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Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

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Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#21

Post by julianlam »

Twirrim wrote: post #5

We started putting captions on when our first kid was born, so we could still watch TV but have the volume down nice and low and not disturb her sleep. It made a radical difference. We now tend to just have them on all the time. It's really mostly more modern movies and TV that we get value from it on, the audio mix is becoming such a mess with dialogue sinking in to the mix, that it's taking so much more effort to w…

One wonders what the judging criteria are for sound mixing at the Academy Awards, since it certainly seems like "legible speech" isn't one of them.

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#22

Post by als0 »

jschveibinz wrote: post #11

Two reasons from my perspective, other than my ears are getting older: 1. The sound mix has a huge dynamic range now, and lots of action scenes are mixed in with quiet conversation. Set the volume down, and you miss the dialogue. Set the volume up, and you wake up the neighbors. 2. Dialects and accents seem to be more prevalent in content, and CC helps to cut down the cognitive load of “translation” while being enter…

> 1. The sound mix has a huge dynamic range now, and lots of action scenes are mixed in with quiet conversation. Set the volume down, and you miss the dialogue. Set the volume up, and you wake up the neighbors.

I've found this really frustrating. I constantly have to control the volume when watching a movie. Commercials are also obnoxiously loud. It made me wonder whether the TV could automatically "balance" upcoming sounds so that quiet scenes are never quiet and loud ones are not too loud.

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#23

Post by dizhn »

als0 wrote: post #22
jschveibinz wrote: post #11

Two reasons from my perspective, other than my ears are getting older: 1. The sound mix has a huge dynamic range now, and lots of action scenes are mixed in with quiet conversation. Set the volume down, and you miss the dialogue. Set the volume up, and you wake up the neighbors. 2. Dialects and accents seem to be more prevalent in content, and CC helps to cut down the cognitive load of “translation” while being enter…

> 1. The sound mix has a huge dynamic range now, and lots of action scenes are mixed in with quiet conversation. Set the volume down, and you miss the dialogue. Set the volume up, and you wake up the neighbors. I've found this really frustrating. I constantly have to control the volume when watching a movie. Commercials are also obnoxiously loud. It made me wonder whether the TV could automatically "balance" upcoming…

Some TVs and receivers have a night mode that does what you want. It's basically a compressor that cuts off the high peaks.

I've always been told that the ads are not really louder, that's another compression technique at work. There's no dynamic range and everything is at the top of the volume range. ( I think it amounts to the same thing )

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#24

Post by jostylr »

unity1001 wrote: post #13

Also probably because reading something is much faster than listening it. It takes just a second to visually read a sentence that is on the screen, instead of waiting for 2-3 seconds for the actor to actually say it out loud. Probably because we humans recognize words and word groups instead of letters (as how that Oxford study a few years back found out), and that's much faster.

I'd be curious to know how many speed up the videos versus cc it. I know I prefer most videos at faster speeds unless there is a lot of music in it. But cc'ing it with faster speeds is difficult.

As a side note, I think the Rings of Power would be way more enjoyable if I could just 2x it. Kind of hoping someone here will say "You can do that, just ..."

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#25

Post by _8j50 »

Not in that age group but I can't imagine not having cc on. I was hooked when watching anime and foreign movies but even with english movies they only have an upside. You don't have to guess what word they said or how someone's name is spelled. Loud scenes where you can barely hear them is one but also when you have characters that have accents or switch to a different language it helps (you don't get distracted by the sudden need to read cc).

You have to get used to it but it only takes a few tries.

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#26

Post by adwi »

Tangential: I’ve found subtitles to be a very useful tool for learning a language. In order of challenge, I’ll at least watch everything in English with Spanish subtitles, then Spanish SAP with English subtitles, then Spanish SAP with Spanish subtitles, then just in Spanish.

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#28

Post by thatsamonad »

_8j50 wrote: post #25

Not in that age group but I can't imagine not having cc on. I was hooked when watching anime and foreign movies but even with english movies they only have an upside. You don't have to guess what word they said or how someone's name is spelled. Loud scenes where you can barely hear them is one but also when you have characters that have accents or switch to a different language it helps (you don't get distracted by t…

I’m also not in that age group (I’m late 30s) but I’ve been watching TV and movies with closed captioning enabled since I was a kid and have found that it helps my comprehension of what’s going on with plot lines, etc, immensely. Maybe I’m just a stronger reader than listener, but I’m at the point where I vastly prefer to watch movies at home rather than at a theater because I can have CC on by default.

I’ve also always had CC on for my kid and they’re an excellent reader. I don’t have any concrete evidence for it but part of me thinks their strong reading skills are partly due to that.

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#29

Post by bobbylarrybobby »

als0 wrote: post #22
jschveibinz wrote: post #11

Two reasons from my perspective, other than my ears are getting older: 1. The sound mix has a huge dynamic range now, and lots of action scenes are mixed in with quiet conversation. Set the volume down, and you miss the dialogue. Set the volume up, and you wake up the neighbors. 2. Dialects and accents seem to be more prevalent in content, and CC helps to cut down the cognitive load of “translation” while being enter…

> 1. The sound mix has a huge dynamic range now, and lots of action scenes are mixed in with quiet conversation. Set the volume down, and you miss the dialogue. Set the volume up, and you wake up the neighbors. I've found this really frustrating. I constantly have to control the volume when watching a movie. Commercials are also obnoxiously loud. It made me wonder whether the TV could automatically "balance" upcoming…

Apple TV has a "reduce loud sounds" setting that basically does this

Re: Why do all these 20-somethings have closed captions turned on?

#30

Post by chmod775 »

extragood wrote: post #17

> Captions can also facilitate multitasking I have a hard time believing this. Captions demand more attention if anything. I can passively "watch" a video by only listening to the audio, but I can't passively read. I think that the phenomenon described in the article may actually be a symptom of a much deeper social change. Listening and auditory comprehension were critical skills for communication and preservation o…

> I have a hard time believing this. Captions demand more attention if anything. I can passively "watch" a video by only listening to the audio, but I can't passively read.

I do this. I can parse what is happening on screen and read the captions in a fraction of the time the thing actually plays out, then I got a few seconds to do something else. Usually I would be reading HN or something while I tune out the video for a few seconds, before glancing at it again to catch the next bit.

Listening to a video and reading something else at the same time doesn't work for me. When I do that, I usually forget what I was reading or miss something in the video. Interleaving works much better for me.

Also I don't normally do that, just when there's some particularly boring part that I don't want to skip but which doesn't demand my undivided attention.

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