GREECE: SignWriting Captioning on Video?

[Valerie Sutton]

SignWriting List
June 5, 2002

Dear Giorgia Dervi in Greece:
Thank you for your message pasted below. Your educational video on
the Olympic Games held in Greece 2004 sounds excellent and I think it
is important to include the Deaf Greek population in your
distribution. The Greek Deaf Association gave you good information.
Greek Sign Language is a different language than Greek spoken
language, and it is only natural that Greek Deaf people would request
the video in their language. Hearing people would want that too...

I understand your dilemma. Costs of producing a Greek Sign Language
video are perhaps too high, and you have a deadline. So there are two
other alternatives. First, you can add captions in written Greek
(spoken language), placed directly on the screen. For that service,
contact http://www.cfv.org , which is an American group that does
both closed and open captioning for people. Or better yet, perhaps in
Greece you have a captioning service?

Second, you can include a printed booklet that accompanies the
videotape, which provides a complete word-for-word transcription of
everything spoken on the video. And that booklet could incorporate
some written Greek Sign Language in SignWriting, if you wish. That
would be the easiest, although printing the booklet still costs money
and postage.

Regarding captions in SignWriting on the video screen.....since we do
not yet have the technology to place captions in SignWriting
automatically on the screen, it would be so expensive that it is not
a good idea.

So I suggest a complete transcription of the video in spoken Greek,
with some SignWriting, printed in a booklet and distributed with the
video to the Greek Deaf Community.

There is one group in Greece that has used SignWriting in the past.
If you like, I can put you in contact with them. I have posted your
message to our SignWriting email List, to see if any members of the
List have other suggestions...

All the best with your project -

Val ;-)


___________________________

Valerie Sutton
Sutton at SignWriting.org

.....visit the...

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http://www.SignWriting.org
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http://www.DanceWriting.org
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Deaf Action Committee for SignWriting
Center For Sutton Movement Writing
an educational nonprofit organization
Box 517, La Jolla, CA, 92038-0517, USA
tel: 858-456-0098....fax: 858-456-0020

------------------------

>From: "Giorgia Dervi" <g.dervi at stefi.gr>
>To: <sutton at signwriting.org>
>Subject: OLYMPIC GAMES 2004 VIDEO FOR THE DEAF!!!
>Date: Fri, 5 Apr 2002 15:33:01 +0300
>X-Priority: 3
>
>Dear Mrs. Sutton,
>My name is Georgia Dervis, I'm an executive producer at STEFI FILMS,
>a production company in Athens, Greece.
>     We have produced a 47 min. video for the Education and Training
>Department of the Organising Committee for the Olympic Games 2004.
>This video is in Greek and concerns the Parolympic Games. Since this
>video is meant for educational purposes, we are now in search for the
>best way to present this audiovisual material to the deaf.
>     We have contacted the Greek Deaf Association who tell us that
>what they normally do is have a person accompany the video
>translating it in signlanguage. This is really not possible because
>the video is intended for various destinations around the country.
>What would you suggest?  If there's an organisation that offers its
>services around such matters we would gladly contact them. I have
>browsed through <http://www.signwriting.org>www.signwriting.org and
><http://www.cfv.org>www.cfv.org and have found interesting
>information but I'm not sure I understand what the BEST thing to do
>is. I understand there is the solution of captioning but is there
>such thing as sign writing/language captioning?  We are seeking for
>the best possible outcome since this is an international matter of
>great importance for our country?
>
>
>I thank you in advance and hope to hear from you soon.
>
>GEORGIA DERVIS
><mailto:g.dervi at stefi.gr>g.dervi at stefi.gr
>tel:  00 3010 6108910-7
>fax: 00 3010 6108918
..