Methods for Applying Audio Descriptions

Introduction:

Audio description is an accessibility feature that provides spoken narration of important visual content in video or graphical multimedia. Audio descriptions help ensure that listeners who are blind or have low vision can access information that is presented visually but not conveyed through dialogue, narration, or other audio elements.

This article walks through some of the practical methods for implementing audio descriptions for your lecture videos.  This article will focus on the practical steps and on using the technical tools to support creating appropriate video products that will support viewers with visual challenges.

There are additional articles on Audio Descriptions:

• Introduction to Audio Descriptions
  • This article explains the basics of audio descriptions and their functionality.
• Best Practices for Creating Audio Descriptions
  • This article walks through best practices for creating descriptions for visual elements in recorded video presentations. 

Table of Contents

• Planned Audio Descriptions
  • Option 1 - Full Verbal Description
  • Option 2 - Full verbal description with slides
  • Additional Resources
• Extended Audio Descriptions
  • Steps for adding and configuring an EAD file
    • Step 1: Download the EAD template file.
    • Step 2: Upload the .VTT file to the appropriate video in the OU MyMedia Platform
    • Step 3: Edit the VTT file to add the needed content descriptions
  • Additional Resources

Planned Audio Description:

The best practice is to plan for audio description as you are drafting your lectures, ensuring that you are addressing all text on the slides and describing any graphics or images when you present the lecture.

• Option 1 - Full verbal description of all elements in the presentation

  • For this option, you want to ensure that you are verbally addressing all of the content in your slides as you create your lecture recording.
    • Script out your presentation to ensure that you are fully covering the content of the slides.
    • For your lecture recording, read all text that is presented on every slide and fully describe any visual elements displayed on the slides.
    • See these tips for creating visual descriptions.
       

• Option 2 - Full verbal description of all elements in the presentation, plus create an accessible slide handout for listeners

  • For this option, you want to ensure that you are verbally addressing all of the content in your slides as you create your lecture recording. For additional support, provide an accessible version of your slide presentation, with full alternative text descriptions for graphic visual elements.
    • Script out your presentation to ensure that you are properly covering the content of the slides.
    • Prepare an accessible version of your slides to share with your audience.
    • For your lecture recording, let your audience know that they can follow the lecture using the extra information in the accessible slides.
    • Be sure to verbalize what slide number you are covering throughout the lecture.
    • Read all text that is presented on every slide and describe any visual elements displayed on the slides, letting listeners know that there is a full image description in the accessible slides handout.

• Additional Resources

  • Article on tips for creating visual descriptions.
  • Video addressing Practical Tips for PowerPoint Accessibility 
  • Video addressing Making PowerPoints Accessible
    • Note you will need to log into with your OU credentials to view these videos.

Extended Audio Description:

If you have lectures that have already been recorded, adding an Extended Audio Description (EAD) file to your video is another option for providing the required audio support for your videos. Extended audio description delivers extended descriptions of video visuals by pausing the main video and reading a text description of the content.

The MyMedia video platform supports adding a .VTT file to support EAD to any video that has been uploaded into the OU MyMedia instance. This is a specially formatted text file that contains extra descriptive information about the visual elements.

Steps for adding and configuring an EAD file

As a best practice, we suggest that you start by reviewing your video and drafting the descriptive content for the video. Then you will be ready to add this content into the captions editor in MyMedia through the steps below.  As a reminder, do not edit the VTT file, but draft up your description in your preferred word processing software.
 

Step 1: Download the EAD template file.

Start by downloading the .VTT template file.

You do not need to open this file on your computer, just download it.
Note: You do not need to download this template every time, but you can use the same template anytime you need a .VTT file. 
You will be editing the file from within MyMedia; you should not be editing the template on your computer. 

Step 2: Upload the .VTT file to the appropriate video in MyMedia.ou.edu

1. Log into MyMedia.ou.edu.
2. Click the profile icon at the top right of the page and select Login.
3. Click the profile icon again and select My Media.
4. Locate the video that needs the added EAD, and select Edit.
5. Below the media player, click the Captions tab.
6. Click the Add extended audio description button.
7. In the "Upload an EAD file" window that appears:
   • Click Browse to locate and select the .VTT file template that you downloaded in Step 1.
   • Click the Select Language pulldown menu to identify the language of the audio description.
   • In the Accuracy pulldown menu, select the percentage that you believe represents the final accuracy (this will most likely be 100% since you are creating this yourself). 
   • In the Label field, provide a name for the extended audio description. We recommend making it clear that it is an audio description, e.g., "EAD - English" or "English Extended Audio Description."
8. Click Save.

This page on Upload and manage EAD files from the Kaltura/MyMedia Knowledge Center walks through this process.  

Step 3: Edit the VTT file to add the needed content descriptions

1. From the Captions tab, click on the Edit Captions button.
2. In the pull-down menu near the top of the page, select the label for your extended audio description if it's not already selected.
3. You can remove the template text (Start of description.) in the editor on the left side of the page.
4. Click the play button in the media player on the right to play the video.
5. When you come to a moment where visuals need to be described, press the pause button in the media player.
6. Click on the first timecode (the "start" timecode) and enter the timecode from the paused video. 
   (Note: the timecode format for captions and audio descriptions in Kaltura is hours:minutes:seconds, milliseconds.)
7. Click on the second timecode (the "end" timecode) and enter a value two seconds later than the start timecode.
8. Repeat this process as you play through the video, adding descriptions as needed.
9. When you're done creating your extended audio description, be sure to click Save.
10. When prompted to update the accuracy, select your desired value and click Save again.
11. Click Back to return to the edit page.

This page on Creating captions manually from the Kaltura/MyMedia Knowledge Center walks through this process. Note that while the page addresses editing closed caption files, it uses the exact same process and editor as EAD files.

Additional Resources

• This video wallkthrough covers all of the steps for adding and editing an EAD to your video in the OU MyMedia platform.
• This page on Upload and manage EAD files from the Kaltura/MyMedia Knowledge Center walks through this process.  
• This page on Creating captions manually from the Kaltura/MyMedia Knowledge Center walks through this process. Note that while the page addresses editing closed caption files, it uses the exact same process and editor as EAD files.