Video Transcripts
Two types of videos can be included in your OER: a video you created or a video you are linking to or embedding that someone else created. The following considerations for transcripts are organized by type.
Author Created Video
If you are developing your video for inclusion in your OER, consider the following:
- Write a script with audio descriptions of what is happening visually in the video.
- Use a microphone or headset to record your voice and limit background noise.
- Use a camera with at least 720p resolution and adequate lighting.
- Ensure the video’s information has sufficient colour contrast and avoid flashing content.
- Order machine-generated captions and edit for accuracy using your script.
- Use edited captions to generate a transcript.
- Upload the video to an accessible video platform. An accessible video player supports closed captions transcripts, is keyboard-accessible, and does not autoplay.
Captions
Captions are the text of the audio in a video, synchronized with the video content. To create captions:
- Use automatic captioning tools to develop a draft.
- Edit automatically generated captions, ensuring names and terminology are correct.
- Include relevant sound effects, music, and other non-speech audio elements.
- Identify speakers if not visually obvious.
- Sync caption timing with audio.
Closed captions can be toggled on and off by each viewer. Open captions are part of the video file and cannot be toggled on and off. Prefer closed captions except for foreign language subtitling.
Videos Created by Others
If you want to include videos that have been created elsewhere, consider the following:
- Does this video include accurate closed captions?
- Does the video include access to a transcript?
If closed captions are not included, you can request that the author add them or look for an alternative video.
If the video does not include transcripts, follow the steps below.
Creating Video Transcripts
Follow these steps to create video transcripts.
- Open a Google Doc and go to Tools – Voice Typing to turn on audio-to-text functionality.
- Open the video and let it play while the voice typing is activated.
- Review the transcript and ensure it is accurate. Also, make sure it is in paragraph format.
Adding Video Transcripts in Pressbooks
When adding videos in Pressbooks from an external site, such as YouTube, or as a video file directly via the “Add Media” option, ensure that your video always contains captions. If the video is uploaded to YouTube, for example, the system will also generate a transcript directly within the player, where timestamps can be turned on or off by the user.
Below the video in Pressbooks, we include the following information:
Video: “How miscommunication happens (and how to avoid it” by TED-Ed [4:32] is licensed under the Standard YouTube License. Captions and transcripts are available on YouTube.
or
Video: “How miscommunication happens (and how to avoid it” by TED-Ed [4:32] is licensed under the Standard YouTube License. Transcript.
In some cases, if captions are unavailable for the video, a transcript will be required. When we generate a transcript in the ODS, it is our best practice to include the transcript directly within Pressbooks rather than providing it as a downloadable PDF or by hosting the transcript as a link on another site, such as Google Docs.
Transcript Process
Add a transcription following this process:
- In the Back Matter of the book, create a section entitled “Video Transcripts” and set the Back Matter type to “Miscellaneous.”
- Using Heading 2, list the chapter/section title where the video appears and hyperlink it back to the section using the Insert Link option.
- Using Heading 3, list the video title information (hyperlink directly to the video if it’s hosted on YouTube).
- Create an anchor at the beginning of Heading 3 (be sure to title the anchor in a way that is easily identifiable, such as Transcript_4.3_Office_Jargon).
- Add the text of the transcript without any additional styling.
- Save the page.
- Repeat this process for each transcript that is added.
- Return back to the chapter/section where the video appears, and make sure to hyperlink the word “Transcript” by using the anchor link you created in Step 4. Do this for each video.
- Separate each transcript entry with a horizontal line .
Example
Refer to the following chapter in Talking Business to view an example of an embedded video with captions and transcripts available on YouTube (Video 1) versus a video on Youtube with a transcript added in Pressbooks (Video 2):
Author Created Video adapted from “Video Accessibility” from Accessibility Handbook for Teaching and Learning by Briana Fraser and Luke McKnight is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted—modifications: summarized the content.
