Closed Captions

Context

Closed captioning is text that describes the audio of video such as TV programmes, movies or online video streaming in a written format. They are similar to subtitles but with additional sound descriptions like music and other background noises.

Closed captions are critical for viewers with hearing disabilities, they help them have the full experience of the video. 

Problem

With the continued growth of live broadcasting, it is imperative that video accessibility is seen as an utmost priority. Not only to comply with accessibility standards, which is a legal requirement in many countries, but to also ensure that all viewers have an equal experience. 

In addition to accessibility standards, live broadcasting can also be subject to other problems like viewing in noisy environments, or when it is being broadcasted in a foreign language for the viewer. 

Solution

We provide closed captioning on live streams outbound from our Wowza servers to end viewers. This means inbound live streams are ingested as usual, and Wowza will provide the audio-to-text capability to generate the close-captioned subtitle.

In the app, presenters can enable closed captions depending on the needs by:

  1. Going to Configurations menu to Accessibility
  2. Enabling Closed Captions

Note: iOS 15 users must enable dictation in their device to use Closed Captions.

Then, viewers will be able to enable closed captions on from the widget by:

  1. Opening the menu ‘More’
  2. Selecting ‘Turn on closed captions’

Limitations

Currently, only English (United States) is supported.