these days there are alot of videos that have great stories. also, when your sighted friends are talking about a movie you want to be able to add to that conversation. Instead of asking question after question about the things that happened when no one on screen was talking.

I use it all the time and constantly advocate for more of it's use. It's nice being able to enjoy media by myself and not have a friend watch it with me so I can ask the most common blind question "What's going on now?" I just wish that when they did dubbing in a language they also dubbed the audio discription. For instance alot of anime has audio discription... in Japanese. Also 'Squid Game' has audio discription... in Korean. I dont speak either language. So I left out of those conversations and shows. I really miss anime I loved the stuff when I could see. I would really like to know what the hell is squid game but I can't.

Is audio discription perfect? No. Can it get better? yes but only so much. There is a quote that I can't remember quite well but it goes something like... "An image can be worth a thousand words." That is truer than many but the visually impared and the blind relize. If I were to have a big scene discribed to me it would prolly take much more time than can be atained. The writers of audio discription have to include as many discribers as possible in as little time as possible. Imagine being shown a huge crowd scene and then being told that you will have to write a discription that takes 16 seconds. to say because that is how much time they have to spare. Madness that is what that is and my hat goes off to those writers whom I assume spend half their time banging their head into a wall.

Some good discribers also make it much more enjoyable. You get the robot people with no emotion but sometimes you get a person that acts things out. If their is a surprise scene they have a surprised tone in their voice. Tone of voice is very important because tone of voice can convey many words without saying a thing. Hear a bit of laughter in the voice? You know it's a light hearted comedy scene. Hear their tone drop and a small quiver in the voice? You know that shit is prolly going down soon. Tone of voice can do more to put a blind person into the same mood as the sighted audiance and at the end of the day that is what audio discription strives to do.

want a fun movie to watch on audio discription? Try out Deadpool 1 and 2. That audio discription is top notch. The Mandolorian audio discription was also very good. Though both have the problem of not offering that same discription in other languages. There are blind spanish speakers out there.

Finally there is one example of a multiple language audio discription. The German show Dark. It has both German and English audio discriptions and I hope it starts a trend towards there being an audio discription for every language the media is dubbed in.


on a related note: I cant figure out how to call netflix and talk to actual management. The customer service says the Netflix HQ has no phone number nor email and the only way to reach them is through snail mail and I call bullshit on that. The company that really got the streaming thing going and has been on the internet for over twenty years doesnt have an email? So if you know it plz share because I intend to continue to message and call them until this audio discription thing gets solved.

I think far more BVI people would choose to have a boring-sounding description than none at all.
Limiting ourselves to the radio is all very well and good (The BBC have brilliant radio drama more often than most are aware), but TV is a cultural thing. People at work talk about it, parents in the school playground, bus drivers and shopkeepers discuss it with you. to withdraw from that just because I'm unable to consume one of the strands when I can enjoy the dialogue, sound, acting, stories, presentation and sometimes description would be silly.

When it is available and I let love it.

Yes, when I can.

Like book narrators there are good and bad audio describers.

I've seen some AD that just added to the comedy but have also seen that guy that sounded dull and like he could not wait to be done to have his coffee break. It really just depends on the person and the company responsible for the AD script.

Yes and I love it. There are some bad audio descriptors out there, but there's bad TV as well. I don't see much of a difference.

>Surely if someone with visual impairment wanted to consume media something like a radio play that is designed to be entertaining from purely auditory consumption would be better.

You realize all the work that would go into making a separate audio only program to match the show? When all you need is an audio description added on. Or are you implying we should only consume audio programs instead of being able to enjoy something a sighted person can?

I don't but that's cause I check out movies and tv shows from audiovault.net instead of tv.

No, my family’s Tv is too old and most Australian channels beyond ABC and SBS haven’t got audio descriptions. Even with the channels that do, it’s only certain programs. I’m not a huge TV watcher anyway, it’s just background noise for me.

I use it a lot. Just wish some older programs were audio described (Battlestar Galactica, anyone?)

An audio description track for a television show or movie is not supposed to add anything extra like comedic value to the narration. It is simply for narrating what is happening on the screen. Everything else you can pretty much get from the normal audio of what you’re watching, be it horror or comedy or tragedy. It is usually pretty well done and very easy to follow.