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Accessible Video: Tips, Tricks, and Tools for YouTube (and Beyond)

April 15th, 2010

Google’s YouTube has made sharing videos easy and popular, even for those who are not technologically skilled. Users simply create a YouTube channel, upload a video directly from their camera, and immediately receive a web address (URL) and even an HTML snippet to embed the video on their own websites.

However, for individuals with sensory disabilities, using social media platforms like YouTube to communicate important information can be frustrating. Videos are rarely captioned, very few provide audio descriptions of visual content, and even the video players themselves often lack accessibility features compatible with screen readers and other assistive technologies. Recently, Google has raised mainstream awareness of the need for accessible videos. Their introduction of user-friendly captioning tools—including automatic captioning—has set a new benchmark for video content.

Motivated by YouTube’s innovations, MassMATCH sought to understand these new captioning tools better, both for the benefit of our program and our broader community. We aimed to learn how to use these tools effectively and explore ways to enhance video accessibility further for individuals with disabilities. Below, we share tips, tricks, and tools for creating accessible video content, gathered from web resources and insights from experts in the field. This article provides advice on captioning, audio description, and accessible video players, offering general awareness as well as deeper insights for novice video creators and anyone embedding video content on their websites.

Special thanks to Geoff Freed from the Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM), Marsha Schwanke of the Burton Blatt Institute (BBI) at Syracuse University, and Jayme Johnson from the High Tech Center Training Unit at the California Community Colleges for their valuable insights and resources that contributed to this article.

Captioning

Captions improve access to people who are deaf or hard of hearing, to anyone who is a visual learner, and—thanks to Google’s new Translate Captions feature for YouTube —to people who use languages other than English.

So how do you get started?

Learn some captioning do’s and don’ts

Captions are not just subtitles. In addition to dialogue they must convey any audible information needed to understand a video (i.e. a door slams).

Sample the YouTube auto-captioning feature

Yes, YouTube can now automatically caption (subtitle) your English-language videos using speech recognition technology. However, the resulting captions are often quite poor (and sometimes even humorous) since the speech recognition algorithm is still in the process of “learning.” Nonetheless, it’s worthwhile to use because YouTube allows you to download these auto-generated captions and then correct them manually. This can significantly save time compared to other captioning methods, especially if the auto-generated captions are recognizable and if there isn’t much non-speech content requiring captions.

To request captioning for your video:

  • Sign into your YouTube account.
  • On the Captions and Subtitles pane, click the “Request Processing” button (this button appears only if the video has not yet been processed).
  • You’ll then see Machine Transcription (processing) in the list of caption tracks, indicating that the captioning process has begun. Remember, it might take a few days for the speech recognition captions to be ready for viewing and download.

To download your captions once they’re ready:

  • Sign into your YouTube account.
  • In the Captions and Subtitles pane, locate the track titled “English: Machine Transcription.” Click the Download button next to it.
  • A file named “captions.sbv” will be saved to your desktop. This is a text file containing timecode information, usable with captioning software or viewable with a regular text editor like Notepad.

Instructions for uploading your caption file to your YouTube video

Caption with the YouTube auto-timing feature

If the YouTube auto-captioning results are too rough to edit, YouTube also provides an auto-timing option for captioning. Unlike auto-captioning, auto-timing requires you to create your own transcript of the video (giving you more control, though it does take extra time). However, with auto-timing, you don’t need to manually input timing information for your captions—YouTube’s speech recognition technology handles this automatically.

To use the auto-timing feature:

  • Create a simple text transcript (.txt file) of your video using Notepad or WordPad (on Windows) or TextEdit (on Mac). The video must be your own.
  • Upload this file to your YouTube account.
  • YouTube then synchronizes your transcript with the audio content of your video. (You may also upload specific caption file formats if you already have them.)

For further guidance, INDATA provides a straightforward step-by-step explanation of YouTube’s auto-timing on their blog page. Although INDATA doesn’t mention this explicitly, you can also download and correct any noticeable timing errors.

Consider using captioning software

You might also choose to skip YouTube’s auto-timing and auto-captioning features and instead create a fully-detailed caption file (such as .smil, .sami, .sub, .srt, .dfxp, or .rt). This gives you the highest degree of control over caption timing, as you manually set the timing yourself. Numerous caption file formats are compatible with YouTube and can also be used with standalone video players like Windows Media Player, QuickTime, or iTunes. The main drawback is that creating caption files typically takes significantly more time—a general rule is 5-10 times the duration of the video you are captioning. (For example, captioning a 5-minute video could take anywhere from 25 to 50 minutes.)

Here are some captioning resources:

  • MAGPie is free captioning software created by WGBH’s NCAM (the Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family National Center for Accessible Media). It has recently been updated (March 2010) to make installation smoother (version 2.5). It will caption most video file formats (but not file extensions .wmv, .rm, or .ra). It will also create caption files in many formats for use with many players (.sami, .rt, .txt, dfxp and ttxt). YouTube is compatible with .sub, .srt, .txt, .rt and dfxp).
  • Additional captioning software options include CapScribe, Macaw, Subtitle Workshop, World Caption Tool (for Mac), and QuickTime Pro.
  • Automatic Sync Technologies Service is a company that provides captioning and transcription services.

Descriptive Video

To help make a video comprehensible for people who are blind or have low vision, videos are sometimes also produced with audio description of visual content. This is known as descriptive video. Audio description works with a separate audio track that is synched with the video. The track uses the natural pauses in a video to describe key visual elements. YouTube, however, does not support the inclusion of additional audio tracks.

Here’s what you need to know:

Narrate your videos to be descriptive from the start to avoid the need for separate audio-description files

The best way to make sure people who are blind or who have low vision can comprehend your video’s content is to remember these audiences before you shoot your video clip. In the body of your narration, cue the listener in to what is happening on the screen, but only as much as is necessary. Too much information is confusing. See this Job Accommodation Network outreach video on AT for Employment for its simple method of orienting the listener. If you use this technique, you can still use YouTube effectively for video sharing. If not…

Review standard techniques in audio description by Joe Clark.

Consider do-it-yourself audio-description file tools:

Consider hiring a professional audio-description service

Truthfully, if your video needs to be audio described (particularly if it is longer than a few minutes), this is best left to professionals because audio description is an art form. Read more about audio description at this AccessIT page and WGBH’s Media Access Group Descriptive Video Service page. Also, sample an audio-described and captioned video from Inclusive Technologies (“The Assistive Technology Boogie”).

Find a player that supports audio description

Once your video is audio described and captioned, there are website-embeddable video players that will support all your files (see VideoLAN-VLC below).

Accessible Video Players

Video players are software that play your video files, and hopefully your caption and audio-description files too. They are the little TVs that pop up on your website when, for example, you embed using that html snippet that YouTube provides. Unfortunately, YouTube’s standard embeddable player is not accessible for screen readers. Google knows it and likely this will change. But for now, here are some options:

Accessible YouTube Player Controls from Ohio State University

The Web Accessibility Center (WAC) at Ohio State University (OSU) provides code (html snippets) and instructions for creating accessibility controls for the YouTube player. It requires some developer knowledge, but it looks like a fairly straightforward way to continue to have YouTube host your videos (if they do not require audio-description files). The Center is currently working to update this page to reflect YouTube’s new auto-captioning feature. However the video player instructions should work with any captioned YouTube. It will not support audio-description files, however.

JW Player 5.1

JW Player 5.1 is Flash-only (.FLV video files), free (open source) and plays both caption and audio-description files (it also advertises that it is the only player that can play both closed captions and closed audio descriptions, which means they can be hidden or revealed). It will also play YouTube. The player provides keyboard controls (using the TAB and SPACE controls), screen-reader-labeled buttons, and a full-screen button. Plus, above the player are visually hidden controls that allow screen-reader users to control play, mute, and stop. Review the captions plug-in for the JW Player and the audio description plug-in for the JW Player. Note: the player requires captions be in in DFXP or TTML format. Several caption software tools can help create or convert your file to DFXP/TTML (including MAGpie). Stanford University offers a free online .srt-to-.DFXP converter.

VideoLAN-VLC is accessible, free (open source), and plays files of most formats (not just Flash), supporting both captions and audio description. Installation requires some developer know-how, and hosting your videos on your own server (not on YouTube).

ccPlayer

The National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM) created ccPlayer, a free Flash player that utilizes DFXP/TTML files to display captions. It will play DFXP/TTML caption files created by MAGpie or by other software. The ccPlayer Web site provides embedding instructions which presume some developer know-how, but you do not need to be a Flash author to use ccPlayer. The player is accessible by both keyboard and screen-reader users, and plays only Flash video files (.FLV). It does not support audio-description files. NCAM hopes to enhance the player to allow it to reference videos directly from a user’s YouTube channel, caption files included (and that would be a neat trick!). For now, using ccPlayer requires hosting your videos on your own server (rather than on YouTube).

Specifically for Flash developers who want total control over the appearance of the video player and captions, NCAM also created CCforFlash, a free captioning component that can be added to a Flash project. The CCforFlash component is completely customizable, and allows authors to control the width and height of the caption region, the caption and background colors, the opacity of the background, and the font family and size of the captions themselves. Many other features are described at the CCforFlash Web site.

Standalone Players

You can also provide a link to your video (hosted on your own server) and bypass embedding a video player altogether. The link will open a standalone player installed on the user’s computer (assuming they have the player for the file type you link to). The advantage of most standalone players (i.e. Windows Media Player, QuickTime Player, RealPlayer, iTunes) is that they tend to be more accessible. They work with keyboard and screen readers and support captions and often audio-description files (Windows Media Player does not support audio description). Read about accessing captions and audio description on different standalone media players at this AccessIT page.

Additional Resources

  • Marsha Schwanke of the Burton Blatt Institute (BBI) at Syracuse University will be conducting a free webinar on September 8, 2010 at 2 pm EST on “Creating Accessible Videos for Your Website.” The webinar is part of a series and coordinated by the DBTAC: Great Lakes ADA Center and the DBTAC: Pacific ADA Center on behalf of the National Network of ADA Centers. Register at this Accessible Technology Webinar page.
  • The Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM) at the WGBH Educational Foundation is a resource for caption and audio-description tools and guidelines as well as information about research-and-development projects aimed at making media more accessible at home, in the classroom, in public spaces and on handheld devices. For more information, contact Donna Danielewski at donna_danielewski@wgbh.org.
  • Creating Accessible iTunes U Content (opens in iTunes). iTunes U is Apple’s distribution system for getting educational material (lectures, film, audiobooks, tours) to students through iTunes. Here NCAM provides guidelines for how to add captions and audio descriptions to media posted to iTunes U, playable on Apple devices such as the iPod, iPhone, iPad, iTunes and the QuickTime Player. Video and audio examples are included, as is information on creating accessible PDF documentation. If you do not have access to iTunes, you can view and download the guidelines directly from NCAM’s Web site.