On June 5, 2012, the National Association of the Deaf testified before the US Copyright Office. They argued that closed captioning should be exempt from copyright law, meaning that third parties should be allowed to add or fix captions and audio description on all digital video distributed via the Internet. A decision should be determined within the year.Read
Unlimi-Tech Software is the creator of FileCatalyst, the world’s leading file transfer solution. Aberdeen has selected FileCatalyst in order to meet all of our “tapeless” distribution needs. Simply having an FTP site wasn’t enough to handle all of Aberdeen’s various tapeless transactions. FileCatalyst allows Aberdeen and their clients to easily handle 50GB files with speed and reliability. Users can log into the web-based portal and upload, download, or send videos, CC files, transcripts, etc. The HotFolders are used by clients who like the automation of file transfers and notifications are sent upon completion of upload. “FileCatalyst provided exactly the products and tools we needed to build Aberfast, our digital video file delivery service,” says Aberdeen President Matthew Cook.
To learn more about FileCatalyst, visit filecatalyst.com.
Are you familiar with IP-delivered programming? This includes all videos that are distributed via the Internet (where you watch the program on your personal computer, cell phone, Xbox, etc.) The most popular sources are video on demand, iTunes, Hulu, and of course, YouTube. If you are a producer and you think your IP-delivered programming is exempt from closed captioning, think again! The FCC released new rules this year which requires all IP-delivered programming to be closed captioned, according to the following timeline:
- All prerecorded programs must have CC by August 2012.
- All live programs must have CC by February 2013.
- All new prerecorded programs must have CC by August 2013.
- All archived programs must have CC by February 2014.
Don’t wait until the last minute! Call Aberdeen today to learn more about your closed captioning options.
Though we are stuck in one location with one official language in one country, it doesn't mean the videos that we post on the Internet are limited to one's geographical location. It's time to go global since the Internet doesn't have limitations on audience, language, cultures, etc. Producers should aim to go global by adding different languages in the captioning/subtitling when they post their videos on the Web. This way they are getting exposure to billions of people in a very inexpensive way. However, this may be an obstacle when the know-how or technological skills are in the way.Read
How many ways are there to translate a word from one language to another? Sometimes it’s as simple as translating Dora the Explorer’s "¡vámonos!" (let’s go), but in Aberdeen’s Multi-Language Department, often times it’s a bit more complex than that.
I regularly work with Spanish translations from very competent people, and although these translations are already great, my job is to make them better. When reading them, it seems that I’m always faced with the same challenge: How do I make certain words neutral enough so that most Spanish-speaking people will understand them? The Spanish language is spoken in 20 different countries worldwide, making the task of choosing one single word very challenging.
A word that I came up with a couple of weeks ago was the translation for “hangover.” It was originally translated as “enguayabado.” When I first read this I was clueless as to what it meant. I had never heard this term before. It turns out that it’s pretty popular in South America. My supervisor, who lives in Spain, mentioned they use the word “resaca,” which I wasn’t familiar with either. Growing up in Mexico, I always heard people use the word “cruda” when talking about a hangover, so obviously I was leaning towards using that term.
Here at Aberdeen, every challenge is thoroughly analyzed before making a decision, and that’s why, after taking in consideration the audience that was going to be reading the subtitles, we decided to go with “cruda (resaca)”. Luckily we had enough time and space in the subtitles to use both terms!
Translation is definitely an art. Now let’s see how artistic I can be at translating this blog! Spanish version.
In the genre of surreal cartoon humor there seems to be some debate over the creation and upkeep of closed captions. Specifically, in reference to the program “Family Guy,” the controversy revolves around the opening song lyrics, particularly, baby Stewie’s solo line of “laugh and cry.” While it is noted that the program’s creator, Seth MacFarlane, has clearly stated that Stewie’s line has always been “laugh and cry,” early closed captions of the show have appeared as “effin’ cry.” So the question has arisen as to whether Stewie’s alleged potty mouth was the result of a captioning error, or an honest interpretation.
The answer can be complicated.
While it is possible that some joker caption editor intentionally captioned the lyrics incorrectly as a prank, that is unlikely, due to the fact that “Family Guy” is a higher quality pop-on style captioning, and pop-on captions usually receive a QC that would require a second set of eyes to review. With that observation in mind, many people have the opinion that the lyrics were changed to the cleaner version after season one, possibly at the request of FOX Television. If this is the case, then it is reasonable to assume that the captions in question were accurate. But if the lyrics have always been “laugh and cry,” as MacFarlane maintains, then why weren’t the captions eventually corrected?
Well, for all you hyper-perfectionists out there, it may pain you to know that closed captions are rarely corrected for errors once sent to producers. Cost is always a limiting factor in these situations, so even if the words have always been “laugh and cry” the chances that the early programs were sent back for corrections are slim, although it is possible.
Most closed caption companies, Aberdeen Captioning included, will make corrections to overt errors and re-send caption files to clients upon request at no additional cost. However, corrections made for changes in program content are not typically covered in contract argreements. And while the burden on the caption company to make corrections is minimal, for producers, the logistics and time involved in replacing encoded files for a syndicated program that is already airing on multiple TV stations could be too much to bear.
So whether it was a straightforward transcription of lyrics that were eventually changed, or simply a mis-interpretation for whatever reason, keep in mind that all captions are NOT created equal . And while Seth MacFarlane may offer a dismissive in-show critique of the issue as the voice of “Family Guy” character Peter Griffin: “Stewie, go on get outta here…laugh and cry, effin’ cry…what’s the difference?” Our response would be that there is a difference, Aberdeen Captioning.
At Aberdeen we always go the extra mile for our clients, which includes in-process communication and customer clarification to ensure accurate captioning.
If you are a producer and have experienced more crying than laughing with your program’s captions in the past, we invite you to contact us at Aberdeen Captioning and find out what the difference can be.
Written by: Rich E., Sr. Caption Editor
My whole life I’ve had an affinity for the English language (and alliteration). Proper spelling, grammar, and punctuation have always been incredibly important to me – even to the point where I will comment on friends’ Facebook statuses with corrections! So naturally, one of my favorite aspects of closed captioning is being able to use my love and knowledge of the English language, professionally, every single day.
Here at Aberdeen, we strive for the best. That expectation starts at the initial point of contact when you first call our office, and it extends all the way down to the accuracy of the captions and subtitles that we ultimately deliver back to you.
One rule that I take pride in is using the serial comma. This is a rule that Aberdeen has decided to put into common practice for all of our captions, and it made the grammar nerd in me very happy.
A serial comma is the comma used immediately before the conjunction that ends a list of three or more. For example: I bought bananas, apples, and oranges. The serial comma is the comma before the “and.”
In the above example, the comma probably isn’t even noticed, and if it were removed the context of the sentence would stay the same. But let’s give a different example.
I dedicate this award to my parents, Jesus Christ and God. Notice the ambiguity? Do I mean to say that my parents are Jesus Christ and God? Or do I mean that the award is dedicated to three separate entities: my parents, Jesus Christ, and God? The simple addition of the serial comma removes all confusion.
Some may argue that the serial comma should only be used in instances where confusion might occur, and that it should be omitted in any instance where there’s no room for ambiguity. However, as the writer of the above examples, I know what I meant when I wrote them. I know that my parents are not Jesus Christ and God, therefore not including the comma could make complete sense to me. In my mind, perhaps that second example leaves no room for confusion because it should be obvious that my parents are not, in fact, Jesus Christ and God. As such, the choice to only use the serial comma in some instances and not in others leaves the rule open to too much interpretation.
You will never come across an example where using the serial comma creates confusion. The original purpose in omitting the serial comma was solely for journalistic reasons, to save column space when writing for a newspaper.
At Aberdeen we provide captions and subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing community. When captions are scrolling past on your screen, there’s not often time to be able to stop and ponder what the meaning of a sentence was supposed to be; by the time you’ve figured it out, the caption is already long gone.
Would you be confused reading this sentence? Today I spoke to my mom, a pastor and a convicted murderer.
The next time you’re writing keep this in mind, because you don’t want people to have to wonder if your mom is a convict or not.
Written by: Jackie Blackwell, Caption Editor at Aberdeen
Homophones are words that are pronounced the same but differ in meaning and can be a daily nuisance to closed captioners and transcribers, who rely solely on what they hear when captioning and transcribing programs. Here is a list of the most commonly misused homophones that I tend to encounter while captioning:
adverse vs. averse—adverse means unfavorable. Averse means reluctant.
descendent vs. descendant—Apparently, descendent is now considered a dead word. Always stick with descendant when referring to something derived from an earlier person, animal, or thing.
complement vs. compliment—Complement is something that adds to something else. A compliment is something nice that someone says about you.
inequity vs. iniquity— Inequity is an injustice. Iniquity is a sin.
insure vs. ensure—Insure relates to insurance only (think car insurance.) Ensure means to guarantee something.
peak vs. peek vs. pique—Peak is a high point, such as on a mountain. Peek is when you look at something. Pique means to excite your interest.
profit vs. prophet—Profit is a net income or measure of gain. A prophet is someone who foretells future events.
whose vs. who’s—Whose is something that belongs to someone else (Whose idea is this?) Who’s is a contraction meaning who is or who has. (Who’s learning about homophones today?)
Having come up through the ranks in Hollywood as a Sound Supervisor and eventually a picture editor during the “Digital Revolution” of the 1990s, I worked with just about every kind of tape deck known to man. Heck, when I started we were still sending MAG reels to the stage for dubbing.
We loved the DA-88 for audio because it had 8 tracks and was affordable enough to put in every editor’s rack. We loved the Digi-Beta because, well, it really was digital; and had lots of buttons and lights and it made us feel powerful! You really had to have some sort of engineering degree to use all of its functions but we were generally using it like a tape deck, so we didn’t care, it cost $30,000 dollars and looked cool in our editing suites!
The funniest thing about all of these “technologies” is that, while they were a definite improvement over analog tape, we were still operating in a tape based environment, and to a great degree we still are to this day!
We’ll spend $40,000 on a Media Composer only to have all of this clean digital picture go through two or three generations of export, ingest and transcoding between layback and final broadcast, creating many opportunities for signal and level degradation, errors in closed captioning and subtitling data, you name it.
For some reason though, we cling tightly to our tape decks. They are safe and tangible. We can hold the tapes in our hands and hear the servos winding the tape around the heads when we load a tape into the deck for layback. When we were at NAB this year, to introduce our digital file delivery we actually went “Office Space” on an old Sony BVW deck and smashed it with a sledge hammer in our parking lot to have a nice visual to grab people’s attention. Some of the reactions were hilarious. Many Engineers were absolutely beside themselves with anger because we smashed up a “perfectly good deck”. (Click here to see the result)
In reality, there is no such thing as a perfectly good deck. They are yesterday’s technology that no one wants to put out to pasture. In the process, many studios waste valuable resources in maintenance, tape stock, man hours etc., only to be left wishing there was an alternative at the end of the day.
As a matter of fact there is an easy way and we at Aberdeen are pioneering it! Everything we do, we believe in challenging the status quo. We believe in fully implementing technology to make lives, jobs and our services better. One way we’ve done this is through our cloud-based digital delivery and transcoding service where clients upload their video file and we distribute file-based with closed captions to their airing stations across the country and around the world. As a result, we’ve eliminated tapes from our clients’ workflows!
About the Author:
Mike Lyle was a Sound Effects Supervisor and Picture Editor in Hollywood for over 15 years. He has had the good fortune of receiving 3 EMMY Awards, 5 Golden Reels a CAS award and 26 Nominations throughout his career. He is a member of The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences as well as the Motion Picture Editor’s Guild Local 700. He was involved with setting up workflows for digital workstations beginning with the Wave Frame and Pro tools audio stations; and has edited on all professional picture systems from Lightworks and Media Composer, to Final Cut Pro and Adobe Premier. Currently he is a Sales Engineer working in Compression and Delivery Technologies for Aberdeen Inc. in Rancho Santa Margarita.
For more information on this article, please contact Mike Lyle at 800-688-6621 or info@abercap.com
Thinking about our last blog post, I was wondering how many movies in my local area offer closed captioning and came across Caption Fish. This website allows you to type in your address and it gives you the current listing of movie titles and show times that offer open captions, Rear Window captions, subtitles, and descriptive narration movies. It also has a list of new movie trailers that are all closed captioned that you can watch on the website. You can even sign up to get e-mail notifications when the movie you want to see is being shown with captions in your area. It’s an extremely informative and helpful website. Check them out at www.captionfish.com!
