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ALL CAPS IN CLOSED CAPTIONING?

post #1 of 8
7/22/12 at 2:09am
Thread Starter 
Hello.

My folks recently bought two new Samsung HDTVs (55" and a 20") to replace their old CRT TVs. I was helping them to set them up.

I noticed closed captionings (CCs) sometimes show all texts in all CAPS in some over the air (OTA) Los Angeles/L.A. broadcasts from an outdoor CM 4228HD antenna. This depends on what is shown like Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy, and Entertainment Tonight on a Saturday evening. Other shows (2.5 Man, The Office, etc.) seems show nice texts (uppercased and lowercased properly).

At first, I thought it was a CC setting but I could not find it (tried font type, services, etc.). I watch TV on my old Windows XP Pro. SP3 computer's HDTV tuner cards, and their DVB Viewer Pro software had no problems when showing CC/subtitles.

Maybe it is not the HDTVs? Does OTA send all caps for specific feeds or something?

Thank you in advance. smile.gif
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post #2 of 8
7/22/12 at 4:54am
CC can be either all caps or a mixture depending on what is needed. With DTV captioning, it can also change font and background color on the fly as well. Many local newscasts that use the Teleprompter for captioning will be in CAPs since that is the format used for the prompter.
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post #3 of 8
7/23/12 at 5:50am
Quote:
Originally Posted by foxeng View Post

CC can be either all caps or a mixture depending on what is needed. With DTV captioning, it can also change font and background color on the fly as well. Many local newscasts that use the Teleprompter for captioning will be in CAPs since that is the format used for the prompter.

Never understood the 'All Caps' thing on US teleprompters.

It's pretty much unknown this side of the pond - we run mixed case on our prompters (I've only worked with one presenter who asked for all caps - and he was an Aussie). AIUI it's easier to read mixed case than all caps - as you get extra cues from the upper/lower case split (particularly when differentiating proper nouns from normal nouns etc.)
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post #4 of 8
7/23/12 at 3:06pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by sneals2000 View Post

Quote:
Originally Posted by foxeng View Post

CC can be either all caps or a mixture depending on what is needed. With DTV captioning, it can also change font and background color on the fly as well. Many local newscasts that use the Teleprompter for captioning will be in CAPs since that is the format used for the prompter.

Never understood the 'All Caps' thing on US teleprompters.

It's pretty much unknown this side of the pond - we run mixed case on our prompters (I've only worked with one presenter who asked for all caps - and he was an Aussie). AIUI it's easier to read mixed case than all caps - as you get extra cues from the upper/lower case split (particularly when differentiating proper nouns from normal nouns etc.)

By doing all caps for the the spoken word, you can put non air things in lower case that never shows up on air, like the name of the anchor to read or video description, etc. We use it as a marker for the director for show elements since we don't have separate TD's and Directors now that we are automated.
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post #5 of 8
7/31/12 at 11:48am
Quote:
Originally Posted by foxeng View Post

By doing all caps for the the spoken word, you can put non air things in lower case that never shows up on air, like the name of the anchor to read or video description, etc. We use it as a marker for the director for show elements since we don't have separate TD's and Directors now that we are automated.

Yep - we have the same issues in the UK - where most news galleries are automated (We started with heavy automation in 1997 - I was one of the first people to use it this side of the pond).

We use reverse video on the prompter for instructions such as anchor names, VT/server or graphics cues for hte director. To enter reverse video you use round brackets - and we usually use ALL CAPS for these instructions. So if it is in mixed case the anchor reads it (as mixed case is easier to read for most people - it's why we use it!) and Reverse Video CAPS is used for technical instructions and anchor allocation (which isn't to be read on air)
eg.

(ANCHOR NAME)
Script which appears in mixed case on prompter and is read by anchor.
(VT OOV)
Script which now appears under VT and is read Out Of Vision by anchor whilst VT runs over the top.I believe is called LVO for Live Voice Over in other parts of the world.

AIUI all the major prompt packages - Autoscript, Autocue etc. - will happily automatically import scripts from ENPS, iNews etc. and reverse sequences in ()s. It's pretty standard here
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post #6 of 8
7/31/12 at 11:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by sneals2000 View Post

Quote:
Originally Posted by foxeng View Post

By doing all caps for the the spoken word, you can put non air things in lower case that never shows up on air, like the name of the anchor to read or video description, etc. We use it as a marker for the director for show elements since we don't have separate TD's and Directors now that we are automated.

Yep - we have the same issues in the UK - where most news galleries are automated (We started with heavy automation in 1997 - I was one of the first people to use it this side of the pond).

We use reverse video on the prompter for instructions such as anchor names, VT/server or graphics cues for hte director. To enter reverse video you use round brackets - and we usually use ALL CAPS for these instructions. So if it is in mixed case the anchor reads it (as mixed case is easier to read for most people - it's why we use it!) and Reverse Video CAPS is used for technical instructions and anchor allocation (which isn't to be read on air)
eg.

(ANCHOR NAME)
Script which appears in mixed case on prompter and is read by anchor.
(VT OOV)
Script which now appears under VT and is read Out Of Vision by anchor whilst VT runs over the top.I believe is called LVO for Live Voice Over in other parts of the world.

AIUI all the major prompt packages - Autoscript, Autocue etc. - will happily automatically import scripts from ENPS, iNews etc. and reverse sequences in ()s. It's pretty standard here

We use Autoscript here.
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post #7 of 8
7/31/12 at 11:58am
Quote:
Originally Posted by foxeng View Post

We use Autoscript here.

So do we!
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post #8 of 8
7/31/12 at 1:42pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by sneals2000 View Post

Quote:
Originally Posted by foxeng View Post

We use Autoscript here.

So do we!

Did you see the PM I sent you a month or so ago?
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