The Closed Captioning Process
We've designed and implemented a proven 5-step process to ensure the delivery of high quality closed captioning services.
Quality Control Inspection and Preparation
We request an original master of the video to be captioned on tape or as a high resolution digital file via FTP, data disc, or hard drive. Those clients who arrange their own encoding can send us a worktape or low resolution digital file. Each video received is logged in to our production department and reviewed for:
- Completeness
- Sequential Time Code
- Audio Quality
- Video Quality
As the review is being conducted, the program is being digitized to one of our production servers.
Caption Production
Using our state-of-the-art workstations, a caption editor accesses the digitized program and carefully transcribes all audio elements, including the dialogue, sound effects and other essential, nonverbal features. This text is then broken down into captions, positioned on the screen to indicate the speaker (with pop-on style captions) and timed to appear with the related audio and video of the program.
Initial Review
Following the caption production, the caption editor performs an initial review, comparing the closed captioning against the original programming to check for accuracy and timing.
Final Review
A senior editor performs a final review of the captioned program and makes any necessary changes to the caption file. That file is then archived for future reformats or transcripts.
Encoding
The final step is the integration of the caption data with the video portion of the program. This is done by a caption encoder, which uses the caption file to create a new captioned sub-master. We do our own encoding, on-site. However, if a client prefers to arrange their own encoding, we will deliver the caption file by email or ftp.