Hot Off the Press Release: Lightbox Captions Handmaid

Blessed be the day: Lightbox at last is starting to caption the programmes it streams, starting with the first three seasons of The Handmaid’s Tale.

It also plans to caption selected movie rentals.

Curiously, among the reasons it doesn’t site for the captioning is the difficulty some of have hearing dialogue on content that isn’t mixed to optimise the spoken word.

Here’s the full release:

THE HANDMAID’S TALE AVAILABLE WITH CAPTIONS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN NEW ZEALAND AS LIGHTBOX INTRODUCES CAPTIONING.

Lightbox has begun the process of introducing captioned content to its platform, launching with all three seasons of The Handmaid’s Tale being made available with closed captions for the first time in New Zealand.

Initially focusing on its most popular and high profile SVOD titles both currently on the platform or coming to Lightbox, viewers can now enjoy captions on shows including The Good Doctor, The Act and the most recent seasons of Outlander and Suits.

“Captioning represents an exciting and important next step in Lightbox’s content strategy,” says Hema Patel, General Manager of Lightbox. “We recognise the importance of making our content more universally accessible for our users and giving them greater control over how they consume the shows they love.”

While captioning is important for deaf and hard of hearing viewers, it is also utilised by those with English as a second language, viewers in sound-sensitive environments (such as public transport) and increasingly as a ‘sound off’ option driven by social media trends.

Lightbox is in the first stages of introducing closed captions and will continue to test and make updates to the platform, add new captioned TV content and introduce when available on selected movie rentals.

FULL LIST OF CAPTIONED CONTENT:

1. The Handmaid’s Tale S1-3

2. The Good Doctor S1-2

3. Outlander S3 (by 28 June), S4

4. The Act S1

5. Suits S8B

6. The Enemy Within S1

7. Vikings S5B

8. The Son S1 (by 28 June), S2

9. Abby’s S1

10. The Harry Quebert Affair S1

11. Better Things S3.

Q&A 

How can I access Captioned Content on Lightbox?

1. Search ‘Captions’ via the search button within Lightbox.co.nz or the Lightbox app.

2. Find the ‘Captions’ carousel on the Home and TV pages within Lightbox.co.nz or the Lightbox app.

3. By hovering over the show tile, it will include the words ‘Captioned’ next to the genre:

4. Displayed on the show page next to the genre:

5. To turn captioning on simply click on the CC icon to the bottom right of your screen on desktop or top right on a Smart TV or Android/iOS app.

My favourite show isn’t captioned?

Lightbox is captioning content as and when the correctly formatted file is made available by the distributor. We endeavour to caption our most popular series but unfortunately can’t caption all titles as much as we would love to.

For more information please visit the Lightbox Help Centre

https://help.lightbox.co.nz/subtitles-closed-captioning-on-lightbox