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FAQs: Captions in Canvas
Expand section General Questions
You aren't able to request human-made captions with Kaltura. However, because you can upload captions yourself, you can use captioning services that you employ on your own, such as Rev.com or Cielo24. Services like these usually cost between $1 and $2 per minute of media. You may want to talk to your department about this cost if you think it necessary.
Typically the way captioning services work is as follows:
- You create an account and add a form of payment
- You upload a media file
- You provide information like desired turnaround time, languages, and other transcription features
- You're sent the caption file(s) or provided download links
Machine captions are sufficient, but consider taking the time to edit them for accuracy.
All videos added to "My Media" after 13 June 2020 will automatically have captions requested and inserted into the video. However, machine captions are only about 70% accurate for colloquial speech. With potentially 1 out of every 3 words being inaccurate, we strongly encourage instructors to consider editing their captions for accuracy.
There's no doubt that editing captions is time-consuming, particularly for longer videos. With that in mind, we encourage you to reach out to TAs and student workers for assistance in the process. Note that you can add a student as a collaborator on a video (specifically a "co-editor") and they'll be able to edit your video's captions. You can learn more about adding collaborators in our tutorial on sharing videos.
If a student with a disability requires captioning as an accommodation, captions will be provided in real time by a certified captionist or you may be asked to provide a complete and accurate captioned transcription of the video. Please contact the Office for Students with Disabilities at osd@ucsd.edu if you have further questions about disability accommodations.
Up to 2 times the length of the video.
As you might imagine, the time it takes for your captions to be created depends on the length of your media. The formula that dictates how long it will take machine captions to be generated is roughly as follows:
- For entries shorter than 15 minutes, the machine caption turnaround time should be less than 30 minutes after the video is done processing.
- For entries longer than 15 minutes, the machine caption turnaround time should be no more than 2 times the length of the video after the video is done processing.
Do note that this refers to Kaltura's captions (which are themselves generated by a subcontractor called Verbit). If your Kaltura entry is the result of our Zoom integration, Kaltura is pulling Zoom's captions over and NOT requesting captions from Verbit. There is no formal stated turnaround time for Zoom captions to make their way to Kaltura.
Expand section Editing Captions
Though it's ultimately a matter of preference, we find it easier to edit captions on your desktop.
Kaltura's web-based editor has a few shortcomings, particularly when it comes to "find and replace" functionality. It's also arguably a little easier to navigate a pure text document than the text within individual caption boxes in the web editor. Admittedly, there are a few additional steps involved in editing locally, insofar as you have to download and upload.
Yes. They need to be a co-editor on the video.
Follow our instructions on adding collaborators to a video to add a user as a "co-editor" on your video. The video will then show up that user's "My Media," after which time they can follow the instructions on this page to edit your captions. Note that that user will also be able to perform a variety of other edits to your video, such as renaming it, changing the description, changing the thumbnail, etc. They'll also be able to download your video.
If you click "save" your old captions will be cut at the timecodes you identify. If you click "save a copy" after editing, your "old" captions will be present in the new entry (cut appropriately) AND a new set of machine captions will be requested.
If you make cuts to a video, the captions will be cut at the timecodes you identify. BUT, every new entry created in Kaltura automatically has machine captions requested. This means:
- For videos where you click "save" after making your edits, your captions will be cut at the timecodes you identify. You may want to take a look at the captions around those timecodes, however, just to make sure that they look right. You can make edits to the captions if necessary.
- For videos where you click "save a copy" after making your edits, the captions will be cut up just like the video. However, because all new Kaltura entries automatically have machine captions requested and inserted, a new set of captions will eventually show up. You may want to either hide or delete one set of the captions.
Have additional questions about video? Contact Multimedia Services at kaltura@ucsd.edu.