In a previous post, we discussed the topic of subtitles in a 360° environment. Within the project Immersive Accessibility (ImAc) IRT investigates together with partners from the media industry how accessibility services can be applied to 360° or VR environments.
At our demo app webpage (short link: www.irt.de/foxfinder), you can see a short 360° scene taken from the theatre play “Foxfinder” by Dawn King. In this demo, the subtitles are rendered next to their corresponding speakers instead of the bottom of the viewport. Placing subtitles next to related objects in the picture has already been tested in the past for both 2D and 3D environments. In a 3D (or 360°) scene, this approach adds another difficulty: you can turn away from a speaker and thus cannot read the subtitle anymore. To support users in finding the main action in the scene, a subtitle will be renderd on top of the screen when you look away. Small arrows will point you to the direction where you can find the speaker. Try it yourself in our demo app:
Screenshot of 360° subtitle renderer – Content credits and copyright: This immersive 360° clip is an excerpt of “Foxfinder”, a theatre play by Dawn King staged at Residenztheater Marstall in Munich. © 2018, Bayerisches Staatsschauspiel, Christian Felder, IAN-Solutions GmbH & CO KG and Institut für Rundfunktechnik GmbH.