[blindkid] Audio Description; art or skill?

Carrie Gilmer carrie.gilmer at gmail.com
Sun Dec 7 19:14:48 UTC 2008


Dear Mike,
I don't think we are in real disagreement.

My point about the classroom teacher or classmates (the trouble with email
communication) was that untrained people often decide by what they think is
important or try and describe everything without real thought--and on the
fly in a classroom "emergency" situation. I agree and understand that
Sometimes hair color is not important sometimes it is. Sometimes in a period
piece or any film, costume, scenery is part of the info needed to comprehend
a scene or the plot from background info--sometimes in Jordan's assignments
this part of a film was analyzed or knowledge of it required. It is more
skill than true art I think, and also there will always be some who
naturally are better at it, and there will always be some "mistakes"...and
as you say sometimes certain people are more interested in costumes than
others...

This is why consumer reviews are so important. On the advisory board Jordan
is sent films--along with others, to review and to say if hair color is
important in this instance or not, what is needed to determine the scene
that is occurring visually that you can not discern from dialogue. Obviously
he doesn't review every film, but they ask for ongoing feedback through
their site, they try and learn from it and make future decisions about what
is truly needed.
 

It is different from translation-but similar too because it does involve
some interpretation (ASL or Spanish or any foreign language), Captioning is
totally just transcribing though, it is exact dialogue, and has no
interpretations or abbreviations. I think we can have some standards, it is
difficult though, and we want it right if it is going into law...one of the
biggest pieces is the requirement of user input and control...IMO

Hopefully it will come. 

Best,
Carrie





From: blindkid-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindkid-bounces at nfbnet.org] On 
Behalf Of Mike Freeman
Sent: Saturday, December 06, 2008 11:49 PM
To: NFBnet Blind Kid Mailing List,(for parents of blind children)
Subject: Re: [blindkid] Audio Description; art or skill?
Carie:

I realize that we could talk this thing to death. Nevertheless, I feel 
that there is a philosophical point to be made so I'll take one more 
stab at it in the interest of furthering understanding of NFB's 
thinking.

You are correct in stating that in part, our opposition to legally 
mandating described video was a matter of "first things first". After 
all, crawlers imparting emergency information are far more important 
than descriptions of scenery or action. Even ACB has tacitly 
acknowledged this in its petition to FCC to require that emergency 
information be voiced.

And you are also correct in saying that describing video is a skill --  
one that can be improved with practice. However, you undercut your case 
in my estimation below when you say that teachers or others described 
"nonessential" stuff such as costumes and colors rather than action. But 
who is to say what is essential and what is not? Is this not a decision 
as to what is artistically important? And does this not imply that 
described video is an art? I know Jim Stovall of "Narrative Television" 
would agree with you and me that descriptions of costumes and scenery is 
largely superfluous. I remember he once said that he started Narrative 
Television in part because he thought the NCAM descriptions were to 
fluffy/frilly with nonessential elements. Yet I know plenty of blind 
persons who say that descriptions of scenery, costumes, colors, faces 
and ambiance is *Precisely* what they want. I think it's stuff and 
nonsense but they have a right to their opinion and it is every bit as 
valid as is mine and clearly indicates that describing video is always a 
judgment call rather than a cut-and-dried exercise of the 
closed-captioning sort (incidentally ACB makes much of the analogy of 
closed-captioning with described video -- a false analogy IMO). 
Moreover, I've listened to movies with described video and had sighted 
persons watching with me say: "*That's* not what happened! They got it 
all wrong!".

Sounds like an art more than a skill to me. And thus it is not easily 
susceptible of being a legal requirement!

If we are to aproach describing video rationally, we'd better have a 
clear idea of what we're asking and whether what we want can be 
accommodated within the framework of the constitution.

Mike Freeman





More information about the BlindKid mailing list