Open Captioning - best option sought - TheatreFace

Also see: http://theatreface…

2011-10-12T16:46:55.050Z

Also see: http://theatreface.ning.com/profiles/blogs/surtitles-101

I do opera supertitles all th…

2011-03-27T22:24:10.376Z

I do opera supertitles all the time and it's quite easy with the right projection equipment. It could also be done for a "local" section of the audience, say, a section of a certain amount of seats- with smaller, less expensive LCD screens. These can be fed from a laptop or other device via Powerpoint or Keynote. A great tip though- if you have a script in Word format, put a carriage return after every line, then click "export to powerpoint". If you have a template set up, you'll end up with a single line (or phrase) on each separate slide. Then it's just a person hitting a space bar.

PM me for questions....or

http://www.projectionfreak.com

I asked a friend of mine who…

2010-12-16T02:11:30.695Z

I asked a friend of mine who put together the first one they used for the opera at the Dorothy Chandler and he seconds the PowerPoint idea.

Mamma Mia road company does n…

2009-12-14T20:54:56.588Z

Mamma Mia road company does not tour with a captioning system.

It can be done in many ways. All you need is some way to project the words, a script and an operator to make the system go. Could be as simple as a power point or as complex as slides and a supertitle screen. May I suggest you find out what you PATRONS prefer? After all, this is a service for their convenience.

Excellent suggestions, Laurie…

2009-12-08T14:05:14.287Z

Excellent suggestions, Laurie. thanks so much!

Hi Julie, Here's a short lis…

2009-12-08T12:55:09.600Z

Hi Julie,

Here's a short list that might help with your research:
Personal Captioning Systems Live Theater Captioning Systems
I-Caption (http://www.soundassociates.com/products/icaption/)

Also, you might contact Rochester (http://www.rbtl.org/) - I read that they ran "Mamma Mia" in Dec 2008 and had an LED panel to the left of the stage which could be seen by about 20 rows of patrons. Unless the touring company brought it in, their TD might have plans on how they constructed it, which could save you time on building one from scratch.

If cost is prohibitive, you could consider applying for a grant to fund it.

Yours, Laurie Babcock

I moved here from Las Vegas.…

2009-11-25T17:50:19.269Z

I moved here from Las Vegas. Yep, the weather thing took a little getting used to, but to have seasons again is well worth it in my opinion. Good luck. ((War Horse does kick butt))

I did research hand-held devi…

2009-11-24T22:06:45.707Z

I did research hand-held devices that display the text, through a company called Figaro Systems. They use IPod Touch units for that. But it's nutty expensive (total of $25K for 10 devices - software plus units plus tech support). Also, when I was at a recent meeting for a hearing-impaired community group, they all stated that they hate those units because, as you suggested, it really intrudes on the experience for them. They FAR prefer the open captioning.

That said, C2 ain't cheap either. We applied for the TDF partnership (TDF pays for C2 for a year) but weren't awarded it for this season. I'll try again next year. In the meantime, my AD wants to figure out something we can do in-house.

He recently saw WAR HORSE in London, and said they had a large screen on either side of the stage, which displayed 4-6 lines of the text at a time in script fashion, probably similar to what you mentioned with the screen and the PowerPoint presentation. While he's not hearing-impaired, he said it not only helped him understand the actors with particularly thick accents, but enhanced his literary appreciation of the play (which, by the way, he said was magnificent and one of the best pieces he's ever seen.)

So I have a feeling that's what we're going to pursue next.

How great that you are at the Guthrie. Wonderful, wonderful theatre. I'm actually moving to Minneapolis next spring. Looking forward to being in the city...if not so much the winter weather. :)

Guthrie Theater in Minneapoli…

2009-11-24T19:54:13.134Z

Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis.
Audio Description is an access service usually for the blind or visually impaired where a person sits in a remote location (like a booth) and describes the action of the play into an earpiece that the patron wears. The other patrons don't know it is happening. So, they hear the actors but also get things like 'she picked up the prized photo and is threatening to put it in the fire' so they can put the text in context.

Yes! Bruce is our PM. What th…

2009-11-24T17:15:24.437Z

Yes! Bruce is our PM. What theatre are you with?

I've never heard of audio description. what is it?