Go Beyond TV:

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Go Beyond TV

• Captioning and Video Description as Teaching
  Tools for the DVD and Multimedia Environment
• OSEP Conference 07.16.07 ET Grants H327C060013
  H327C060014

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Purpose of Today

• Introduce You to CaptionMax
• Demonstrate What CaptionMax is Doing with the
  Emerging Technologies Grants
• Outreach Efforts
• Research Opportunities

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CaptionMax

• Founded 1993, privately held
• Video description - 2003
• Media accessibility is all we do
• Goal Level the educational playing field

4
Media Accessibility Today
Closed Captions

• What they are
• FCC Rules
• Limitations

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Closed Captions FCC Rules

• 2006 all new programming
• 2008 75 of anything produced before 1998
• Spanish 2010 and 2012 respectively
• Broadcast Only

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Closed Captions - Limitations

• Viewer has little control over settings
• Captioning signals can interfere with each other
• Not all TVs are capable of reading all captioning
  signals

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Media Accessibility Today
Video Description

• When it is used, features
• FCC Rules
• No requirements
• Limitations
• Timing
• Menu option hard to find
• Shares channel with Spanish translations

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2006 Emerging Technology Grants

• CaptionMax won 2 of 3 available awards
• Funding the development of accessibility for
  emerging technologies
• 5 year project, in year 1 now
• 5 year goal Standard part of educational
  landscape

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Our Project

• Go beyond standard captioning and description
  practices
• Collaboration with media suppliers
• DCMP as distribution partner
• Rely on CAB for feedback
• NOT a research grant

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Going Beyond the Standard

• New technologies create new opportunities
• Multiple tracks
• Interactivity
• User options
• Scheduling
• Flexible interface

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Phase One DVD

• Inexpensive and widely
• available format
• Familiar technology
• Schools have capacity to use
• DCMP can deliver files via web

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DVD Menu Accessibility

• Auto-play spoken menu
• Voiced navigation instructions
• Large type and high-contrast coloring
• CaptionMax as DVD author
• Accessibility is the first option

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Spoken Menus

• Action verbs describe visual cues
• Go back to the chapter menu
• Simple, direct menu structure

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• Any questions
• at this point?

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DVD Subtitles

• Traditionally limited to dialog
• Subtitles for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (SDH)

• Activated via on-screen menu
• Any font, color, background
• Up to 32 subtitle streams

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Caption/Subtitle Choices

• Verbatim or edited
• for slower
• reading

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Caption/Subtitle Choices

• Choose
• larger or
• smaller
• text

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Caption/Subtitle Choices

• Less
• obtrusive
• subtitles

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Caption/Subtitle Choices

• High-
• contrast
• subtitles

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Caption/Subtitle Advanced Features

• Clickable words/phrases
• Identified by highlight and sound
• Definitions and annotations
• Enables greater interactivity and learning
  opportunities

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DVD Video Description

• No SAP channel required
• Eight audio tracks available
• Spanish
• Video description
• Other languages

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Expanded Description

• Menu Expanded description track
• Pause video
• Detailed description
• Adds few minutes to program
• Optimized for classrooms with a variety of
  abilities
• Very positive feedback
• Potential data source
• for research

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Subtitled Description

• Dialog and descriptive narration
• Italicized description subtitles at top of the
  screen
• For students with both vision and hearing loss
• For classrooms with students of varying abilities
  
• For those learning about accessibility
• Positive feedback
• Research resource

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View CaptionMaxs Enhanced DVDDemonstration
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Other DVD Elements

• Extras Subtitled and Described
• Slideshows
• Lesson planning videos
• DVD-ROM Supplements
• Tagged, described PDFs optimized for screen
  reader software

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Future Features/Enhancements

• More text size options
• User feedback on menu options
• Repurposing for reuse on other display systems
• web streaming
• hard drives
• portable devices (iPod)

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Outreach Efforts

• Teacher outreach
• For Teachers subsite

www.captionmax.com/teacher
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New Marks for Public Domain
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Thank You