• Captions are words placed in a box at the foot of a television picture or film which tells the viewer exactly what is happening on screen. The action, the dialogue the sounds and so on.
• Captions differ from sub-titles in that they are optional. The viewer can choose to view them or not.
• Why caption? There are 4 million South Africans who are Deaf or hearing impaired. There are many more that are illiterate or semi-literate. Captioning will give many millions of South Africans an opportunity to access television programmes in their own language.
• Captions are contained within the free-to-air broadcast signal where the Teletext system operates. They can also be contained in pay and satellite signals.
• To receive captions the viewer requires a Teletext ready TV receiver or a Teletext decoder as an outboard item. Existing television receivers can be modified by the manufacturer to include the Teletext chip.
• We are in discussions with The Australian Caption Centre (A.C.C), an NGO which supplies captioning to 4 hours of prime time television programming daily, on all free-to-air channels in Australia. Providing we can raise the required sponsorship we will be sending our one Deaf partner Donovan Mulligan to Sydney in early October to spend time with the A.C.C to study their system called Supertext and see how they operate. We intend to adapt their system to suit South African needs.
• How are captions accessed? Each TV receiver has a remote control and each remote has a Teletext button on it. Printed TV guides such as those in the daily or weekly press show whether the programmed is captioned and the viewer can then opt to view the captions by pressing the Teletext button on the remote to optimise it. We believe this option can be made available in a number of different languages. It may also be possible to activate Sign Language in a similar way. This we are currently in discussion with a Decoder manufacturer on this issue.
• The benefits are obvious for the Deaf and hearing impaired but may be less so for others. The point is we believe that anyone watching a programme in its original form can choose to select the language of their choice. Ultimately we hope to have all of our official languages available on this system.
• Job creation - The captions are captured by skilled Stenocaptioners who are stenographers trained to use their machines specifically for this purpose. There is an obvious job creation element to this as it will be necessary to have branches of the South African Caption Centre in Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth, Durban and Polokwane as well as the Head Office in Cape Town to facilitate all official languages.
• Who foots the bill? In Australia it’s a joint funding between their Lotteries and Gaming Board and a major sponsor, Toyota. In Canada the headline sponsor is Shell. Here we believe the National Lottery, the various Casinos Gold Circle (TAB) and a major private sector partner would fund it.
• Captioning would result in a huge improvement of national literacy levels as we would be in a position to view a programme in one language whilst simultaneously reading the captions in another.

When the Government of National Unity came into power on 27 April 1994, South Africa was

divided into 9 provinces.

Some of these provinces are highly urbanised with many resources for Deaf people, but others have no facilities for Deaf people whatsoever.

Provinces such as Gauteng, Western Cape and KwaZulu/Natal have facilities for the Deaf such as schools, associations, clubs, etc.

Eastern Cape, Free State and Northern Transvaal have limited services with only one school in each province.

Northern Cape, North-West and Eastern Transvaal Provinces have no services for the Deaf whatsoever.

The following statistics give a clearer picture:

Western Cape 3 633 077 36 331 108 992 217 985 363 308

Eastern Cape 6 436 790 64 368 193 104 386 207 643 679

Northern Cape 73 7306 7373 22119 44239 73731

KwaZululNatal 850 5338 85054 255 160 510320 850534

Free State 2 726 840 27 268 81 805 163 610 272 683

North-West 3 252 991 32530 97 590 195 179 325 299

Northern Transvaal 5201630 52016 156049 312098 520163

Eastern Transvaal 2 921 559 29216 87 647 175 294 292 157

Gauteng 6 869 103 68 691 206073 412 146 686910

TOTAL 40 284 634 402 847 1 208 539 2 417 078 4 028 464

Estimated number of Deaf people who

accept Sign language as first language

Challenge Productions cc is based in Cape Town, South Africa and is unique in that it brings together a group of individuals from diverse backgrounds but with complementary skills and experience.

Donovan Mulligan is a 34 year old who is the only Deaf television director in Cape Town. He has directed public service inserts for the Vuka awards and an information programme about HIV/AIDS for the Deaf community. He has extensive experience in the film industry having worked on numerous commercials and features as an assistant to the producer.

Dale Holmes is a Deaf actor who specializes in signing presentations and serves on the Executive Committee of the Western Cape branch of DEAFSA.

Rashaad Carlsen has considerable experience in film where he has worked on a number of community based feature films and documentaries and has a number of years experience in radio having worked on Radio 702 and Radio Sonder Grense. He was also Programme Manager at 567 MW Cape Talk. Further, he has considerable marketing experience.

Gerry Karg has been a leading figure in the sound recording, film and television industry in the Cape since the early 1960’s. He has worked on such prestigious productions as David Lean’s ‘Ryan’s Daughter’ as well as numerous major commercials for the Rembrandt Group. As a sound engineer he has recorded some of South Africa’s best known musical talent and in more recent years has become a well respected commercials director.

Mike Westcott is best known for his work as a voice artist with a portfolio which reads like a Who’s Who of South Africa’s leading brands. He is also a script writer and producer, ran his own studio in Durban for 11 years and has produced and presented live television shows for ZTV and Bop TV.

Challenge aims to provide a high quality service to clients who need corporate videos or commercials for cinema or television. We are also keen to provide programmes for broadcast television and because of our two Deaf members have a special interest in providing programming about Disability issues.