Article and Podcast of Interest re AD

Sundance Partnership Extends Accessibility for Attendees With Disabilities. The article includes a discussion of expanding the amount of audio description.

TechShare (UK) Podcast:  Panel Discussion on Audio description and Video on Demand, chaired by Sonali Rai, Broadcast Relationships and Audio Description Manager, RNIB.  Panelist include Sarah Henninger, Director, Global Accessibility Policy & Initiatives, Apple; Abhiram Moturi, Senior Product Manager - Technical, Prime Video Accessibility and Core CX, Amazon; plus three from the UK.  Alternatively, you can download a transcript of the Panel Discussion as a Word document.  (Posted Jan 21)

Free Described Movies on IMDb TV

IMDb, the Internet Movie Database, is owned by Amazon.  In addition to their well-known online database of movie data, they operate a FREE streaming service called IMDb TV which includes some audio described content.  There are several ways to access the content.  (1) Online in a browser via the link above.  (2) Via the IMDb TV App, if you have a Fire Stick or other Fire product.  (3) Via the IMDb TV App on your mobile phone.  (4) Or via the Prime Video App on any device (remember, Amazon owns both services).

What's the catch?  Ads.  Ads support the free viewing.  If you find a title via Prime Video, you will have a choice of watching right away, right there, free with ads, or renting or buying from Prime Video without ads.  Its free via any of the other IMDb TV options directly, though a free ID is required.  Unfortunately, there is no list of IMDb described titles at present, so we are adding this information to our Prime Video AD Titles listing, since they are all a subset of Prime Video titles.  As you will see in our listing, here is a list of current titles.  (Posted Jan 21)

• Chappie
• Collide
• Corner Gas Animated
• Dolphin Tale (2011)
• Fury
• Ghost
• Hands of Stone
• Megamind
• Pride And Prejudice And Zombies
• She's Out of My League
• Shrek Forever After
• Sing Street
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out Of The Shadows
• The Adventures of Tintin
• The Founder
• The Ring
• The Smurfs 2
• Trouble With The Curve

Audio Describer Training at ADI
Filling Fast - Sign Up Now!

Once again the Audio Description Project's Audio Description Institute will be providing training for persons wishing to learn how to become an audio describer or to refresh skills.  The dates are February 22-24 in Alexandria, Virginia.  Read the ADI Brochure and enroll now.  (Updated Jan 14)

Audio Description Narrators of America
Introduction - and a Contest!

theADNA.org (The Audio Description Narrators of America) is a new website which links Audio Description Narrators (the voice-over artists who read audio description scripts) with their film credits for blind and low vision audiences.  As the site continues to evolve, they need your help to grow the content by contributing publicly available information on narrators and the features and series they narrate.  So they are doing a 4 week promotion to get you more directly involved.

Beginning January 7th and continuing for the next 7 days, you can contribute video titles and their narrators by emailing admin@theADNA.org with as much detail as you can.  On the 14th, the highest contributor will receive a free month of the streaming service of their choice, up to $20.  They will continue this for an additional 3 weeks, giving out 4 one-month subscriptions!  At the end of the 4 weeks, the person who has contributed the most titles and their narrators during the 4 weeks gets one year of the streaming service of their choice, up to $240!  Really!  Only the first NEW submission of a pairing will count, of course.  While we encourage narrators themselves to submit their own titles (along with a brief bio), these awards are intended for our audiences.  Per ADNA management, all legal disclaimers for this kind of promotion apply.  (Posted Jan 7)

A Look Back at Audio Description in 2019
by Fred Brack, Webmaster

As I look back at the events of 2019 from my perspective as the guy who collects and presents all the details of who-releases-what in the area of audio description, my number one impression is WOW! — what a huge increase in the amount of audio description available in 2019!  The increase is primarily in the area of streaming services.  We closed out 2018 with 2177 videos available with description on three streaming services (iTunes, Netflix, and Prime Video), and we are ending up 2019 with a whopping 4326 described titles (some duplicated of course) across six streaming services (now adding Apple TV+, Disney+, and Hulu), an increase of 99%.  On 12/31/2019, there were 3661 unique titles (movies and series) available with description in theaters, on DVD, on TV, and on the six streaming services.

Who stands out as major contributors to that effort?  Number 1 would have to be Amazon Prime Video, where the team bent over backwards to bring us 1212 more videos during 2019, an increase of 275% over YE2018, pushing Prime Video to the #1 supplier position with 1652 described titles.  I feel that number 2 is the team at Disney for premiering a new streaming service with over 300 described videos on day 1.  And some of those described videos were produced as far back as the 1930s!  And number 3 would be Paramount Studios, who took the time, effort, and money to go back and create audio description tracks for over 150 old movies that didn't have them, making them available to the streaming services.  I sure wish other studios would do the same.  Thank you, thank you to all who contributed.

Apple's iTunes and Netflix folks are to be complimented as well on their steady increase in described videos, and their willingness to listen to customer requests for specific description tracks.  And of course while it is in its infancy, the new Apple TV+ service has provided description for all its original offerings not just in English, but in eight more languages!  Wow again.

We have three studios audio describing all their mainstream DVDs:  Disney, Sony, and lesser-known Summit.  See my report elsewhere on this page.  We now have 1201 DVDs with Audio Description tracks available.

Finally, I would like to thank my two regular contributors to this website:  Sebastian Andrade-Miles for the weekly described TV listings, and Vicki Vogt for the list of current movies described in theaters.  I also appreciate the contributions of ADP Committee members (especially Carl Richardson) who send me pointers to articles and other information, and the various users of this website who do the same.  I wish all of our website visitors a Happy New Year filled with wonderful description opportunities for both providers and users!  (Posted Dec 31)

SUPPORT the ADP Website!  (please ...)

IF you make purchases via Amazon, you can help support the expenses associated with the Audio Description Project and this website.  If you shop online by clicking our "Shop Now!" link (which is always on this main page), any and all purchases you make from Amazon will result in a commission to the ACB (American Council of the Blind), our parent organization.  Purchasing videos via our DVDs page counts, as do additional purchases made while buying a DVD.  PLEASE remember this and help us out!  THANKS!  (And of course you can also click the DONATE button at the top of every page!)