”

I mention the website FAQ—Yes, they’ve already tried that. That’s why they’re calling. And by this point they’re usually somewhere between mildly agitated and very irritated.

And here’s the thing—They’re right.

In the brave new digital cable/satellite universe, here is what I have to do to turn captions on and off at home:

First, I have to turn off the signal decoder box–That’s right, turn it off, completely.

Except it’s not really off. It’s sort of, I don’t know, sleeping or something. The next step is to hit the settings button on the remote, which gives me an onscreen menu. From there I have to find the closed captioning sub-menu, which has an on/off toggle along with many, many other settings relating to caption size, shape, color, background.

But I don’t care. I just want to turn them on or off and get on with my life.

I have to toggle the setting to on, restart the box, then, often, retune it to the channel I was watching before I decided I wanted to check out the CC. Of course, to turn it off, I have to do all of this in reverse.

I’ve tried walking callers through this process over the phone, but we usually hit a wall at some point. That’s because not all boxes are the same and not all signal providers handle captioning in the same way. Whether it’s an easy fix or not, I usually refer them back to their provider on the theory that if the providers get enough of these calls, they’ll fix the process to make accessing (as well as de-accessing) CC data easier, and the TV world will be a much better place for everybody.

Fun Film Friday!

Posted by Emma on May 28, 2010 at 8:56 am. Audio Description, Captioning, Fun Word Friday, High Definition, Subtitling, YouTube

CaptionMax has just made another YouTube video! We wanted to show you more about our services and specifically what is available for YouTube Captioning.

When you’re watching our new video you can choose to view English timed captions, Spanish timed captions or an English transcript that uses YouTube’s auto-timing. We think it’s really cool to see how all the different files work in YouTube’s player (or maybe we’re just really nerdy).

You can even watch our video in HD…up to 1080p. The graphics look awesome (okay, again we’re just being too nerdy).

Tell us what you think? Did you notice a difference? How cool is the Spanish?

Gerald Freda: 10 years with CaptionMax

Posted by Max Duckler on May 6, 2010 at 7:32 pm. Captioning, Techy

Congratulations and an enormous Thank You goes out to Mr. Gerald Freda, COO, CaptionMax.  Gerald celebrates 10 years with CaptionMax this week, and oh, what a decade it has been!

Immediately upon starting to work for us, Gerald was tasked with opening our Burbank office—staffed it, found it, designed it, ran it—still does.

That task out of the way, sometime within the next week he took over our realtime captioning department, brought some order to it- staffed it, built it, ran it—still does.

OK. We’re on a roll, I thought…no matter what I give this guy to do, he gets it done in like, what? An hour?

So, I said, “Hey, why don’t you just run the Minneapolis office while you are at it?”  Did it, done, BAM.  Then, maybe a year or so later, “Hey Gerald, we’re starting this audio description thing, how about you run that too?” Boom!  It’s done.

Then, “Hey Freda, I think I want to buy a building in Burbank for CaptionMax to be housed in.  Would you find a space, design it, build the tech center in Virginia and ship it out in parts on semis to Burbank, put it together, manage the construction, and do it while keeping all the other departments you are running… well, running.  Badda bing badda boom. “Consider it done, Max!”

“Well,” I said, 2 years later.. “That went so well, we may as well buy a building in Minneapolis.  Hey, when you have a minute,” I said, “would you design the building, the new equipment facility, oversee the construction, and take care of the move?”  Ding dong, Gerald’s calling:  “All done Mr Duckler, what color would you like your office wall to be?”

After 10 years of this miracle work—watching our company grow to bring in over TEN times the revenue it did when he started, I just threw out the ultimate: ”Hey Gerald, let’s be honest, you basically run the company.  Can we make it official?  Can you just be the guy?  Can you find a few minutes between everything else you do and run the strategy meetings and the entire company?”  “Sure, Max, but could I have a few months to transition?”

“Well all right, since you asked, I guess so.”

It may seem like I’m exaggerating—on the contrary, it’s all true, and if anything, I’ve oversimplified how complex all the things Gerald has done for CaptionMax have been.  It’s true that we’ve witnessed his hair go from redtop to grey top—but that’s true of everyone..

All the time, with all the crises that have happened along the way, Gerald was, and is, my constant voice of reason.  He keeps me calm, and I can sleep a lot better now that there is someone who knows what he is doing running the company.

My feelings toward Gerald are too large to put into a blog.  The man is a lifesaver and huge asset to our entire industry.  Gerald’s roots in captioning and passion for the service date back to the inventions of the technology—some of which he holds the original patents to.

Deaf and hard of hearing citizens, the families of hundreds of employees, networks, studios, corporations, schools and even the FCC all join me in a big huge salute to the G-Man, G, Freda, Jerry, Jack, Teddy Bear, and all the other names he answers to.

Personally, I feel extremely lucky to have Gerald as my business partner and more importantly, my friend.  Thanks G!  I love you, dude.

-Max-

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