Nai’s Midterm Portfolio – #4 Audio Description – Digital Accessibility and Creative Applications: Fall 2024

The Project

Project Description

For this project, I chose to add an in-line audio description to the piece ‘Cindy Goes to a Party.’ I wanted to challenge myself by not only making the piece more accessible but also ensuring that it remained enjoyable. My goal was to enhance the experience without detracting from it.

Documentation

Script I made:

[EXTENDED] Intro Scene: Cheerful, upbeat music plays, creating an uplifting atmosphere 

The screen displays text that reads: Young America Films  presents. The text disappears and promptly transitions to the text: Cindy goes to a party. As the title fades, it transitions to reveal: A Centron production.

Reflection Questions

[INLINE] 1st Scene: The intro music fades, revealing Cindy and Dennis playing basketball in the backyard.

[INLINE] 2nd scene: Dennis hands the ball to Cindy and walks away. Lost in thought, she holds the ball in her hands, slowly walking around the yard. After circling, She heads toward the door as the scene fades.

3rd Scene: The scene cuts to Cindy and her mom on her bed, preparing to sleep.

4th Scene: 

Cindy's mom leaves the room. Cindy lies down, her eyes heavy, slowly drifting off to sleep. The room is still
As Cindy falls asleep, voices call out for her. 

5th scene: 

A fairy godmother appears. Cindy stands up from her bed, and  the fairy godmother waves her wand, changing Cindy's clothes from a nightgown to a dress. The fairy godmother waves her wand and the text 'Be Clean' appears. Then the text 'and Neat' appears."

6th Scene: 

With a wave, Cindy and the fairy godmother appear at Mary’s front door. The fairy waves her wand and the text be on time appear on screen The fairy waves her wand and the text leave on time appear on screen 

7th Scene: 
The fairy godmother waves her wand and Dennis appear seated taking part of the musical chairs games

8th Scene: 

The fairy godmother waves her wand and the text JOIN IN THE GAMES APPEARS. The kids stand up and start running around the chairs (musical chairs) 

9th Scene: 

The fairy godmother waves her wand and Dennis appear seated taking part of the musical chairs games

Additional Modality (if applicable)

What modality did you apply?

I applied the modality of audio description, I implemented both in-line and extended audio description.

How did you decide on this modality?

Before this piece, I had implemented creating captioning by leveraging color, typography, and motion- to make this piece feel complete and accessible audio description was the next step to bring the visual components to life through a spoken narrative for people who might be Blind or low-vision individuals

What does the beholder gain from this additional modality? Why?

Besides captioning, viewers also get to experience the story in the form of audio. Often audio description is

Does the beholder lose anything from this modality? What?

Beholders that might be both blind or low-vision and Deaf can definitely miss out on an experience like this. Introducing a tactile form of modality could help with that or maybe leveraging sign language.