If you have not followed the evolution of closed captioning in the In-Flight Entertainment world you might take note some recent changes. Specifically, the recent IMS news release demonstrates that their behind-the-scenes work in closed captioning is about to pay off. Our readers might want to pay particular attention to this solution as it has other downstream ramifications and may be the next generation of IFE closed captioning!

Just because it’s smaller doesn’t mean it’s more limited—that seems to be the message behind today’s IMS announcement. Having developed a relatively simple solution for the provisioning of closed-captioned media content with Media Access Group at WGBH in Boston, IMS’ next step for portable media player upgrades is a scheme that only upgrades player firmware. No hardware modification simplifies this really clever to user selected captioning. The new solution stores two files (movie and closed captions) on the player hard drive and the player viewing hardware superimposes them during playback using the content time code as timing mechanism. Under the content delivery plan, WGBH will provide IMS with text transcriptions of the audio portion of movies and TV shows for people who are deaf or hard of hearing in a player-compatible format. IMS and Archos have changed the firmware on the PMPs to support this form of text and superimpose it on the video at the discretion of the viewer.

As we noted, the IMS’ players have the ability to store the captions on the hard disk as independent text files merged with the video in playback using timecode. This method is much simpler and far more efficient than the current methodology commonly used for IFE subtitles where two separate video versions of the content are made and stored, one with subtitles and one without. Under IMS’ approach, the video files are neither changed nor duplicated, but simply synched with the captions in playback. Could this be why IMS refers to itself as a "solutions provider?"

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) recently announced that they were taking a second look at their previously announced intention to require airlines flying in and out of the U.S. to provide closed-captions on all inflight media and would consider a new requirement based on "evolving technology." Several airlines have previously relied on the closed-caption capabilities of DVDs to accommodate the needs of deaf or hard of hearing passengers and provided needed in-flight service by distribution of handhelds and special DVD’s. But airlines seem to be favoring Personal Media Players over DVDs, and this solution is a very good reason for doing so.
We can certainly see airlines with embedded systems keeping a supply of PMPs onboard with closed-caption content to use not only for deaf and hard of hearing passengers but for service recovery in the event that any of their embedded screens go dark. That’s twice the mileage for handhelds and IMS believes that it will be ready to implement the closed-caption offering with its October 2008 content.