Proceedings of the 15 th International Conference on Auditory Display, Copenhagen, Denmark, May 18-22, 2009 ICAD09-1 THE DESIGN OF AN AUDIO FILM FOR THE VISUALLY IMPAIRED Mariana Julieta Lopez and Sandra Pauletto Department of Theatre, Film and Television The University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DQ marianajlopez@yahoo.com, sp148@york.ac.uk 1. ABSTRACT Nowadays, Audio Description is used to enable visually impaired people to access films. However, it presents an important limitation, which consists in the need of the visually impaired audiences to rely on a describer, not being able to access the work directly. The aim of this project was to design a format of sonic art called audio film that eliminates the need of visual elements and of a describer, by providing information solely through sound, sound processing and spatialization, and which might be considered as an alternative to Audio Description. In order to explore the viability of this format an example has been designed based on Roald Dahl’s Lamb to the Slaughter (1954) using a 6.1 surround sound configuration. Through the design of this example it could be noticed that this format can successfully convey a story without the need of either visual elements or of a narrator. 2. INTRODUCTION Film, television, theatre performances and museum tours use Audio Description to enable visually impaired people to access these forms of art. However, the inclusion of these descriptions has as a consequence that visually impaired audiences cannot access the work directly but have to rely on a describer. The aim of this project was to design an alternative to Audio Description for films. In order to explore the potential of this format an example based on Roald Dahl’s Lamb to the Slaughter (1954) was designed for a 6.1 surround sound setup. Lamb to the Slaughter is the story of Mary Maloney, who after finding out that her husband plans to leave her, murders him with a frozen leg of lamb and feeds the murder weapon to the police. In this project the term audio film was chosen due to the belief that certain elements from the filmmaking process might be adapted for the conveyance of a story through sound, creating an experience equivalent to the cinematic experience. In this project the adaptation of different cinema languages was explored, in particular the use of the Master Scene and the interpersonal cinema language. Ron Richards defines the Master Scene as the use of one shot ‘that establishes the environment and the people, and records the event or action in its entirety.’ [1, p.89] This can be used to introduce the different spaces by presenting all the sounds heard in that particular environment. In this way the space is aurally established as it would be visually established through a long shot. Also, the interpersonal cinema language, which focuses on involving the audience with the emotional states of the characters, can be achieved through the content of the lines delivered, the expressiveness in the voices and the use of music to emphasize the characters’ feelings. The notion of cuts through sound can be explored to indicate parallel actions taking place in different spaces. An effect comparable to that of a tracking shot can be achieved by editing the sounds in a way in which a character’s movements are followed through different spaces. 2.1. Audio Description The design of an audio film is motivated by the possibility of providing an alternative to Audio Description. The concept of Audio Description was first introduced and studied by Gregory Frazier in 1975 and consists in an audio track in which ‘a describer inserts spoken words to provide representations of information contained in the visual field of the production’ [2, p.1]. An important analysis on Audio Description is the one provided by Philip J. Piety. Piety points out four components of Audio Description: source text, modified text, describer and consumer [2, p.28]. The source text is the original text, generally aimed at a sighted audience. The modified text is the conjunction of the source text and the descriptions that have been inserted. The describer refers to the person in charge of the creation and the placement of the descriptions and the consumer to the recipient of the modified text [2, p.29]. Although Audio Description has enabled visually impaired people to access visual forms of art it presents several limitations. Firstly, it evaluates and summarizes the scene described, leaving the consumer ‘less opportunity to independently assign meaning’ [2, p.35]. Secondly, Audio Description must not overlap the dialogues. This means that visual aspects are not described during dialogues, leaving the listener without part of the information. Another problem regarding this is that descriptions are constrained to the gaps between lines, which may not be long enough to provide the necessary descriptions. A further limitation is related to the situations in which descriptions are synchronized to the sound effects. Descriptions mask what might be important audio clues, which might be interpreted without the need of descriptions. Another limitation is that consumers cannot experience the source text on its own because it does not contain enough information for them to follow the plot. The audio film proposed attempts to solve most of these limitations by providing just a source text that enables the visually impaired listener to experience the audio film in the same way as it would be experienced by a sighted listener. Also, by eliminating descriptions, the listener will be able to use his/her imagination more freely. Furthermore, the fact that this format does not need a describer, would eliminate another disadvantage of Audio Description: the way in which the