Marketing Communications provides closed captioning from a third-party service, Rev.com. Marketing Communications will submit the video for closed captioning on your behalf and charge your budget, unless otherwise agreed upon. Your captions will then be reviewed by a member of your team for accuracy.
You can create your own closed captioning in the form of an SRT file (such as through YouTube, Canvas Studio, or another method) or you can work directly with a paid third-party service to create an SRT file for you. MarCom recommends Rev.com.
You should review captions for accuracy and edit them before publishing or sharing your multimedia content.
For other media like podcasts or other audio files, you should include transcripts. You may create transcripts yourself, or you may utilize a third-party vendor, such as Rev.com.
Before you add captions to your video, please ensure that the video has been edited and is in it's finalized form.
Caution: if you edit the video after creating/editing the caption file, particularly if the video edits change the timing of the video at all, you will have to create a new caption file.
YouTube provides auto-generated closed captioning on all videos. These captions can contain errors and need to be reviewed for accuracy and edited by members of your team before they can go live. See YouTube’s instructions for editing captions.
SRT files generated by YouTube can be downloaded and used in other platforms (such as Vimeo, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.)
You should submit an SRT file for each video uploaded to Vimeo. The SRT file will need to be provided by you or purchased through a third-party. See Vimeo’s instructions for adding captions.
Facebook provides auto-generated closed captioning on all videos. These captions need to be reviewed for accuracy and edited by a member of your team within the Facebook platform before they can go live. See Facebook’s instructions for adding captions.
You should submit an SRT file for each video uploaded to LinkedIn. The SRT file will need to be provided by you or purchased through a third-party. See LinkedIn’s instructions for adding captions.
Captions need to be “baked-in” to the video file itself before being posted to Instagram. Video files with baked-in captions should be provided by you or purchased through a third-party. See Instagram’s instructions for adding captions.
Also, check out MarCom's video instructions on how to bake-in captions into your video file using Adobe Premiere.
You should submit an SRT file for each video uploaded to Twitter. The SRT file will need to be provided by you or purchased through a third-party. See Twitter’s instructions for adding captions.
Studio (video platform built into Seattle U’s Learning Management System, Canvas) can create auto-generated captions for videos that you upload. These captions need to be reviewed for accuracy and edited by a member of your team before they can go live. See instructions for adding and editing captions in Canvas Studio. Support and training for Canvas Studio is offered through the Center for Digital Learning and Innovation.
SRT files generated by Studio can be downloaded and used in other platforms (such as Vimeo, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.)
Marketing Communications offers guidance and support for web accessibility and video captioning.
For more information and assistance with closed captioning, please contact videographer Carter Johnson, social media marketing specialist Matt Lipsen, or the MarCom Web Team.
How to use an SRT file to add "baked in" captions in Adobe Premiere, video by Matt Lipsen