For a long time, I thought that maybe there was some great technical complication I just didn't understand that made this much harder than it seemed from the outside.
There is: Screenwriters often don't leave room for that narration to occur to when writing. So how are you going to fit all the narrative information into an audio track without breaking up the flow of dialog? This is especially problematic for situations where you you jump from one scene into a completely different one involving other times, places, characters or whatever for story reasons, and that scene's dramatic impact often depends on the abruptness or incongruity of the transition.
I'm looking over my current script in regards to this and while it would work fine for some scenes it would be hugely problematic for others. I have characters who show up unannounced and start talking before they appear on screen, characters who engage in important expository conversations immediately after they show up (but whose appearance differs significantly from how they looked previously), character that react to things that are not fully articulated to the audience, and things that are deliberately left ambiguous or paradoxical for aesthetic reasons.
I'm certainly not against making it easier for blind people to enjoy movies and would cheerfully work with someone one this, but just because you have a copy of the script doesn't mean you're going to have all the answers to convey those things to the audience. I think I would rather rewrite large chunks of it as a radio play than have someone trying to do an additional voice-over track explaining what's going on in the gaps between the dialog and this film has substantially less dialog than most (about a 3:1 action:dialog ratio, whereas most drama films are more like 1:1).
Besides all these factors, adding something like this isn't free or even cheap. Sure, Netflix can afford to throw money at the problem, but if this becomes a requirement for selling your film it's going to be an expensive overhead for indie producers. You basically have to write a second script, fit it in between the existing dialog and sound effects and music, and pay an actor (or multiple actors) to voice it, plus the studio rental and the sound editing. Doing this properly would add probably $10,000 to a film's production budget, Bear in mind that streaming revenue going to the producer from a service like Netflix is (estimated) about $0.25.
Also, as Kingett has said, "now comes the easy part." Adding description tracks on Netflix for all of the movies and TV shows for which they have been available all along.
Few people actually do this. I think it might be better if there were some open-source portal where volunteer 'readers' do this for blind people and upload them.
Is it everything? No. But according to WGBH's media access group, "All major studios now caption and describe all wide released features and nearly all independent studios caption all releases."[1] In 2014, that description was available on at least 88 films released on DVD or Blu-ray[2]. As for television, in the US, the networks and the 5 largest cable stations are required to air about 4 hours of programming a week with description[3].
My point is: The biggest problem is no longer a lack of described content, it's a lack of access, particularly through internet streaming services which have the potential to provide the most accessible experience of all.
That's true. The caption thing is a no-brainer for any size production and has been for years, due to the relatively low cost, but the narration's a much bigger hurdle for anyone other than a major studio.
There is: Screenwriters often don't leave room for that narration to occur to when writing. So how are you going to fit all the narrative information into an audio track without breaking up the flow of dialog? This is especially problematic for situations where you you jump from one scene into a completely different one involving other times, places, characters or whatever for story reasons, and that scene's dramatic impact often depends on the abruptness or incongruity of the transition.
I'm looking over my current script in regards to this and while it would work fine for some scenes it would be hugely problematic for others. I have characters who show up unannounced and start talking before they appear on screen, characters who engage in important expository conversations immediately after they show up (but whose appearance differs significantly from how they looked previously), character that react to things that are not fully articulated to the audience, and things that are deliberately left ambiguous or paradoxical for aesthetic reasons.
I'm certainly not against making it easier for blind people to enjoy movies and would cheerfully work with someone one this, but just because you have a copy of the script doesn't mean you're going to have all the answers to convey those things to the audience. I think I would rather rewrite large chunks of it as a radio play than have someone trying to do an additional voice-over track explaining what's going on in the gaps between the dialog and this film has substantially less dialog than most (about a 3:1 action:dialog ratio, whereas most drama films are more like 1:1).
Besides all these factors, adding something like this isn't free or even cheap. Sure, Netflix can afford to throw money at the problem, but if this becomes a requirement for selling your film it's going to be an expensive overhead for indie producers. You basically have to write a second script, fit it in between the existing dialog and sound effects and music, and pay an actor (or multiple actors) to voice it, plus the studio rental and the sound editing. Doing this properly would add probably $10,000 to a film's production budget, Bear in mind that streaming revenue going to the producer from a service like Netflix is (estimated) about $0.25.
Also, as Kingett has said, "now comes the easy part." Adding description tracks on Netflix for all of the movies and TV shows for which they have been available all along.
Few people actually do this. I think it might be better if there were some open-source portal where volunteer 'readers' do this for blind people and upload them.