Did you know Audio Description, also known as Video Description, is available for people with visual impairments? Here is the definition of this service as found in Wikipedia:
“Audio description, also referred to as a video description, described video, or more precisely called a visual description, is an additional narration track intended primarily for blind and visually impaired consumers of visual media.”
Recently our friends at Walmart came to us to partner on an Audio Description project. We have a track record of providing this service for fully produced videos, but providing this for a live event was new to us. Sure, live theater productions use audio description all over the country. They have opportunities to use a script and participate in rehearsals. The project we were asked to participate in was a completely live event, no scripts, just a business meeting. Walmart’s goal was to make this business meeting accessible to anyone who wanted to participate, regardless of visual impairments.
We worked on the workflow for this project with Dave Magnia at Walmart. For the first attempt at this project, we assembled at Rex Post in Portland, Oregon, in order to have high-quality and high-speed audio delivery from and back to Walmart. We worked with our friends Russ Gorsline and Brent Rogers of Rex Post. Dave provided our talented audio artist, Paige Jones, the live audio feed of the event. She spoke into a microphone which delivered her description of the event back to Walmart on a different line to be added to the event. Dave and his crew created a secondary video feed for Walmart employees who needed to use the audio description. The event was a success!
Let us know if you’d like to find out more about this service. LNS is all about accessibility for everyone.
