TV Stations/Networks
TV stations and networks that produce their own programming are responsible for contracting closed captioning services if they do not have their own closed captioning team on site. Most TV stations and networks either purchase content or producers buy airtime. When they get new content, they typically require that the program arrives with captions.
Program Producers
Individual program producers make are the majority of people who contract closed-captioning services because the airing stations require programs to be delivered with closed captions, as it is part of their contract. Program producers create the program—they shoot and edit the video. They will typically send the closed captioning company a final master tape and in return will get a closed-captioned master or a file to create a closed-captioned master. Because editing systems have become inexpensive and easy to use, there are many churches and novice videographers who now do the entire process. For the captioning company, this can create problems because amateurs may not fully understand the nuts and bolts of broadcast video, therefore a good captioning company will end up catching many problems. Sometimes they use a post-production house to do the editing and creation of the final tape.
Post-Production House (A.K.A. Post House)
Post houses are facilities that do everything from shooting video to editing, dubbing, DVD authoring, and much more. Typically, but not always, these facilities have people who are better educated in the video business. One post house may contract with a captioning company to do all of the captioning for the various programming they work on.
Government
Most US county, state, and federal government agencies are required by law to caption all videos they produce. This may include city council meetings, transportation agencies, US Army recruiting and training DVDs, et cetera. Most government agencies choose to contract with a closed-captioning company. All meetings require live-style captioning, while most DVD training videos require post-production captioning.
