“The cinema is the most accessible and thrilling social experience, where you can go with friends and family alike to watch the best and biggest new films. So why is it that I didn’t go to the cinema for the first 19 years of my life?

It was just pointless when I couldn’t hear anything the characters said, but thanks to the efforts over the past decade, I’ve kept up with the cinematic world and socially, culturally and historically my life has become better for it. Thank you for making movies accessible to people like me.”

DCP Production – Narration and Closed Caption Creation

From the first lens used during the first production shot, to the last lens and the screen it shines upon, all the equipment and time spent on a movie is used to deliver the director’s intent to the audience. It is no less with audio enrichment and captioning for the audience with sensory impairments. 

The conversion to digital cinema brings digital precision, with some ease of workflow and speed of access to the exhibition process. Days long chemical processes and the need to transport large reels to several post production facilities are eliminated. But there is still an extremely detailed workflow required to create and join the necessary materials into the distribution package, the DCP (Digital Cinema Package). Creating different versions of closed captions, open captions, and narrative tracks still add additional steps that can only happen during the hectic few days between the final picture and audio edits and the release date.

The tasks of creating the VI-N (Vision Impaired–Narration) DCP is done by a separate post-production chain, just as it was in the historical film system. While a general release DCP can be sent to large audiences in several markets, different VI-N DCPs are needed, targeted to smaller audiences around the world. These will end up as a separate DCP with a separate set of security keys. There is added pressure to make these available with the same release date, which is now regularly accomplished for the “Hollywood” movies, but more rare for “smaller” movies.  

A separate DCP allows different exhibitors to choose the right package for each of these micro-targeted audiences, while keeping security for the whole package. The downside is that the film booking team and projectionists do the extra work of ordering and monitoring and loading the materials, and processing their separate security keys. The hard disk at the exhibitor also gets filled more quickly with similar-named packages, which leaves the door open for error and mis-played shows. Eventually meta-data is expected to help automate these package choices for different show times. Today’s techniques still require extra labor and diligence to avoid confusion in the projection booth, and in the theater.   

The essential steps of creating a VI-N DCP are:

• Write a script of the on-screen action. Since the description information cannot conflict with characters speaking, dramatic music and other sounds, this must be very cleverly done with separate time points that cannot be grabbed from previous editing notes. 
• Voiceover talent has to record the narration in a mixing session with technicians & engineers. There are many companies who make purpose built equipment for this task, and there are thousands of people around the world who participate in creating the tracks for variations in different languages. This is particularly true in the television and internet world, which is going through a transition of its own with new inclusion laws in dozens of countries around the world. But these workflows, as well as DVD/Blu Ray workflows, can be allowed months for the preparation while first run movies don’t have the luxury of time.
  For movies, sound tracks and audio dubbing is often not finished until mere weeks before the distribution date, so it is not uncommon to find union specialists (talent and engineers) who are not only skilled, but available and ready to work long hours at proportionate rates.
• The recording then has to be prepared for d-cinema use – sample rates have to be chosen, reel data needs to be matched so the sound relates correctly to the picture, and the VI-N track is added as another audio channel in a final differently named DCP.

Narration track preparation for assisting the blind and partially sighted costs approximately $10,000 – $12,000US, with variables of running time and complexity.

The caption file workflow can use the existing dialog continuity script as a starting point for a script that adds the deaf and hard of hearing particulars, such as “gunshot off-screen” or “dog barks in background”, and their appropriate time codes points. Compared to the VI-N steps, it is simpler to create and combine an XML script (a special, formulated type of text package) that the DCP uses. In the case of open captions, placement information is included in the XML, e.g., making sure open captions don’t collide with on-screen titles, subtitles and credits. In the case of closed captions, different breakpoints are added to match the 3 lines that the personal captioning devices use.

The generation of caption files for a DCP will be $2,000 – $3,000US.

Combined then, these costs are about $12,000 to $15,000, and don’t include the costs of a specially prepared dialog-pushed HI track or administration to make it all happen or keep the distribution packages going to the proper facilities. All of these costs are typically charged to distribution, not production or exhibition.

For comparison, it costs approximately $15,000US for the creation of the DCDM (the digital master – the unencrypted compilation from which different versions are added into or taken from) and a DCP of the baseline general domestic release and international versions. In round numbers then, the creation of VI-N and caption files costs double a movie’s DCP costs.

Additionally, there is typically more than one language to add, in addition to foreign subtitles or language dubs. As a greater number of capable digital facilities become available overseas, these functions will go back to being handled by the local market distribution, as it was in the film days.

It should also be noted that many large studios are paying for the digital infrastructure that makes these processes possible, including the emollient of the digital transition, the VPF. Virtual Print Fees reimburse many of the exhibitor’s digital equipment expenses – though not all – as far out as 2020.

Moviemakers on the other hand, point out that tens of thousands of movies get started, but only a small percentage actually get finished and even fewer get distribution deals. Finishing touches like multiple languages, descriptive narration and captioning are therefore not on their primary checklist. On the other hand, costs for digital distribution for festivals and limited release “prints” – even adding in these accessibility packages – are a fraction of what film prints and distribution previously cost a production.

As more audiences around the world are promised and expect access capability, more directors and producers are becoming aware of these issues, discussing them earlier in the process. Film festivals, familiar with requiring multiple languages, have been on a steep learning curve in the digital transition. Large exhibition chains are beginning to demand inclusion tracks of winners and those in contention.

There are new caption and narration tools becoming available. One example is Amara – Universal subtitling which takes advantage of open source software and crowd-sourcing volunteers. There are copyright exemptions in some countries that allow this for internet movies, e.g., Australia’s 200AB of the Copyright Act. In the US, copyright exemption allowing third parties to caption and narrate for the deaf, blind, hard of hearing and sight impaired is still a work in progress. Regardless, smaller movie projects can take advantage of such resources to bring their movies to a broader audience.