Screencast & Animation

The video week #2. I learned further about video creation and editing with various tools, For video accessibility, the synchronized closed caption is becoming standard practice as listed in WCAG 2.1 and is also part of the ADA compliance in the U.S. As for the activity, after writing a script, I recorded a voice-over, produced an animation video with Creative Commons licenses, and recorded it by screencasting.

Animation: 

• Give learners the ability to pause, stop, or hide any content that starts automatically and moves, scrolls, or blinks for longer than five seconds.  WCAG 2.2.2 Pause, Stop, Hide - Level A

• No page content flashes more than 3 times per second. Some people with seizure disorders can have a seizure triggered by flashing visual content.  WCAG 2.3.1 Three Flashes or Below Threshold - Level A

Captions: A text version of the dialogue and non-dialogue audio information to understand the content, for people who are deaf, hard of hearing, and others. “Closed Captions (CC)” are hidden or activated by the viewer. "Open-Captions" are burned-in and always visible (3WC WAI, 2022). Generally, it's shown in one or two lines, and best to keep them under 32 characters per line (Mohaney, 2021). Similar, but the different term “subtitles” translates spoken dialogue.

Challenge #1: Ways to add captions

• Editing captions on YouTube

It seems there are ways to add options. I initially edited the auto-synced captions on YouTube, but because of the number of errors from the automated captions, I found it easier to directly add them from the existing script. YouTube also auto-produces an SBV file that can contain a series of start and end timestamps paired with captions using the H:MM:SS.000 format (FileInfo.com, n.d.). Note that this SBV file doesn't meet accessibility requirements.

• Formatting caption file

An alternative option is to format the basic script into captions before uploading the video to YouTube. Among many options, a plain text format (.sbv or .txt) and SRT format (.srt) are basic and I'm learning how to DIY this and upload it on YouTube/Google Drive to combine with the video mp4 file. 

    Challenge #2: Colors

Color Contrast: The colors of the characters of the Biteable template didn't go along with the brand colors. To prioritize passing the color contrast test at least WCAG2.1 A level, I chose to use most of the template colors that have high contrast.

Designing accessible e-learning resources:

I found a couple of additional resources to learn more about accessibility in the industry.

• 6 Best Practices for Designing Accessible E-learning from E-Learning Heros

• Create accessible screencasts from Indiana University, IT Services

• How to make your content accessible for all students from Screencast-O-Matic

Process

1. Determine which part of the course to develop into a video

2. Outline the concept or process

3. Write scripts (plan ahead to add descriptions of visual information)

4. Record voice-over

5. Edit the voice-over

6. Find an appropriate animation template

7. Draw a rough storyboard

8. Edit the template to fit scripts

9. Produce the animation video with the voice-over

10. Screencast the video

11. Edit the screencast video

12. Upload the video and edit captions on YouTube

13. Update the storyboard

Challenges

The animation was created in Biteable, which allowed only a link to play within the site and required purchasing their Pro plan to download. The alternative solution was to take a screencast of the link. 

Solution

I tried both Screencastify and Screencast-O-Matic to record the browser tab and the audio. It turned out Screencast-O-Matic requires purchasing their plan to add the voice-over, so the option was left with Screencastify. Because of this workaround, the animation is less crisp compared to the original. At the stage of course building, it's recommended to embed the video directly from the site link to obtain clearer lines.

In the end

Putting the voice-over, screencast video, and background music together in a video editor is worth trying. It's important to know the limitations of a free version of the tool and determine which tool is worth upgrading.

The video has open captions in which the video narration appears as text at the appropriate time and gives access to people regardless of abilities and conditions.

The audio description (AD) follows the main narration to describe visual elements, providing access to people who are blind or visually impaired. In this video, I differentiated with a female voice as the main narrator and a male voice as the AD.