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Closed Captioning and Transcripts: Home

Introduction

Ensuring that accessibility features such as closed captioning and transcripts are available for users in the video titles we acquire individually/a-la-carte is part of the larger licensing and acquisitions process we undertake. Faculty wanting to request new video titles should contact their liaison librarian.

However, we also subscribe to several aggregated video collections such as those in the box on the right, also listed on our "Image, Video, and Music Databases" page.

Content in those collections can often be older films, and/or from third-parties, that never had closed captioning or transcripts, or those vendors’ end-user platforms may not offer that functionality. 

We can request the vendors above add captioning and/or transcripts to films in their collections that don’t have them, but it may not be available in all cases. If it is not, we then ask the vendors if they can provide us with a copy of the film that we can then give to a third-party vendor, 3Play Media, who will generate captioning and/or transcription for us. Even then it may not be possible to reload said files back into their end-user platforms, so we would also have to ask about possible loading to, and use through, MS Stream. 

Students, or faculty on their behalf, who require closed captioning and/or a transcript for a film in one of our subscription video collections that does not have them, should contact librarytechhelp@senecapolytechnic.ca with the title of the film. Please note, given what is indicated in the paragraph above, that there can be a considerable time delay in getting closed captioning and/or transcripts for specific films, so plan accordingly whenever possible.

Accessibility in Video Collections

Aesthetic Videosource - VideoShelf:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are not available at all.

Audio Cine Films:

  • Closed-captioning is available for most content. Transcripts are not.

Can-Core Academic Video:

  • Closed-captioning is available for some content (April 2022: "McIntyre Media is over 50% of the way through captioning the titles in the Can-Core subscription. It is mostly the older titles that have not been completed, but they are continuing to work through all of the titles. They are using 3PlayMedia to provide the captions."). Transcripts less so ("...where available").

Criterion on Demand:

  • This vendor makes separate English-subtitled versions available for some, but not all, of their films, even those originally produced in English. True closed-captioning that can be switched on or off in a given version is not often available.

Curio.ca (including CBC News in Review):

  • Closed-captioning is available on very few of the clips, programs, and documentaries. Transcripts do not seem to be available at all.

Destination Development Association Resource Center:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are not available at all.

Engineering Case Studies Online:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are available for most content.

Films on Demand:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are available for most titles.
  • If a title has a "Transcript" tab, you may read along with the transcript while the film plays, but you may also click any point in the transcript text and you will be taken to that point in the film.
  • As this database does not offer simultaneous full-screen viewing with transcript reading, turning closed-captioning on can still allow for viewing and reading if you are in full-screen mode.
  • From their FAQs, 25 August 2020: "Films On Demand strives to maintain a 100% caption rate for all English speaking video within our product.  We do not caption foreign language content.  If you come across something that should be captioned, please don't hesitate to contact our support department and notify us."

JoVE Science Education:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are available for most content.

Kanopy:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are available for less than half of the content, but this database offers users the ability to request that Kanopy pursue closed-captioning with film producers.

LinkedIn Learning (formerly Lynda.com):

  • Closed-captioning and read-along transcripts are available for most content.

LWW Health Library: Made Incredibly Easy!:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are not available at all.

NFB.ca (National Film Board of Canada):

  • Closed-captioning is available for a small amount of content only, as is described video for the visually impaired on some titles. There are no transcripts with their films.

Nursing & Allied Health Premium:

  • Closed-captioning and read-along transcripts are available for most video content.

Safari Books Online (also known as OReilly for Higher Education):

  • Closed-captioning is not available for most videos. It depends on each film's producer. Transcripts do not seem to be available at all.

Safetyhub:

  • Closed-captioning is available for most content. There are no transcripts with their films.

Seneca Libraries Streaming on MS Stream:

  • Closed-captioning and read-along transcripts are available for most content.

Skillsoft Books (formerly known as Books24x7):

  • Contains "Leadership Channel" videos and closed-captioning is available for most of that content. There are no transcripts with those films.

University of Fashion:

  • Closed-captioning and transcripts are available for most content.