Isn’t Subtitling for the Deaf & Hard-of-Hearing Just Localized Captions? (No.)

Subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing (SDH) is quickly becoming a standard deliverable for video localization projects. Why? Because SDH adds a significant level of accessibility, usually the purview of closed captioning, to subtitling. But this is also why many multimedia localization professionals think of them as “translated captions” – and this can cause serious issues during production.

This post will discuss the 3 critical differences between closed captioning and SDH.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

First, what are captioning and subtitling for the deaf and hard-of-hearing?

Captions (also commonly called closed captions) are lines of text that appear on a video, specifically to relay any audible information necessary to understand the content. That includes dialogue, non-verbal cues like sighing or grunting, sound effects and musical cues. They were created initially to make broadcast content accessible to deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers in the United States.

In order to understand what SDH is, it’s good to define subtitling first. Subtitles contain a lot of the same content as captions, but they are intended specifically for viewers who don’t speak the source language of a show or video. That is to say, they focus on linguistic content only. As with captions, most of that is dialogue or voice-over. However, subs also include signage, newspaper headlines or on-screen titles – linguistic content that wouldn’t be covered by captions since it’s not audible information.

Accessibility experts realized that many deaf and hard-of-hearing persons used subtitles to access videos, but with critical gaps in the content – specifically, the non-linguistic “audibles.” The great innovation of SDH is that it makes subtitles content accessible to viewers who don’t speak a program’s source language and are deaf and hard-of-hearing.

What differences do video localization professionals need to know?

Captioning was developed over 60 years after subtitling, on a separate technology and for a different audience. SDH in some ways “marries” the two services. Thus the production issues. To avoid them, localization professionals must remember the following differences between captioning and SDH.

1. Content

To reiterate, SDH contains linguistic elements that captions would ignore. For corporate videos, that’s titles and name identifiers for interviews, as well as slides, quiz questions, or text in e-Learning materials. For entertainment productions like movies and TV shows, that includes any text in the frame that conveys information necessary to the plot, as well as forced narratives and main credits. Because this information isn’t generally included in transcription and spotting for captions, it’s important for localization professionals to ensure that it gets captured.

2. Video localization workflow

Remember that captioning is integrated by post-production specialists who speak the language of the source content. Not necessarily so with SDH (or subtitling in general), which goes through a multilingual workflow. That means two things. First, that the process is inherently more time-consuming – in particular the translation phase, which is labor-intensive. Second, that it requires a QA performed by a bilingual editor who’s a native speaker in the target language and understands accessibility requirements and captioning standards. The length of typical SDH timelines often surprises video producers, who are used to the more straight-forward captioning process.

3. Deliverable file formats

Most online captions files are delivered in SRT or WebVTT, or even a format like TTML. The same goes for SDH. However, broadcast and DVD/BRD projects still use the SCC captioning format, which can’t be localized. Why? Because SCC was created specifically for the English-language character set and doesn’t support anything beyond it, including European Latin-character languages. It’s crucial to remember that legacy projects requiring SDH are going to need an extra file conversion pass, and may have very different workflows for their captioning and SDH deliverables.

So what do you need to do for multimedia localization?

First, get exact specifications on your deliverable – whether it’s closed captions, subs or SDH localization. Remember that these terms get used interchangeably, so if you’re not sure what your client needs, ask which audience they’re addressing – deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers in their home market, or foreign-language viewers (including those with accessibility needs). Second, lock down where your captions, subtitles or SDH will play – this will often be enough to determine your deliverable format. And third, take the time to review your content to make sure you understand its specific needs. As on any multimedia localization project, it’s critical to get specifications right at project launch, to avoid re-work and production issues. Remember – that’s the only way to ensure that your accessibility or video localization project delivers on time, on scope and on budget.