Summer blockbusters. They’re movies from your youth that made such an impression, captivating your imagination and maybe your dreams long after the lights came up in the theater. Think Jaws. Think Star Wars (all of them) and Harry Potter (all of them so far) and Finding Nemo (there could be only one).
And they’re movies coming out this summer that we’re all excited to see– Toy Story 3, Grown Ups, Twilight: Eclipse and Inception.
For many years, people who were deaf or hard of hearing had their anticipation tinged with frustration, as they wouldn’t hear the soundtrack, or enough of it to really enjoy movies. And for people who were blind or had low vision, it was yet another round of “What’s happening now’s?” asked of a companion, with the inevitable “Shhh’s!” coming from their fellow patrons.
Enter WGBH, Boston’s public media station and producer of programs such as NOVA, Frontline, Arthur and Antiques Roadshow, and also a pioneer of media access technologies which benefit over 36 million people in the US alone who have sensory disabilities. Captioning for television was developed by WGBH, as was video description for blind viewers, which weaves narration of what’s happening on the screen into natural pauses in dialogue. In the early 90′s, WGBH began researching ways to make movies in theaters accessible. The goal was to offer captions only to patrons who need them vs. open subtitles on the screen seen by the entire audience (which were available for some movies in some theaters). Delivering descriptive narration could be achieved with infrared or FM systems already developed to provide an amplified soundtrack delivered through headphones for people who are hard of hearing.
The result of WGBH’s research was Rear Window® Captioning and DVS Theatrical®, which debuted at the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum’s IMAX theater in 1995, and in a first-run movie theater in 1997. Together, the systems are called Motion Picture Access® or MoPix®.
Here’s how they work:
Rear Window® Captioning
The patented Rear Window Captioning System displays reversed captions on a light-emitting diode (LED) text display which is mounted in the rear of a theater. Deaf and hard-of-hearing patrons use transparent acrylic panels attached to their seats to reflect the captions so that they appear superimposed on the movie screen. The reflective panels are portable and adjustable, enabling the caption user to sit anywhere in the theater.
DVS Theatrical®
DVS Theatrical delivers descriptive narration via infrared or FM listening systems, enabling blind and visually impaired moviegoers to hear the descriptive narration on headsets without disturbing other audience members. The descriptions provide narrated information about key visual elements such as actions, settings, and scene changes, making movies more meaningful to people with vision loss.
MoPix
MoPix systems are now installed in over 350 first-run and specialty theaters (such as National Park Visitors Centers, IMAX theatres and Disney theme parks) in North America. All of the major Hollywood studios work with WGBH to make their films accessible in time for their debut. People can now enjoy movies during regularly scheduled screenings–with their families and friends–when it is convenient for them.
Open captions (captions projected onto the screen vs. the “burned in” subtitles of old) are also available in several hundred theaters. While this means of displaying captioning requires special screenings so as not to detract from hearing audiences’ enjoyment of movies, it is yet another way to make movies accessible. New devices for delivering captions to individual patrons are in development, signaling the film industry’s growing commitment to serving this audience. Good news for everyone.
Resources for more information:
- Mopix.org – Web site for the Motion Picture Access Project. Lists movies now available with access features, past movies and upcoming releases, equipped theater locations, quotes from users, and information about how captioning and description work with new digital cinema systems.
- Captionfish.com – Web site to find captioned and described movies near you. The site has a Web crawler that scans theater chains’ sites to find accessible film showtimes, and offers results based on your zip code.
- WGBH’s Caption Center
- WGBH’s Video Description Service
Tags: accessible movies, Audio description, Closed captioning, Hearing impairment, movies, movies captioned, summer blockbusters, WGBH
