media

Movies. I used to really enjoy them. Television too. My particular favorites were typical for the nerdy guy that I am, science fiction, fantasy, and action flicks. Unfortunately, as my sight has worsened, I really don’t invest much time in them anymore. While I can still see somewhat, any fast-paced, action movie was just confusing as they are hard to keep track of. Especially more modern ones where the directors seem to enjoy adding as many edgy camera angles, camera jump-cuts, and fist fights in dark warehouses as possible. I would just leave the theater feeling certain that i had missed A LOT.

Then, I stumbled across audio descriptions while listening to a podcast called Twenty Thousand Hertz (one of my favorites). Audio descriptions is a separate audio track that you can listen to that adds description narration on top of the audio for the movies. Essentially, when dialogue is not being actively spoken, a professional narrator can speak up and describe the scene and what the characters are doing. For example, in a fight scene, the audio describer might provide a running play-by-play of the fight which really helps someone with low vision to keep up with what is happening on screen. It really does add so much to the watching experience and actually reminds me of listening to an audiobook. 

The first movie that I actually tried it was a recent Marvel movie entitled Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. I watched it on the Disney Plus streaming service and all I had to do was change the language option to English – Audio Description rather than the standard English option. Then I kicked back, put my headphones on and hit play. The narrator’s voice starts almost immediately, describing the opening Marvel animation sequence and reading the opening titles to me. After a few minutes, I didn’t even really notice the narration as it just felt natural. All of the various characters were so much easier to keep track of because the narrator told me who exactly was on-screen. Additionally, any time someone new appeared, they would get a short physical descriptoin which was really helpful. 

As I neared the end of the film and the climactic battle sequence, I was so much more invested in the movie than I had been in such a long time. The movie wrapped up and I just sat there for a minute, processing my experience. It was such an eye-opening experience and I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it. I attribute this entirely to the audio description and what it added to my experience. I actually feel like I picked up on more than what most fully-sighted people would have because the narration filled in some of the gaps for me. 

I am so thankful to have discovered this accessibility feature and have gone on to watch numerous movies and TV shows. I even watched the most recent Spider-Man movie in the theater, utilizing a provided device to get the audio description audio track. I will write all about that experience in a future post. When we match movies together as a family, I now watch the same movie on a laptop with audio descriptions turned on while the rest of the family watches the regular version. It really is awesome and I feel so much more included. 

There are some wonderfully talented and dedicated people working in this area and the market fot it seems to be growing, which is wonderful to see. Services like Disney Plus, Netflix, and Paramount Plus are including the audio description track with just about every new release and Disney has even gone back and done most of their catalogue. I love to see it and am looking forward to so much video content now.