Free Accessible Downloads from PBS
Award-Winning Presidential Bios Available Till Inauguration Day
Dec 23, 2008
The Media Access Group at Boston-based WGBH is offering free downloads of six presidential biographies from the PBS series American Experience in formats that are more accessible for those with disabilities.
The accessible Presidents’ series includes Closed-caption biographies of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan.
The Roosevelt biography FDR (1994) is also the first online video program to be offered as a download with a Descriptive Video Service (DVS) track that includes narration of key visual elements (e.g. actions, costumes, gestures, or scene changes) inserted into pauses in dialogue. DVS is designed to make programs, films, and other visual media more accessible to blind and visually impaired viewers.
The Presidents’ series website presents over 25 hours of video and builds on the enormous collection of research materials developed for the award-winning broadcasts. The site includes a summary page for each chief executive, an in-depth look at the presidents in the series, links to presidential sites, and a detailed bibliography.
How Closed Captions are Produced
Closed captions display spoken dialogue as printed words on a TV or computer screen and are specifically designed for viewers who are deaf and hard of hearing. Captions are carefully placed to identify speakers, on- and offscreen sound effects, music, and laughter. Captions can also help adults and children learning to read, and those learning English as a second language.
Caption writers transcribe a program's entire script into a computer, then time and place captions and add or adapt information to give viewers a full sense of the events occurring onscreen. Finally, the captions are encoded as data into the program's video, ready for broadcast or duplication. Captioning a one-hour program can take up to 30 hours.
Captions are embedded in the television signal and must be decoded before they can be displayed.
Viewers can switch captions on or off with the press of a button using either a set-top decoder or a caption-ready TV, available at all consumer electronics stores.
How DVS Tracks are Produced
Trained “describers” prepare a written script that is professionally narrated and mixed in a professional audio production suite for broadcast-quality results. A full DVS® mix consists of the main program audio track combined with narrated descriptions. DVS tracks can be prepared for pre-produced TV programs, live performances, teleconferences, videos and DVDs, and the web.
The WGBH Media Access Group has pioneered and delivered accessible media to disabled adults, students, and their families, teachers, and friends for over 30 years.
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