Let the needs of the blind be "seen"

　　Hundreds of barrier-free movies are online

　　Our reporter Zhao Yuhan

　　The Winter Paralympics is underway, and Chinese Paralympic athletes have won gold and silver. The self-improvement displayed by them has moved the world, and at the same time, more people have paid attention to the importance of creating a barrier-free environment for the disabled.

Recently, the Watermelon Video Accessible Cinema Channel has launched more than 100 films, including "The Mermaid", "Big Fish and Begonia", "Assembly" and "I'm Not the God of Medicine".

"Barrier-free movies have brought me an immersive world." Xiao En, a visually impaired person, sighed.

　　"At the beginning of the film, the male protagonist Cheng Yong is sitting alone in a health care product store... His store is located in a dilapidated alley, and there is a love hotel next to the store..." At the beginning of the movie "I'm Not the God of Medicine", After a commentary, the first character dialogue in the film begins.

While retaining the original sound and dialogue of the film, the off-site commentary is inserted in a timely manner, and the scenes in the film without dialogue are described in detail and vividly, so as to help the visually impaired to better "see" and "understand" the film. This is a barrier-free film.

　　"It turns out I can 'watch' movies too"

　　Xiao En, 18, was born blind due to retinal damage.

When he was a child, his parents went out to work and left him at home alone, and they would play Ultraman cartoons for him.

He didn't even know what Ultraman and the monster looked like, he only knew that the sound of crackling fighting was constantly coming from the TV.

　　When he was young, Xiaoen once followed his parents to the cinema.

But in the remaining impression, I can only feel that "there are many people in the cinema and the sound is noisy", and the rest is no different from "listening to cartoons" at home.

After that, Xiaoen never went to the cinema again, and never looked forward to watching a movie.

　　It wasn't until junior high school in a special school that Xiaoen first came into contact with barrier-free movies.

In the process of watching barrier-free movies, he found that there are detailed narration descriptions from plots to scenes and actions, and language can also form images in his mind.

　　"He said that there was an eagle flying in the blue sky in the picture, and I could probably think of a big bird like Kunpeng flying in the mountains; he said that the mountain road was too steep during the climbing process, and people had to be hanged by ropes. I really feel immersed in it, for fear of falling!" This viewing experience brought Xiaoen a deep sensory experience.

Later, he often went to the Internet to search for accessible movies, but unfortunately could not find any resources.

　　Use more than 30,000 words to "act" for two hours

　　It is precisely in order to meet the pain points of the visually impaired, in April 2021, as a public welfare project of ByteDance, Xigua Video launched the barrier-free cinema project.

"There is no experience to learn from, and the project team is in total darkness." Yuyang, head of the content production team of Watermelon Video Accessible Cinema, admitted frankly.

　　Moving forward in the dark, the production of barrier-free movies has been continuously improved with perseverance.

After making a few movies, the project team invited some visually impaired users to participate in the internal test.

Visually impaired users provided two suggestions for the production team: First, try not to write color in the copy, because they have no concept of color.

The second is that they want the description to be as objective as possible. For example, there are tears in the eyes of the characters. You can describe it, but don't define whether the expression is excited or sad.

　　"The specific emotions of the characters will be understood by the audience according to the story line. We should leave this feeling to them." Yuyang said.

In order to present the film authentically to the visually impaired, the team adhered to the principle of "one frame is not lost".

For a two-hour movie, the team often needs to polish a manuscript of more than 30,000 words.

　　Every time a movie is made, Yuyang will close his eyes to "check".

However, because he was very familiar with the plot, when he heard the narration, the corresponding picture always appeared in front of him.

"We can only try to experience their world." Yuyang said.

　　Continue to meet the spiritual needs of the blind

　　Today, more than 100 accessible films are available on the platform.

Xiaoen has "watched" nearly 30 movies, and he thinks the commentary is accurate.

"I sometimes burst into tears, sometimes excited, and it felt good."

　　"It will bring me an immersive world that doesn't require imagination. I used to listen to the recordings of TV dramas on the radio on the radio. There was no dictation, only audio, and I always felt that something was missing." Another Accessible Cinema User Wu Liquan said so.

　　Liquan Wu is now a user product experience engineer at the Shenzhen Information Accessibility Research Association.

Over the past four years, he has provided accessibility support for more than 40 apps.

In his view, if visually impaired people want to integrate into the current society, they first need the Internet to provide corresponding infrastructure construction, and the establishment of barrier-free theaters is an important part of it.

　　"The main significance of the barrier-free film project is not that these 100 films make me personally satisfied, but that it gives me hope." Wu Liquan believes that for the visually impaired who have little contact with the outside world, their spiritual level Needs need to be seen and met.

　　For Xiaoen, another significance of barrier-free movies is to provide him with new career ideas.

He has a high perception of melody since childhood and is currently studying in a private music school in Wenzhou.

Xiao En originally wanted to be a tuner or a piano teacher, but after "watching" the movie, he found that soundtracking for the movie is also a good option.

"Maybe in the future I can not only be an audience in a barrier-free cinema, but also a filmmaker."