Live Captioning
Live captioning is recommended when an event or course is being live streamed. Captions provide access to individuals who are Deaf or hard of hearing, individuals who are listening without sound, and English as second language learners, as well as many others. Setup and cost will differ in each platform and vendors will assist with setup. In communication with vendors, Zoom is the recommended platform to provide live captions but options can be provided in other streaming platforms as well. Please feel free to contact ODR if we can be of any assistance to you in providing for accessible programming to all.
** Special Note: Please remember to check platform settings to allow for closed captions to be used.**
Video Captioning
Providing time-coded captioning is an important part of creating inclusive and accessible content. While providing closed captions on all videos utilized for the purpose of educating our community is required, it is also known that captioning, transcription and subtitling solutions increase the value of an online video by making it accessible, usable, and searchable.
**Special Note: All videos, even those that have been done professionally, require a manual check for accurate captions before use.
Do It Yourself: Captioning Videos
There are many free do it yourself captioning platforms available such as Amara, YouTube, and DIY Captions.
Recommendations:
- If you own the video or it is a self-created video, YouTube would be the best platform to begin with. Simply upload your video to YouTube and utilize the auto generator provided for captioning. This allows the majority of the work to be automatically completed. Your video will only require you to edit the captions within YouTube for accuracy.Please see the Guide for creating captions in YouTube.
- If you have a video owned by others, with captions that require editing, it is recommended to use the DIY Captions platform. Please see the Guide for using DIY Captions for more information on how to use this platform.
- f you found a video without captions (which is owned by another party), Amara would be the recommended platform to add captions. This platform will require additional time, as you will be creating captions from scratch, most likely requiring additional edits before your video is completed. Please see the Guide for Adding Captions with Amara.
Paid Captioning
The University of Mary Washington is committed to ensuring that all have equal access to information, programs, activities, and services. One of the core values underlying UMW’s Mission Statement within the Principles on Diversity and Inclusion is a commitment to the responsibility of the entire University community to carry out the institutional values on diversity and inclusion.
UMW employees have access to create a free Kanopy account through UMW libraries and stream thousands of videos, most of which are already captioned. If the video is not captioned, you can send a request to Kanopy to have a video captioned. Process of Requesting Captions through Kanopy.
Additional Resources for Locating and Creating Captioned Videos.
Responsibilities to achieve accessibility falls on every member and department of the University of Mary Washington community to help the university fulfill their responsibilities. Providing time-coded captioning is an important part of creating inclusive and accessible content. Captioning, transcription, and subtitling solutions also increase the value of online video by making it accessible, usable, and searchable.
Staff and Faculty at the University of Mary Washington can choose between three different vendors for captioning and transcription services using the information listed below or any other vendor of their choosing. Virginia institutions of higher education have the opportunity to use the contracts below that have been negotiated by George Mason University. Please be sure to use the correct contract information when communicating with the vendor.
The use of these services allows for the purchase of SRT files (caption text files). Caption Encoding is needed in order to merge caption text files with video files. This allows for the end product to be a captioned video and ready for use. This service can be provided for an additional fee by 3PlayMedia.
3Play Media, Inc.
- Address: 77 N Washington St, Floor 2 Boston, MA 02114
- Website: https://www.3playmedia.com/virginia/
- Contract Number: GMU-1475-18-01
- Contact: support@3playmedia.com
| Turnaround Time | Price per video minute |
|---|---|
| 1 business day | $2.85 |
| 2 business days | $2.35 |
| 4 business days (standard) | $1.95 |
| 10 business days | $1.80 |
** 3Play Media offers Caption Encoding for $10/file.
Cielo24, Inc.
**Requires account minimum purchase
- Address: PO Box 91130, Santa Barbara, CA 93190
- Website: https://cielo24.com/partners/VASCUPP/
- Contract Number: GMU-1475-18-02
- Contact: Joseph DeRocco (joseph.derocco@cielo24.com)
| Turnaround Time | Price per video minute |
|---|---|
| 24 hours | $2.60 |
| 48 hours | $1.80 |
| 4 days (standard) | $1.60 |
| 7 days | $1.50 |
Verbit, Inc.
- Address: 3921 Fabian Way, Palo Alto, CA 94303
- Website: https://verbit.ai/
- Contract Number: GMU-1475-18-03
- Contact: Jacques Botbol (jacques@verbit.ai)
| Turnaround Time | Price per video minute |
|---|---|
| 1 business day | $1.66 |
| 2 business days | $1.46 |
| 3 business days (standard) | $1.25 |
If you have any questions, contact the Office of Disability Resources at (540) 654-1266 or odr@umw.edu.