[blindkid] Accessible Media

[Richard Holloway]

I found this too interesting not to share-- I don't know how many deaf / hearing-impaired people this might reach, and I know it probably won't be terribly useful to deaf-blind persons, but it does speak to the continuing accessibility trend with DVD's and the like.

We watched the newest Ice Age film tonight-- Continental Drift. (Cute film, by the way...)  When I went to turn on Audio Description, I saw an option for "Sign Along" mode. I did a double take-- no, not SING along, it did say "SIGN". Yes indeed-- with this option, when actors are speaking, people appear in the lower right corner-- a man or a woman, or both, (as needed) and they take turns signing dialogue then they vanish when the dialogue stops.

I confess this drove me to distraction, but I did test and determine that, you can even listen to audio description and have people sign the dialogue, and indeed, you can also run subtitles at the same time if you like. Overkill? Perhaps, but then again, who says you can't have a blind person and a deaf person watching the same DVD at once, and if the deaf person prefers to have the dialogue signed or wants signing plus captions? Why not have them all? Or maybe you want Spanish or French subtitles while you need sign language and audio description. What an amazing variety of options!

The sign language doesn't help my family at all, but then again, audio description doesn't help most viewers either. What the sign language does do for us, however, is tell us that someone from 20th Century Fox, has added a new way to make one of their films even more accessible than most newer films, and a lot of newer films are already adding DVS. 

I like this trend.