APEX TECH Newport Beach: Closed Captioning Update
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“The news regarding the DOT rulemaking is that there is no news,” says Bryan Rusenko, APEX Closed Caption Working Group (CCWG) co-chair, and APEX technical director, on Tuesday afternoon at the APEX TECH conference in Newport Beach.
The CCWG has been working in response to expected rulemaking from the US Department of Transport (DOT) regarding IFE closed captioning. The working group submitted a White Paper to the DOT in 2014, with the expectation that a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) would be publically released this month or next. However, regardless of the intended timetable, “there really has been no progress forward communicated [from the DOT] for some months now,” says Rusenko.
“Irrespective of the DOT, we are moving forward to develop and implement a next generation closed caption specification on our timeframe.” – Bryan Rusenko
The CCWG has developed the APEX 0814 standard for closed captioning. This standard’s core format for caption data utilizes Timed Text Markup Language (TTML), which is to captioning as HTML is to the Internet. TTML supports worldwide languages and legacy captioning formats, while providing the base for the Internet Media Subtitles and Captions (IMSC) standard.
Rusenko says that the CCWG continues its work in developing workflows, fine-tuning APEX 0814, and educating APEX members on IFE closed captioning. So, although the DOT appears to have delayed the NPRM release, “we’ll be more prepared and more able to respond to any next steps in the DOT process. Irrespective of the DOT, we are moving forward to develop and implement a next generation closed caption specification on our timeframe.”
Read previous updates and stories around closed captioning from APEX.