BBC Subtitle Guidelines
bbc.co.uk
BBC Subtitle Guidelines
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Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#2Kind of related (to broadcast TV, not online media) - broadcasters are required to subtitle British TV in most cases. Tom Scott has a video about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m__OZ3ZsO4Y
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#3One of those big difference between UK subtitling and US captioning is the use of colo(u)r or the absence of it (https://www.bbc.co.uk/accessibility/forproducts/guides/subti...), which I believe boils down to technological differences between television systems in the '80s. While the UK-developed teletext system is also available in NTSC (in fact CBC have deployed it), the US opted out to develope a separate captioning system that only supports basic text and positoning.
I'M NOT SURE IF THIS IS BECAUSE
OF GOOD OLD PROTECTIONISM OR
CONVERTING STATIONS TO HAVE A
TELETEXT COMPUTER ON EVERY
STATION IS IMPRACTICAL IN THE US
WHERE, AT THE TIME AT LEAST,
THERE ARE A DIVERSE NUMBER OF
BROADCASTERS WHICH MIGHT NOT
AFFORD THE EQUIPMENT NEEDED
SINCE TELETEXT IS AN "ACTIVE"
SYSTEM WHEREAS THE PBS-DEVE-
LOPED SYSTEM CAN BE USED ON
EXISTING, CAPTION-UNAWARE
SYSTEMS
* Despite their name suggesting that it only monitors broadcasts, they are actually the broadcaster which has the authority to install teletext equipment. The then-ITV companies are only program suppliers to the IBA, not broadcasters in their own right.
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#4Something I've wondered... when politicians give speeches they often have some hand gesturing from a sign language interpreter standing next to them. But I've never understood why this is better than subtitles. If you're deaf then wouldn't you rather read text than follow sign language?
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#5One of those big difference between UK subtitling and US captioning is the use of colo(u)r or the absence of it ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/accessibility/forproducts/guides/subti... ), which I believe boils down to technological differences between television systems in the '80s. While the UK-developed teletext system is also available in NTSC (in fact CBC have deployed it), the US opted out to develope a separate captio…
That's fascinating, to color-code by character.
For (foreign-language) subtitles that seems distracting and unnecessary, since even if you don't see the character speaking, you can recognize their voice.
But for closed-captioning (for the hard of hearing), it seems like it could add clarity. Yet in the past I've watched movies with CC without sound (like on a long-distance bus) and don't remember ever having a problem understanding who a line belonged to.
Does anybody have actual experience with color-coded captions and whether they're more of a help or more of a distraction?
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#6Something I've wondered... when politicians give speeches they often have some hand gesturing from a sign language interpreter standing next to them. But I've never understood why this is better than subtitles. If you're deaf then wouldn't you rather read text than follow sign language?
I would guess that the sign language interpreter is translating in near real time in live speeches.
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#7One of those big difference between UK subtitling and US captioning is the use of colo(u)r or the absence of it ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/accessibility/forproducts/guides/subti... ), which I believe boils down to technological differences between television systems in the '80s. While the UK-developed teletext system is also available in NTSC (in fact CBC have deployed it), the US opted out to develope a separate captio…
The older “608”[1] system in North America was much simpler but the current “708”[2] standard does support specifying colours and fonts, but in my experience in the industry nobody uses those functions at all and just uses the 708 function to embed the older 608 payload data within the newer 708 data structure.
In UK/Europe the older/simpler format would be OP-42/OP-47 Teletext[3] which can be used for captions instead of the full-screen data pages, or DVB Subtitles[4], which get into more uses around “subtitles” in terms of language translation, rather than only the “closed caption” use case where it matches the content language. DVB subtitles can be sent as pre-rendered bitmaps or as data for client-side rendering.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EIA-608 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CTA-708 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletext [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subtitles
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#8Something I've wondered... when politicians give speeches they often have some hand gesturing from a sign language interpreter standing next to them. But I've never understood why this is better than subtitles. If you're deaf then wouldn't you rather read text than follow sign language?
There's more to speaking than just the words. Sign language can convey inflection and emotion in ways that closed captions cannot.
Watch someone signing: they use their face and body to convey emotions like anger, confusion, hesitation, love, joy, and the rest of the human range.
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#9Something I've wondered... when politicians give speeches they often have some hand gesturing from a sign language interpreter standing next to them. But I've never understood why this is better than subtitles. If you're deaf then wouldn't you rather read text than follow sign language?
Since I live with someone whose first language isn't English I basically watch everything with subtitles. And live subtitling - while it's a thing - isn't that good. Try turning on subtitles for something like a news programme or live broadcast and it'll usually be quite delayed, with lots of misspellings and even outright wrong text. (This is true for premier public broadcasters in the UK such as the BBC, I don't know if this is solved better in other countries).
Anyway my theory is that sign language interpreters may be much better at this because sign language uses the same areas of the brain as speaking[1] so they're able to listen and sign much more intuitively than typing. Think if you were able to listen and speak at the same time without your "speech" drowning out what you are listening to.
[1] https://maxplanckneuroscience.org/language-is-more-than-spea...
Re: BBC Subtitle Guidelines
#10Something I've wondered... when politicians give speeches they often have some hand gesturing from a sign language interpreter standing next to them. But I've never understood why this is better than subtitles. If you're deaf then wouldn't you rather read text than follow sign language?
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