CASE

• Mixed case characters are preferred for readability
• Use Capital Letters for:
• Individual word
• Single Phrase to denote emphasis
• Shouting

FONT

USE:

• White Characters
• Medium weight font
• Sans Serif
• A drop or rim shadow
• Proportionally spaced
• Translucent box, especially on light backgrounds

Include:

• Upper and lowercase letters with descenders that drop below the baseline
• Multi line captions should be left aligned

DO NOT

• Allow overlap with other characters, ascenders, or descenders

A font, or typeface, is a set of characters at a certain size, weight, and style. Font characteristics must be consistent throughout the media.

LINE DIVISION

DO NOT BREAK:

• A modifier from the word it modifies
• A prepositional phrase
• A person’s name nor a title from the name with which it is associated
• A line after a conjunction
• An auxiliary verb from the word it modifies
• Never end a sentence a begin a new sentence on the same line unless they are short, related sentences containing one or two words

When a sentence is broken into two or more lines of captions, it should be broken at a logical point where speech normally pauses.

CAPTION PLACEMENT

• Multi-lined captions should be left aligned when technically possible
• Captions are placed on the bottom two lines
• If placing captions at the top of the screen also interferes with visuals/graphics, place captions elsewhere on the screen where they do not interfere
• It is preferred that there are no more than two lines per caption
• Place all captions with reasonable margins
• Captioned dialogue must be placed under the speaker
• If a speaker continuously moves from one screen location to another, one placement for captions of that speaker’s communication must be used
• Placement should not interfere with names, faces, or mouths of speakers or text/graphics that are essential to the comprehension of the media
• Do not use other speaker identification techniques, such as hyphens

Caption Placement(vertical and horizontal) refers to the location of captions on the screen

SPELLING AND CAPITALIZATION

• Be consistent in the spelling of words throughout the media
• Capitalize proper nouns for speaker identification
• Lowercase sound effects, including both descriptions and onomatopoeia. Except when a proper noun is part of the description

DO NOT:

• Emphasize a word using all capital letters except to indicate screaming or shouting

PUNCTUATION AND GRAMMAR

Commas:

• When captioning a list separated by commas, use a serial, or Oxford, comma

Hyphens and Dashes:

• When a speaker hesitates or slutters, caption what is said

Ellipses:

• Use an ellipsis when there is a significant pause within a caption
• Use an ellipsis to lead into or out of audio relating to an onscreen graphic
• Do not use an ellipses to indicate that the sentence continues into the next caption

Quotation Marks:

• Use for on screen readings from a poem, book, play, journal, or letter
• Beginning quotation marks should be used for each caption of quoted material except for the last caption

Spacing:

• A space should be inserted after the beginning music icon and before the ending music icons
• Spacing should not be inserted before ending punctuation, after opening and before closing parenthesis and brackets, before and after double hyphens and dashes, or before/between/after the periods of an ellipsis

Italics:

Use Italics as follows:

• When a person is dreaming, thinking, or reminiscing
• When there is a background audio that is essential to the plot, such as a PA system or TV
• The first time a new word is being defined
• Off-screen  dialogue,  narrator, sound effects, or music
• The off-screen narrator when there are multiple speakers onscreen or off-screen
• Speaker identification when the captioned dialogue is in italics
• Foreign words and phrases, unless they are in an English dictionary
• When a particular word is heavily emphasized in speech
• Do not italicize when a person who is off-screen is translating for a speaker who is onscreen

SOUND EFFECTS:

• A description of sound effects, in brackets, should include the source of the sound. However, the source may be omitted if it can be clearly seen onscreen
• The described sound effect should be on the first line of the caption, separate from the onomatopoeia
• Described sound effects and onomatopoeia must be lowercased
• Offscreen sound effects should be italicized, if italics are available
• Place the description of the sound effect as close as possible to the sound source
• Use punctuation to indicate speed or pace of sound
• A sound represented by a repeated word is not hyphenated
• A sound repeated by two different words is hyphenated
• When describing a sustained sound, use the present participle from the verb
• When describing an abrupt sound, use the third person verb form
• Caption background sound effects only when they are essential to the plot

• Never use the past tense when describing sounds

Sound effects are sounds other than music, narration or dialogue.

MUSIC

Background Music:

• A description(in brackets) should be used for instrumental/background music when it’s essential to the understanding of the program
• Off-screen background music description should be italicized
• If possible, the description should include the performer/composer and the title
• Use descriptions that indicate the mood
• Be objective as possible
• For a music that is not essential to the understanding of the program, place a music icon in the upper right corner of the screen

• Avoid subjective words, such as “delightful”, ”beautiful,” or “melodic”
• Nonessential background music should never be captioned at the expense of dialog
• Do not caption background music with a duration under 5 seconds

Lyrics:

• Caption the lyrics verbatim
• Lyrics should be introduced with the name of the artist and the title in brackets, if the presentation rate permits
• Caption lyrics with music icons
• Use one music icon at the beginning and end of each caption within a song, but use two music icons at the ned of the last line of a song
• Space should be inserted after the beginning music icon and before the ending music icons

Intonation, Play on words, and No Audio

•  If the speaker is not visible onscreen, or visual clues that denote the emotional state are not shown, indicate the speaker’s emotion
• When a person is whispering, caption as: [whispering]
• When feasible, describe puns
• When people are seen talking, but there is no audio, caption as [no audio] or [silence]

Foreign Language, Dialect, Slang, and Phonetics

• If possible, caption the actual foreign words.
• If possible, use accent marks, diacritical marks, and other indicators
• Indicate regional accent at the beginning of the first caption
• Keep the flavour of the dialect
• Caption profanity and slang if in the audio
• When a word is spoken phonetically, caption it the way it is commonly written
• If it is not possible to caption the foreign words, use a description (e.g., [speaking French]). Never translate into English