A New Approach to Film Accessibility

Commendation from eWell-Being Award, for projects using Information and Communication Technologies to deliver social, economic and envionmental benefits

Merit Award for Nectar at California's Superfest for expanding the audience through captioning, audio description or other accommodations.

Nominated for New Statesman New Media Award, for making a significant contribution towards society through the use of new media technology.

"Nectar was India's introduction to audio description, and has really set everyone thinking. We are now trying to promote the idea of audio description in India." Abilityfest

Captioning, sign language and audio description (ACS) are increasingly being used to make films accessible to audiences. However, current approaches often make a disappointing experience for both audience and filmmaker, with access produced as a neutral describer or an after-thought and rarely as a creative contribution.

Roaring Girl Productions has been working to make ACS an integral part of the production process rather than an access 'add-on'.

Audio description is an audio narration of visual elements for audiences with a visual impairment. For Deaf/hearing impaired audiences, captioning transcribes and annotates audio information, whilst sign language interpretation interprets it.

Quality ACS benefits audiences, filmmakers and distributors, holding the potential for new and satisfied audiences.

ACS is rarely included within the production of the core film. Where it is addressed, it is generally at the point of distribution, when the creative production of the film is complete. As a result, the film is often shoe horned into an existing template that often bears no relation to the aesthetic of the film.

Film exists across genre, encompasses every subject, style and emotion. Yet, when it comes to access, there is still a one-size-fits-all approach. Sign language interpreters and captions are usually located in boxes to the right and base of the screen, whilst the main picture is shrunk and pushed aside to accommodate them. Audio description frequently seems just as removed from the overall feel of the production.

For Liz Crow, it was the experience of making Frida Kahlo's Corset that made the limitations clear. The audio description was produced at the point of distribution by an outside agency. Listening to it, she discovered it simply didn't represent the film. "Their priority was to get across the narrative," she says, "to describe but not interpret. But in a film where every shot is composed and framed to convey meaning, description alone leaves the audience without crucial information. The very first shot, a close up of Kahlo's eyes darting left and right is very distinctive and, in context, it builds a crucial sense of unease. To listen to the audio description, the character could just as well have been watching a tennis match."

For the audience, the very methods designed to promote access can detract from the qualitative experience of the production. For the filmmaker, the access conventions available can misrepresent and undermine the vision they have worked so hard to create and communicate.

In response, at Roaring Girl Productions, we use our own productions to trial imaginative and innovative approaches.

On Nectar, we worked closely with Films at 59 to bring ACS into the core of the creative and production process.

On Illumination, we experimented with the design of the captions, building them into the picture so they are a part of the action.

On the Resistance installation, we worked with our technical team, Art AV, to author software that would allow the installation to be tailored to individual audiences.

Our work with both aesthetic and technological solutions is producing ACS with the potential to be:

• High quality
• Reliable
• Cost-effective
• Better able to represent the vision of a specific work.

We have documented this work and tested it with audiences, filmmakers, distributors and access facilitators. We want to:

• Generate dialogue between audiences, filmmakers, distributors and access facilitators
• Create a practical resource for practitioners to use in their own work
• Inspire others to experiment and push the bounds of ACS both technically and aesthetically
• Motivate others to make innovative use of existing and developing technologies to improve the film experience
• Encourage audiences to demand more of filmmakers and distributors, and for filmmakers and distributors to rise to that challenge.

Your comments are welcome.

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This page last modified: 21 Dec 2009