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DVD Audio Description Review

Thank God You're Here (Series Two)

Roadshow Entertainment, 2007.

 

 

About the Author

Tim Noonan, a blind consultant and Company Director of Tim Noonan Consulting Pty Ltd Excellence in Accessibility and Usability, kindly agreed to review the DVD release of Channel Ten's popular television show Thank God You're Here (Series Two).

Tim Noonan has been consulting to government departments, not for profit and non government organisations, educational institutions, and industry groups since 1995. His expertise is in usability and accessibility, with a key focus upon making information and technology accessible to people with disabilities. Read more about Tim Noonan on his website, or contact him by email at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

 

Thank God You're Here has been Released on DVD with Audio Description

Recently, the second of Channel Ten's  'Thank God You're Here' television series was released on DVD by Roadshow Entertainment. This second series also provides audio description of the nonverbal parts of the programs for vision impaired viewers. The visual descriptions are available by activating this feature on the DVD via the menu system.

 

What Thank God You're Here is all About

This very entertaining improvisation show involves each guest entering a room and a context and having to play the role of a key character, but without being told what their actual role is, or what the purpose of the activity is. They have to use their wit and the rules of improvisation (accepting offers and building on the information given to them) to appear as though they know who they are and why they are there.

 

Why Audio Description was Helpful

This show is a great candidate for audio description, because it is largely a dialogue based show, but the costumes being worn, the features of the room and information used by the guest (and very much by the audience!) are key clues to understanding the Guest's role. Unless the visual context is described, it is not possible to understand the triggers behind the words and actions of the guest.

 

The Obstacles

Somewhat ironically though, for me, a blind person, keen to watch the series, and excited to hear that it was equipped with audio description, I started to feel much more like one of the guests on the show than like a member of the audience! The difference between me and the guest however was that I knew what I wanted from the DVD but had no idea how to do it myself without help from a sighted person.

Let me explain. Sadly, this is the incredible irony behind most recently audio described DVDs, which in most cases don't provide spoken menus and audible DVD labeling.

Picture this:

  1. The DVD arrives;
  2. I get excited;
  3. I place one of the disks in my DVD machine and prepare to be entertained.


Problem Number One

How do I get to play an episode? I semi randomly press buttons on my DVD player and before I know it, the first episode starts playing, but it plays without the audio descriptions. As you might expect, with this kind of show, the listening experience is greatly diminished without the necessary contextual descriptions.

'Hmmmm' I think, I can understand why audio description isn't the default mode for DVD viewers, but 'If I can't see the DVD display or on screen menus, then how on earth am I going to be able to activate it, so I can enjoy the show and have the audio descriptions play?'

The only solution is to ask someone sighted to come over and turn on the feature for me. Not always a viable option depending on when you have time to view the DVD. But at least I'll know exactly what to say when they get here:

'Thank God You're Here!'


Problem Number Two

How on earth do I get to view more than the first episode on each DVD?

As I explained, by pressing buttons at random I'm able to get the first episode to play on each DVD, but, for the life of me, I can't work out how to view the second or third episodes on any of the disks, as this also requires selecting options from the on screen DVD menus.

Solution, Ask another friend to come over and select the episode I want to watch next. Why another friend, you ask? Because, the first friend has already heard the wonderfully appropriate greeting:

'Thank God You're Here!'

And therein lies the supreme irony I mentioned, the provision of audio description is a fantastic feature, but it seems to be completely inaccessible to me without borrowing a pair of eyes.

Of course, the further irony here is that if your household includes friends or family members who are sighted, then they most likely will want to watch this great show with you and in many cases will be able to provide live audio description anyway. However, it is great to know that for this DVD series, that job is completely optional.

 

My Previous Audio Description Experiences

You see I've been spoiled by good or best practice in DVD accessibility. Some months ago I reviewed the Dr Who Series Two DVD set, which was also audio described but, wonderfully, it was also designed to be an accessible DVD, for it provided spoken menus and audio voice labels so a vision impaired viewer could select the desired DVD, select the desired episode and adjust the DVD's features independently via the speaking menus.

 

The Quality of Audio Description on the DVD

So, how was the audio description, once activated?

It was very cool. It wasn't excessive, which is a good thing, but it did provide helpful and relevant contextual and visual clues which significantly improved the listening experience. The provision of audio description for video material is a significant challenge, even an art, for it needs to be interspersed between any existing spoken content in the program, so it doesn't interfere with the standard dialogue.

 

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, I think it's a great move forward that an Australian DVD producer has taken the time and made the effort to provide an audio description track for this series, and I understand this is the first described Australian television series made available on DVD. It is definitely a great first step in increasing the 'viewing/listening' experience for the numerous blind and vision impaired people in Australia and elsewhere.

The important advocacy work by organisations such as Media Access Australia is clearly making a positive difference for the audio visual industries in Australia. However, I firmly believe that unless local education and advocacy clearly explains the reasons for and the importance of providing accessible speaking menus to support audio description, then the significant expense, time and effort of scripting and delivering audio description will at best be largely unappreciated, or worse, unused by the audience the descriptions are designed to serve.