How to Request Audio Description

CaptionSync supports Audio Description, also known as video description or descriptive narration. Our Audio Description feature allows users to request a verbal description track of relevant visual elements that appear in the video and are essential for comprehension, but are not communicated through the video’s existing audio. In this tutorial we show how to enable your CaptionSync account for this feature, and request Audio Description for your video files.

Learn more about our Audio Description offer.

Before making the request, please check out our Important Notes section first.

Tutorial

One-Time Setup:

• Log into CaptionSync, go to Settings -> Account Features, select Add Audio Description to my account from the Account Feature to Add drop-down menu, and click Request Account Feature. You will receive an email updating you about the feature status. Note that if you can't see Audio Description on the "Account Feature to Add" drop-down menu, then it's already enabled.

• Once you're notified that the feature is enabled, log back in and you will see a Describe tab on your CaptionSync account.

Making Audio Description requests:

There are several important notes you should read, before placing your request:

• Audio Description can only be requested for existing Captioning submissions. If you need to place a new Transcription-Captioning request for your video, and there is little or no spoken content in it, ensure you add a note for the transcriber, at submission time, asking that the order is not rejected. E.g.:
  Please do not reject audio with little or no spoken content. Please mark such content using parenthetical comments, like [ Silence ], [ Music ], [ Singing ], [ Noise ], etc.  

• If you want to use the Smart Player to display the Audio Description results, please ensure you submit the formats listed below.

• If you want to submit content that is not in English, Spanish or French, or that is mixed, please read the notes below.

There are three methods available to request Audio Description for existing Captioning submissions: at the time you place the Captioning request; using the "bulk" Audio Description request feature, available under the Describe tab; or requesting Audio Description from within individual Submission Details pages.

At submission time:

• Go to the New Captioning Submission or New List of URLs for Captioning page, and fill out the form to place your Captioning request.
• In the Audio Description step, check the Add audio description box.

• Use the Guidance for Describer feature to send notes and specific instructions for the describer. Note: If you're not using an Extended Audio Description-capable player to display the results, like our Smart Player, use the Guidance for Describer field to ask the describer: Short and concise descriptions are preferred, as they will not be used with an Extended Audio Description-capable player.

• We do not accept attachments on the Guidance for Describer field. So if you have a file and wish to send it to the describer (for example, the script of your movie), you can make it available online, using services like Google Drive, Dropbox, Hightail, etc. Publish the file as "public" and/or "unlisted". Then paste the URL to your file in the Guidance field, and explain what it pertains to.

• Select the Customer Reviews Description Before Results checkbox if you want to review the descriptions before generating final results.

• Finally, submit both the Captioning and Audio Description request. 

Using the "bulk" Audio Description request feature:

• Go to Describe -> New Audio Description. A list of available submissions is presented. Note: Only submissions in video formats will show on this list, since Audio Description is not available for audio files (e.g. MP3, WAV).

• Select the submissions you want to add audio description to, and then click Request Audio Descriptions. Note that you don't have to wait for the captioning process to be completed in order to request Audio Description.

• If you have a Purchase Order account, the most recently Purchase Order used will show in the Purchase Order box.

• Use the Guidance for Describer feature to send notes and specific instructions for the describer. Note that this guidance will be applied to all the individual requests. If you need to leave specific guidance for each individual submission, place the request from its Details page instead. Note: If you're not using an Extended Audio Description-capable player to display the results, like our Smart Player, use the Guidance for Describer field to ask the describer: Short and concise descriptions are preferred, as they will not be used with an Extended Audio Description-capable player.

• We do not accept attachments on the Guidance for Describer field. So if you have a file and wish to send it to the describer (for example, the script of your movie), you can make it available online, using services like Google Drive, Dropbox, Hightail, etc. Publish the file as "public" and/or "unlisted". Then paste the URL to your file in the Guidance field, and explain what it pertains to.

• Select the Customer Reviews Description Before Results checkbox if you want to review the descriptions before generating final results.

• Click Request Audio Description. It typically takes about 4 business days to create the audio description results.

Making an Audio Description request from an individual Submission Details page:

• Go to Caption/Transcribe -> Status of Submissions, and select the submission you wish to add Audio Description to.

• On the Submission Details page, the Audio Description field will show if the submission is eligible. If it is, click the Request Audio Description link.

• Use the Guidance for Describer feature to send notes and specific instructions to the describer. Note: If you're not using an Extended Audio Description-capable player to display the results, like our Smart Player, use the Guidance for Describer field to ask the describer: Short and concise descriptions are preferred, as they will not be used with an Extended Audio Description-capable player.

• We do not accept attachments on the Guidance for Describer field. So if you have a file and wish to send it to the describer (for example, the script of your movie), you can make it available online, using services like Google Drive, Dropbox, Hightail, etc. Publish the file as "public" and/or "unlisted". Then paste the URL to your file in the Guidance field, and explain what it pertains to.

• Select the Customer Reviews Description Before Results checkbox to review the description before generating final results.

• If you have a Purchase Order account, the most recently Purchase Order used will show in the Purchase Order box.

• Click Request Audio Description. It typically takes about 4 business days to create the audio description results.

Monitoring the status of the request, Cancelling a description and retrieving results:

• Go to Describe -> Status of Audio Descriptions, to monitor the status of a request.

• You can cancel a request up until the describer starts working on a description (Awaiting Description status). Select the ID of the Audio Description request, from the Status of Audio Descriptions page, and click the cancel link.

• Once an Audio Description request completes, the status will show Description Succeeded.

• You can retrieve the new results from your results email, or go to the Status of Audio Descriptions page and download the results from the Audio Description Details page.

• For requests made via List of URLs, a Smart Player URL can be generated from within the Describe ->Status of Audio Description, if one was not already created. Both the Audio Description and Captioning results need to be completed for the Generate link to show.

Using Audio Description results:

You can learn how to use your Audio Description results in our How to use your Audio Description results article.

Important Notes:

• To make an Audio Description request, ensure that you provide us with a video format. You can also request Audio Description for videos submitted via List of URLs, including YouTube and Dropbox URLs; or request Audio Description for submissions placed via one of our integrations that creates batch lists (Legacy Brightcove, Brightcove Video Cloud, Kaltura, Kaltura MediaSpace, Warpwire, 3C Media and D2L Capture (legacy)).

• The CaptionSync Smart Player will only be available for Audio Description requests placed via one of the following submission methods, or if one of the following media URL sources is provided afterwards:
  • YouTube
  • "Direct links" to Vimeo videos, available for Vimeo Premium, Business or PRO users.
  • Dropbox and direct URLs to videos in the .mp4, .m4v or .f4v format.
  • 3C Media URLs
  • Videos submitted via the YouTube, Legacy Brightcove, Brightcove Video Cloud, Kaltura, Kaltura MediaSpace, Warpwire, 3C Media and D2L Capture (legacy) integrations.

Additional Notes:

• Audio Description can only be requested for existing or new Captioning requests, since the Audio Description results are influenced by the timing in the captions.

• Audio Description can be requested for Captioning submissions placed in our system, in the last 6 months. For Captioning submissions older than 45 days, we may have to ask you to make the video asset available to us, since we only keep the original media for 45 days, to allow users to request additional services like Video Encoding or Audio Description.

• Please ensure you don't have multiple windows/tabs open in CaptionSync, or reload the request page, when requesting Audio Description. This could result in submissions not processed or duplicate requests.

• This service is currently available for English, Spanish or French content only. If you submit a video with occasional non-English content that is subtitled on screen (open-subtitled), then we can capture the subtitles in the Audio Description.
  If the video is predominately in another language, there are several scenarios to consider:
  • For languages we support (German), you need to submit the video for Transcription and/or Captioning first; then, translate it to English; finally, you can request Audio Description (our Describer will use the English captions we generated, as guidance).
  • For languages we don't support, please contact us in advance, before placing an Audio Description request. If we are able to provide Audio Description for your file, you will need to supply us with a .webvtt file containing the English subtitles. If we decide we are able to capture the existing subtitles in the Audio Description results, there will likely be an additional surcharge. Then you'll need to submit the video for Transcription and Captioning (the request will be rejected, but we need to generate a Captioning ID), and finally request Audio Description. If the video is open-subtitled in English, and there is no standalone caption file with English subtitles available, there will be an additional surcharge. Finally, if the video is open-subtitled in English, but the English subtitles are not captured in the Audio Description results, and there is no standalone caption file with English subtitles available, then no English subtitles will be available to the TTS (text-to-speech) system. Which means that no English subtitles will be available to blind and visually impaired users.
  • If the video is in a language we do not support, there aren't English subtitles available (in a side-car .webvtt file), and the video is not open-subtitled in English, we will be unable to complete your Audio Description request.