BoxCast's closed captioning feature allows you to caption your broadcasts automatically with the click of a button.
Enable Captioning Pre-broadcast
There are three ways (outlined below) to enable closed captions for a recorded broadcast before the broadcast even goes live. This will automatically generate closed captions once the broadcast has aired and the recording rendered.
Note in the following steps that leaving the Broadcast Language field blank will default to English-only captions. If caption translation is available on your subscription, however, select the non-English language spoken during the broadcast in order to read captions in either English or that chosen language.
1. While Scheduling a Broadcast
Scroll down to the Advanced section on the Schedule page, click on Closed Captioning to expand, and then toggle on Request Automated Captioning When Recorded.
2. While Editing an Upcoming Broadcast
Open the edit modal for an upcoming broadcast, click Advanced, and then toggle on Request Automated Captioning When Recorded.
3. Set Globally
Go to Settings > Preferences, click Edit in the Captioning and Translation section, followed by toggling on Always Caption Broadcasts.
Generate Captioning Post-broadcast
If captions were not set up to generate automatically before the broadcast aired, navigate to the broadcast you wish to caption, click the Captions tab, and then click Generate Captions. Feel free to leave the page and return later if needed.
Edit Captions
Editing captions is super easy! Simply click in the text box to change how you want the caption to read. Use the player to preview your captions, watching as cues are highlighted in blue throughout playback. Click the ▶ button at the end of a cue in order to skip to and preview that specific part of the broadcast. Playback of the subsequent cues will simply continue from this point.
Click the ⠇button to edit certain things relative to a specific cue.
Edit Start/Stop Times Control the window of time for when a caption appears during playback.
Insert Cue Before Did a line of speech get excluded from appearing in the captions? Select this option for manually adding the new cue to precede the cue selected.
Insert Cue After Did a line of speech get excluded from appearing in the captions? Select this option for manually adding the new cue to follow the cue selected.
Delete Cue Is there a line of speech you wish to exclude from appearing in the captions? You may completely delete the cue from appearing.
Click Settings to use some different tools which may further assist while editing captions.
Review Low-Confidence Cues BoxCast is able to detect uncertainty with some generated words. Captions with highest uncertainty will appear in red. It is recommended you review every line if not constrained by time, otherwise you might want to prioritize editing the captions with higher uncertainty.
Edit All Timestamps Opens all the cues at once for editing the windows of time each caption appears during playback.
Replace Captions with WebVTT File Upload a WebVTT file to replace the BoxCast-generated captions with another (external) source you used to record captions with.
Find and Replace This tool is recommended for using with names, and other proper nouns or other uncommon words. As an example, we at BoxCast often have to edit captions for our webinars and change "Box cars" to "BoxCast."
Click Publish Changes upon completing your edits. Changes can take a few minutes to process and may not be available immediately after publishing the caption file, but rest assured they will appear.
Common Questions
Can viewers turn on/off the captions?
Yes, the viewer chooses whether or not to view with captions enabled.
Can I add captions automatically to a live broadcast?
Yes! Learn more
Can captions be downloaded?
Yes, BoxCast allows downloading of the captioning transcript into WebVTT or Text files.
How might I improve the quality of the automatically generated captions?
The caption quality is best determined by your broadcast audio's quality and clarity. A single speaker with a good microphone will typically perform well. Excessive ambient noise or a crowded room with multiple speakers, however, will make it more difficult for the automated caption tool.
Will captions appear everywhere I streamed the broadcast?
Captions will appear on any BoxCast player as described below. Captions will not appear on Facebook, YouTube, X (Twitter), etc.
BoxCast embedded player
BoxCast.tv
BoxCast apps for Roku, Apple TV, and Fire TV
Does BoxCast support embedded captions over RTMP (e.g. CEA-608, CEA-708, DVB-T, DVB-S, WST)?
No. BoxCast only supports automatically generated captions, or separated captions like WebVTT files.
Will captions work in languages other than English?
Yes, provided caption translation is available with your subscription. If you have a speaker speaking Spanish, as just one example, captions will be available in both Spanish and English. The captioning feature currently cannot translate one non-English into another besides English. As an example, Spanish captions cannot be translated to display in French.
Does BoxCast have a way to prevent profanity appearing in our captions?
Yes, BoxCast has a Filter Profanity option to help prevent profane words from being displayed. This setting is enabled by default.
Can captions be re-positioned in the player window?
No. The captions will only display near the bottom of the broadcast, so keep in mind that they could interfere with lower-third content.
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