Listed below are just some of the interesting titles available from retail outlets with both captions and audio description. These synopses are sourced from movie website IMDB.
Captioning is the text version of speech and other sound that can be provided on television, DVDs, online videos, and at cinemas and theatres. Captions look similar to subtitles on foreign language content but provide additional information such as sound effects and music.
Simply speaking, closed captions can be turned on and off while open captions are always on. In cinemas, captions are open when they are displayed on the screen and closed when they are shown on a personal device.
Blu-ray has been an alternative home entertainment video format since 2006 and sold itself on offerings of greater picture quality as well as increased disc space which would allow for more features. This space was promoted by some home entertainment industry representatives as the ‘sure thing’ that would lead to increased levels of closed captioning and audio description.
Peltz Strauss, who is currently Deputy Bureau Chief of the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), has been involved in this field for 30 years. In her presentation, she explained that legislation always struggles to keep up with technology. For example, an amendment to the Telecommunications for the Disabled Act in 1988 ensured that all telephones would be accessible to people with disabilities – with the exception of wireless phones.
