Deaf and Hard of hearing issues

[Boom Boom]

I think the CRTC has mandated CC for all networks, regardless. I don't know how to check, but all televisions built since 1993 have CC capability, and there was a huge fight in the 1980s to get all networks operating in Canada to CC all their programs. It's a small part of their overall operating expenses. Regardless of whether the original video was CC or not, networks can contract out the CC to an outside company. When you watch a televison program or a movie on television, you often see a CC credit to an outside production company. And, advertisers are jumping on the CC bandwagon: many huge companies sponsor CC on televion programs. Television commercials have been closed captioned for many years.

[GDKitty]

That's really frustrating, Boom Boom.  Last year, I bought the DVDs for 'Little Britain,' mainly for the captions. I'd been enjoying the show on the Showcase channel but they weren't airing the episodes with CC, and Mr. Kitty couldn't hear a damn bit of dialogue--just the extra loud laugh-track commonly used in British comedies. (Ab Fab's laugh-track was quite awful, too).

Here's something odd: BBC World News airs on PBS (WNED Buffalo here) without CC, but it airs on CBC Newsworld with full CC.

[GDKitty]

All TV sets made after a certain date must be CC-capable, but I don't think CC is mandatory for all programs yet, which totally sucks.

[Boom Boom]

I think it's weird that I can watch Vicar of Dibley on American PBS-TV with closed captioning, but Vicar of Dibley is not closed captioned on Ontario's TVO. :

[GDKitty]

You're definitely on to something with the advertising/sponsorship thing, Boom Boom: I often see 'CC provided by

• ' at the very end of a show. It's just not clear to me whether it's the producer of the show, the studio, or ??? who pays for it. I know it's very, very expensive for some reason...a lot of 'indy' stuff never gets captioned, particularly documentaries.

Perhaps TVO can't afford it, if the CC costs them 'extra'? I dunno

[Timebandit]

Actually, you HAVE to closed caption as part of pretty much any broadcast pre-license agreement, even if you are an independent producer of documentary.  Even my low budget work has closed captioning.  It isn't that bad for expensive, either (about $1500 per hour, unless you're paying for transcription as well, which will put you up to about $2500, which is still relatively inexpensive in terms of production costs).  So don't be dissing us documentary-makers, we almost always closed caption.

Oh, yes, and as a budget line item, technically we pay for it as part of the cost of production, which is funded by a combination of broadcast pre-license, tax credit (that would be producer equity), and potentially other funding such as the Canadian Television Fund.

As to acquisitions (which a foreign property like V of D), it may be different, and of course a series may be expensive to CC, inclusive of transcription.

[GDKitty]

Thanks for the info, Timebandit---and I would never diss documentary makers themselves! I love documentaries  :mrgreen: I was just commenting that some docos aren't captioned, and I just assumed it was b/c it was so expensive. Come to think of it, the non-CC'd films I have are USian or British indies, not Canadian.

I don't think the onus should necessarily be on the film-maker though, and I've always jumped to the conclusion that it was the TV network at fault