Wednesday, September 21, 2022

Close Caption Faux Pas

Close caption is a text version of spoken part of television, movie or a computer presentation. It was originally developed to aid the hearing-impaired people. Also, caption can be read when audio cannot be heard. I read somewhere it is made possible through a process called encoding. (I have no idea what this means.) 

Sometimes, there is a faux pas in close caption words. Completely different from the audio portion. Most of the times it is hilarious. Here a few examples. 

Baseball game. The announcer says “Longoria at first base. The next hitter will be Carlos Pena”. The close caption showed “The next Hitler will be Carlos Pena” (In cricket it is batsman but in baseball it is hitter,)

Reporter says “President Nixon is in the White House”. The close caption showed “President Nixon is in the White Hoe”. 

“Nancy Reagan a former first lady was back at home”. The close caption showed “Nancy Reagan a former fertile lady was back at home”. 

2007 Malibu Fire. The ABC news reporter said: “Fire fighters to deal with not just the fire with people in the middle of the road evacuating”. The close caption showed “Fire fighters to deal with not just the fire with people in the middle of the road ejaculating”. 

Movie close caption. A guy tells his friend: We have to take a ferry to get there. The close caption showed “We have to take a fairy to get there”. 

These are the 2 close caption faux pas I saw in the TV last week. 

BBC was covering the death of Queen Elizabeth. They showed a picture of Camilla, wife of Prince Charles. Narrator says “Now she has become Camilla, the Queen Consort to King Charles. But Camilla will not be called Queen Regina”. But the close caption showed “Camilla will not be called Queen Vxgina”. 

There was a Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. A TV reporter was saying: In a few minutes Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will speak. The close caption showed “In a few minutes Indian Prime Minister Indra Modi will speak”. 

If you know any other close caption faux pas, please let me know through your comments. Thanks.

11 comments:

  1. The close caption for evacuating and Regina made me laugh out loud

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  2. What language you speak. As the song goes "do you spik my langvage".

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  3. Close captions are hilarious at times. Even the speech to text translate are entertaining at times

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  4. This is really hilarious. I think it generates via audio. (and hence the mistakes)

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  5. True. Nice examples :)
    Have seen wrong info provided in the text vs the audio.
    Some times there are wrong spellings.

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