CaptionKit help guide : How to produce captions with the Kit

You can also discuss this software online at CaptionKit Discussion Forum

1. Using the software : Getting started
2. Basic controls
   • Player transport controls
   • Captioning entry controls
   • Font and background colours
   • Jump to time code
3. Creating captions
   • Adding actors to the list
   • Choosing an actor from the list
   • Adding and viewing scenes
4. Organising and editing your captions
   • Editing captions
   • Deleting captions
   • Adding and viewing scenes
5. Saving and loading your work
   • Saving your work in progress
   • Loading previously saved projects
   • Saving your work online
   • Loading online projects
6. Publishing your presentation
   • About publish settings
   • Output scaling
   • Font face
   • Font size
   • Actor identification
7. Viewing your presentation
   • View immediately
   • Add to Favourites
   • Email the link
   • Get it 'Zipped'
   • Online projects
8. Performance Limitations

Basic player controls for moving through the video

There are 3 buttons and a slider visible, together with a timecode readout.

This will begin the video, or restart the player if it is paused.

This will pause the video where it is. Using pause will allow you to type in longer sentences, go for a coffee break etc.

This will stop the video playing and reset the position slider to zero. You will need to press Play to restart the video, before you can use the slider to move about within the video.

Slider : The slider will allow you to skip around within the video unless it is paused. It can also be used to go through the presentation to add a scene.

Timecode : This shows the current video position (minutes:seconds:tenths) and length of the video you have loaded. It will be blank if no video has been specified.

Controls for adding captions to your presentation

When your video is loaded (playing or paused), this will record the current time index from the video. Press Mark as soon as somebody starts speaking or a sound event occurs. You can keep pressing Mark to set a new time code - the video will keep playing.

The video will pause, and allow you to type in a caption for what was just said, and choose who said it from the actors list. The timecode used will be when you last pressed the Mark button.

Continue : When you have entered a caption and actor, the caption list will be updated and the video will automatically continue to play.

Setting colours for your captions

The colour box in the bottom left of the kit, allows you to pick from one of 216 colours. Move your mouse over it and you will see the 'Preview' box shows the current colour.

Picking an actor colour : Make sure the checkbox 'Actor Colour' is selected. When you like the colour your mouse is over, click on it to select. The 'Actor Colour' box will change to the selected colour. You can keep doing this until you are happy with the result. When you create a new Actor, their text will be displayed in that colour. You can make all your actors one colour, or any combination you choose.

Picking a background colour : Try to pick a colour which has good contrast with the text colours you choose. Use the same process as above but make sure the 'Background' checkbox is selected.

The background colour will be the colour on screen behind your captions when they are published. You can change this at any time. It is helpful to use a dark background with contrasting pale text - give some thought to the effect of multicoloured moving text on your audience :-)

Using the timecodes to move through the presentation

Timecodes are created when you press the Mark button, and saved with each caption. As you add captions, you will see an entry in the Time column, which is the precise time the Mark button was pressed within the video.

The Time values are clickable, and will cause the video player to jump to that point in the video. This is a very quick way to navigate through your presentation, and is useful if you are captioning a presentation held on your computer's hard drive.

Adding actors to the actor list

You can add any number of actors to the list. To do this, type their name into the 'New Actor' box. Pick a colour for their on-screen text from the 'Actor Colour' box. Then click 'Add Actor' to add them to the list.

Often just a 'Narrator' will do. There are some pre-selected actors on the list for you (narrator, offscreen narrator, music, sound effect).

If the list becomes too long, you can sort the list of actors by clicking on the sort type at the top of the actor list :

• 'In Order' : Order they were added in (most recent first).
• 'Usage' : Order by how often the actor is used across the whole presentation
• 'A-Z' : Order alphabetically. This will change to 'Z-A' when you click it, and back to 'A-Z' when you click it again.

Picking an actor from the actors list

To choose an actor from the list, click on their name. The name will be selected and added to the 'Current Actor' box to remind you who is being captioned. You will need to create at least one actor for the whole presentation. When you add a new actor, they are automatically selected as the current actor.

Editing captions

To edit your captions, click the Edit button next to your caption. The text to edit will appear in the caption entry box. You can change the text, the actor, or both.

Pressing Edit marks the captions time code but the video will continue playing. When you have listened to the speaker, press 'Caption' as usual and enter the new text (or change the actor).

Press 'Continue' to complete the change.
Your new text and actor will replace the existing caption.

Deleting bad captions

Clicking the delete button will totally remove that caption from the list. It will not delete a scene (even if that scene becomes empty).

Adding and viewing scenes

Scenes allow you to break up the presentation into manageable chunks. They are self contained units (although all scenes share the same actor list). Each scene can have an optional title to remind you what is in it. This can be published if you choose to do so.

You can expand & contract scenes by clicking on the arrow next to the scene name - click once to expand, click to minimise the scene. You can also jump to the start of a scene by clicking on its title, just as you do for caption timecodes.

Saving your work in progress

You can save your projects from the 'Project' page. Click the 'Save Project' button to do this. Please enter a memorable title, and a description if required.

Your work is saved from the browser using your 'User Data' store in IE.This is a temporary storage area which allows CaptionKit to store up to 640k of data.

You can enable this feature in IE by going to the IE menu : Tools->Internet Options->Security

Choose the Local Intranet, then pick the 'Custom' option. To enable Userdata, ensure that the checkbox on the right is selected.

This feature is provided as a convenience and may be subject to browser security restrictions - if you encounter any problems saving and retrieving projects, you are advised to use the 'Publish' feature instead.

Loading previously saved projects

Once you have saved a project, you can get it back by opening the Project page and clicking 'Load Projects'.

This will show a list of the projects you have saved - click on 'Load' to open it and continue working. Don't forget to save your work! You can also delete projects from the list at this point.

There is a demo file with an online video which you can load. Click the 'Load Demo' button. This will show you how a completed project will look.

Saving your work online

You can save your project by choosing the 'Publish' page and click 'Publish'. Your data will be sent to the CaptionKit.com web server for storage.

The website's project page will open, and offer you the chance to preview the presentation, save as a zip file, email the link to the project or add it to your browsers Favourites.

NOTE : If you have deleted your cookies recently, a password box will pop up : enter the username and password which you used when you signed up at CaptionKit. Your project will then be published.

If you have problems publishing (access denied errors etc.), please login to the site first then click Publish as normal. Doing this should allow your Kit to be recognised by the server.

Loading online projects

To load projects you have already published, open the Project page and click the 'Published' button. This will load a list of projects you have saved on the CaptionKit website. You can load them as if they were local files.

About publish settings

To publish your work, user the 'Publish' link in the CaptionKit.

There are a few settings which will affect the way your captions look when they are viewed as a complete presentation.

More options are available on the online Project pages (when you are logged in to the CaptionKit internet site).

• Output scaling

CaptionKit displays video at 176x144 pixels when you create captions, this is purely so it fits on screen :-)

Output scaling refers to how much your video will be resized when it is viewed as a captioned presentation. Normal size will be exactly the same size as the original video.

+50% is a good setting for many videos because it results in a larger picture with only limited degradation of the picture. Double size will probably give you a blocky effect with most videos.

• Font face

Specify a preferred font. This is normally helvetica because it's the most widely supported font (Mac, PC, Unix), and is the one specified by the Captioned Media Program in the US

• Font size

Specify a preferred font size. It is best to pick a size which will result in approximately 32 characters per line. This will ensure the captions can be read easily by average readers. You may wish to reduce or increase the font size for children or special interest presentations.

• Show actors name

This affects when the speakers name is displayed with the captions.

'Always' displayes the speakers name before each line of dialogue.
'First line' (recommended) means that their name is displayed only when the speaker changes. It will be shown again next time the speaker changes.
'Once' displays the first time a speaker begins to speak. After that they will only be identified by the font colour you chose for that actor. This may be appropriate for eg a single narrator or a dialogue between only two people.

Viewing your presentation

When you click the 'Publish' button, your captions are transferred to online storage at the CaptionKit website. This means they can be viewed by other internet users.

You have several ways to let people know about your presentation.

• View immediately

This link will attempt to open the media player which you used to view the video you have just captioned. The players (Real player, Quicktime, Media player) all use different formats for their captions. CaptionKit writes captions specific for that player. Playing the link for a quicktime file in media player will probably result in an error, and so on.

• Add to Favourites

This adds a quick link to your IE favourites list, which you can access quickly.

• Email the link

This will start your email program, and add the link to your presentation to the Body of the message. The email Subject line will initially be the title you gave the project - you can change this if preferred.

• Get it 'Zipped'

This will pop up a file download box. Your captions and supporting files (including instructions on using them) will be offered as a ZIP file to save space.

The ZIP file can be attached to any email, posted to newsgroups or discussion forums and so on. Please refer to the instructions you receive in the zip file to make the most of this format.

• Online projects

You can access this page again from the website. Make sure you are logged in, and click the 'View my projects' to see a list of all the projects you have created.

Performance limitations

CaptionKit works best with any video file which is saved on your computer, because the access time is quick enough to skip through the video like you would with a DVD or video editing program.

You may have performance issues captioning existing internet video, because there will be a delay while the server is contacted. This delay will be small with DSL (high speed internet) but will be a big problem if you are using dialup.

So, you may wish to save the video on your own machine before working on it.

Some internet video (saved as files) will need to be loaded up to that point in the video before it will play. Streamed video can be played from any point by a streaming video server.

File-based locations for video footage will often start http:// and for streaming video will normally start rtsp:// (real player & quicktime) or mms:// (windows media player)

CaptionKit can open any of the formats for which you have player software on your machine. An error message will be shown if the Kit cannot open your selected video.