Welcome to the Audio Description Project!

Announcing:  Audio Description Gala

The American Council of the Blind proudly announces the inaugural launch of the ACB Audio Description (AD) Awards Gala on October 21, 2021.  The AD Gala will celebrate audio description through recognition of leaders in the industry and by expanding awareness of the benefits of audio description.  For more information, please read the press release on the AD Gala.  (Posted Jun 4)

World Blindness Summit June 25-30

The first World Blindness Summit will take place virtually this month from June 25 to 30, and registration is free.  Attendees from around the world will "share their experiences and practices developed over the past five years, and especially those implemented to cope with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in all spheres of life."  New priorities will be set "to prevent blind and partially sighted people from being left behind in the digital revolution that has made such great progress in the past months."  Our own Dr. Joel Snyder will be speaking on June 29 on the topic "Audio description around the globe."  Website:  World Blindness Summit.  (Posted Jun 2)

ADP Conference July 16-23 Agenda

Once again the ACB's annual convention will be virtual via Zoom this year, and the ADP Conference will have its presentations scattered throughout the week.  We are offering ten presentations plus two audio described commercial video presentations.  See the full agenda on our Conference page, which includes a link to the full ACB agenda and registration information.  Each week we'll update this entry with another item from the agenda as follows ...  (Updated June 10)

• Sunday, July 18, 1:00 PM to 2:15 PM:
  Audio Description Project Website Overview and Update (acb.org/adp).
  The number of audio described videos available has increased dramatically in the past year to the 6000-plus range. The ADP website is the place to find pointers to them all. This presentation will cover how you can best use the website to find what interests you and how to access description resources.  Presenter: Fred Brack, ADP Webmaster and Social Media Manager, Raleigh, NC.

Television Academy Allows AD Narrators Admission

The Television Academy is the organization responsible for The Primetime Emmy Awards.  The criteria for "Active" membership in the Academy (which then allows voting for Emmy nominees) requires "credits" which are obtained via work in TV.  New this year, the Academy now allows AD Narrators (professional voiceover artists who voice TV series audio description) to use their credits to qualify as members with the potential to vote.  This is not an award for AD work (like SOVAS, the Society of Voice Arts and Sciences, recently announced), but it is a great step forward in acknowledging the role of audio description in the visual arts.  Voiceover artist Roy Samuelson was instrumental in lobbying for this change, and you can read Roy's article for more information.  (Posted May 30)

Commentary on Streaming Services
by Fred Brack, Webmaster

As webmaster, I spend most of my time tracking and organizing the more than 6,000 audio described video titles available on twelve different media and services; but most of those titles are on eight streaming services, so let's talk about the services.  The numbers in parentheses are the number of titles with AD they offer as of June 8, 2021.

• Apple TV+ (66) is unique in that it was created with the intent of providing 100% Apple TV+ originals, all audio described in nine languages on day one.  Naturally, this means fewer titles than the other services, but a guarantee that everything will have AD.  A few non-Apple titles have appeared (Charlie Brown movies), but they all have description.
• Disney+ (710) has a huge library to draw on (including Pixar, Marvel, and Star Wars) and is exceptionally popular with parents, as they have no adult-rated (R or TV-MA) programming.  In addition, Disney has been adding description to older titles that didn't have it, all the way back to 1928!
• Google Play Store (45) is new to our website and offers AD for movies.
• HBO Max (255) is our newest streaming service with AD.  It's off to a good start, though there are some startup problems, like shows with missing or faulty AD.  We try to identify problems for you.  They have a nice listing of audio described titles by movies, series, originals, etc.  Watch our listing for pull dates.
• Hulu (122): Despite the settlement agreement reached with the ACB in October 2018, Hulu (owned mostly by Disney) has been slow to pickup audio description tracks for movies and TV series they license.  The ACB continues to negotiate with them.
• iTunes (1594) has been easy to work with and gives us a reliable listing of titles with AD each week.  Unlike the other services, the titles are all movies.
• Netflix (1600) retains its title as the dominant streaming service, but it is being challenged (according to the analysts) by Disney and HBO Max. Their number of AD titles is neck-and-neck with iTunes.
• Paramount+ (58) grew out of CBS All Access and has been adding titles with some regularity, though AD is missing from many movies.  Notable is the fact that they have added AD to eight CBS series which are not described on CBS TV; and if you have an ad-free subscription, you can watch all the CBS shows with description (and more) without advertisements. (You can also watch them for free, with ads, on the new CBS app.)
• Peacock (12) began offering AD titles (mostly for their own Originals) in June 2021.
• Prime Video (2884) has the largest number of audio described videos, with a rapid increase this year due to describing literally thousands of movies and TV show episodes that never had description, with the "catch" that the description is via synthesized voice, not a human.  Many titles (including all Originals) are free to watch with a subscription to Amazon Prime.  We are having trouble getting updates.

Several general notes:

• For all services, we offer a breakdown by video rating.
• For four of the streaming services we offer links to see titles by genre.
• For five of the services, we offer a link to see a title listing by year of release.

In streaming news, AT&T and Discovery have announced that WarnerMedia (which owns HBO Max) will split off from AT&T and join Discovery to form a new company named Warner Bros. Discovery in mid-2022.  The Discovery+ streaming service does not currently offer any AD, so a combined streaming service (if that happens) could be advantageous.  In any case the combination is expected to be powerful competition.  But right on the heels of that announcement, Amazon has acquired MGM Studios and their massive catalog of titles.  (Updated Jun 8)