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Stanford Captioning System

Captioning Videos with a Transcript

If you already have a transcript, created either by you or from outsourcing the transcription process separately, then the Stanford Captioning System can process your transcript into caption files at no charge. If you do not have a transcript and wish to create a captioned version of your media presentation, please follow the instructions for creating videos without a transcript.

Step 1 - Uploading the Media File

Choose the media file to upload to the Captioning System. The file should be less than 1GB and may be one of the following formats:

• Video: MOV, WMV, MP4
• Audio: WAV, WMA, MP3, MP4

Please ensure that audio files are encoded are greater than 12 kHz.

For files that require that require higher quality encodings, are greater than 1GB, or in HD-format, it is recommended to upload an audio-only version of the presentation. This will still allow for a time-stamped/caption file to be created and added to the media presentation when appropriate.

Step 2 - Specify a Title

Provide a title and description of the job. The title should be a unique name to distinguish this job from other captioning jobs you may submitted to the Stanford Captioning System. Do not use any special characters for the title and keep titles to less than 100 characters.

You may also provide a longer description of the project. This can aid in differentiating between jobs that may be part of a larger project or if the materials are being resubmitted for processing.

Step 3 - Click the "I already have transcript..." Hyperlink

When you click on the hyperlink "I already have a transcript..." the page will provide the option to upload your text transcript. Transcript files must be text-only and end with the extension TXT. Text files may be of either ASCII or UTF-8 encoding.

In order to ensure the Stanford Captioning System processes your text file correctly, please follow these content formatting guidelines:

• Do not include any blank lines.
• Use only plain text formatting (e.g., no italics or bold formatting).
• Each sentence should be on its own line.
• Include a carriage return at the end of each sentence.
• For music or musical instruments, it will not be possible to use the musical note icon. Please use [music] or [singing] as appropriate. If the name of the song or lyrics are provided, include that information.
• If there are multiple speakers, indicate the speaker change with the same information the viewer has or use right arrows (">>" or ">>>") to indicate which individual is speaking.
• Sound effects (e.g., applause, laughter, etc.) should be included on the same line as a sentence where it is most appropriate.
  Example: [applause] Thank you for the introduction this afternoon

E-Mail Notifications

You will receive two e-mail notifications after submitting media content to the Stanford Captioning System. The first e-mail will inform you that the Captioning System has converted your video presentation into "Web-ready" formats (i.e., FLV and MP4). The second e-mail will inform you that the Captioning System has processed the text transcript and the caption files are now available. Follow the appropriate instructions for adding captions in your media presentations:

• Adding Captions to iTunes U and YouTube
• Adding Captioned Videos to Web Pages
• Embedding Captioned Videos into CMS Platforms