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BBC R&D White Paper WHP051

Audio Description: what it is and how it works
N.E. Tanton, T. Ware and M. Armstrong

Keywords
Access services, visual impairments, audio description, digital television, digital terrestrial television, DTV, DTT

Abstract
For understandable reasons many television programmes rely on visual content and composition to help to tell their story. The provision of additional description of the scene or action can therefore provide a considerable benefit to understanding, especially to the visually impaired.

Audio description (AD) is an ancillary component associated with a TV service which delivers a verbal description of the visual scene as an aid to understanding and enjoyment particularly (but not exclusively) for viewers who have visual impairments.

This White Paper describes the user requirements for audio description, how audio description can be implemented for digital television and how it works for digital terrestrial television (DTT). It also describes a particular practical implementation based on a PCMCIA card module which plugs into any DTT receiver which is fitted with an operative "Common Interface" (CI) socket.