Importance for Accessibility

Captions are text versions of audio in a video, including speech and important sounds.

Why It Matters

  • Supports users who are deaf or hard of hearing
  • Helps in no-audio environments
  • Improves comprehension for everyone 

Core Requirements

  • All videos with audio must have captions
  • Captions must be:
    • Accurate
    • Synchronized with audio
    • Complete (include key sounds)

What to Include

  • Spoken dialogue
  • Speaker identification (when needed)
  • Important sounds:
    • [music]
    • [laughter]
    • [applause] 

Best Practices

  • Keep captions easy to read
  • Break text into short chunks
  • Match captions to timing of speech
  • Review auto-captions for accuracy

Captions vs. Transcripts

  • Captions: synced with video
  • Transcripts: full text version (separate document)

What to Avoid

  • Auto-captions without editing
  • Missing sound descriptions
  • Poor timing or unreadable speed
  • Videos with no captions

Captioning Resources

Captioning and Yuja

Yuja provides a platform that will create an automatic transcript for your video content. Additionally, editors can use Yuja's content manager to edit these transcripts for accuracy. 

Rev

Rev is a professional captioning services contracted by the University. Content that needs to be human captioned can be sent to either of these services for a cost.

To order captions, you will want to do the following:

  1. Create an account with your preferred caption vendor.
  2. Gather a quote for your requisition or create a blanket purchase order.
  3. Reference the contract number in the header when creating your requisition.
    1. Rev: TXST-IT-2022-7366-VPIT
  4. In your requisition, include your quote for supporting documentation.
  5. When using a blanket purchase order, include a date range defining when the purchase order will be used and provide a description of events that will utilize the purchase order.

Zoom Captions

Zoom offers the ability to create a transcript when using their cloud recording service. This process creates a separate VTT file that can be corrected and uploaded into Yuja as the caption file. Zoom captioning resources can be found on their support website.

PowerPoint

Microsoft published clear instructions for how to enable recording for PowerPoint presentations.

PowerPoint Presentation with Prerecorded Audio

For PowerPoint presentations with prerecorded audio, you can do the following to export the PPT into an .mp4 video that can then be captioned via Yuja or a paid service.

  1. Open the file
  2. Select Record from the PowerPoint ribbon
  3. Select Export to Video
  4. Name the export file and choose the location for the export
  5. Select Export to convert the file the mp4 format

YouTube Captions

YouTube can be used to create an automatic transcript for video captions. Google Support provides an easy to read guide for managing captions in YouTube.

Live Captioning Options

Providing live captions for meetings and events helps all users understand your content.

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams offers an easy way for you to provide automated captions for your meetings or online courses.

For more information about how to use Teams, please visit ITAC's own extensive help section.

Present with Automatic Captions in PowerPoint

Learn how to enable real-time, automatic captions or subtitles in PowerPoint.

Microsoft Stream

Any recorded Teams Meeting or PowerPoint presentation will upload into Microsoft Stream automatically.

Learn how to Creat transcripts and captions using MS Stream

Zoom Live Captions

Learn how to enable Zoom captions.

CART Services

Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) services employ a caption writer to provide accurate captions for an event in real-time.