A Resource for Movie Accessibility:
What is Captionfish?

 

Captionfish is an internet listing of current and upcoming movies in the United States offering captions of one kind or another. See the website at www.captionfish.com to find theaters all over the country showing captioned films. Reprinted here is the FAQ from the website to explain more about captioning and frequent questions that consumers have.   

What do the caption type acronyms mean?

OC - Open Captioned - The movie's text is superimposed over the screen images.

RW - Rear Window® Captioned - A transparent acrylic panel attached to your seat reflects the captions so that they appear superimposed on the screen.

USL - USL Closed Captioned System (CCS)® - The CCS is designed to enhance the hearing impaired cinema patron's movie-going experience. A single infrared emitter broadcasts closed caption text and two channels of audio into an auditorium which can be picked up by either a display that can be flexibly positioned in front of you or special eyewear.

CV - CaptiView® Closed Captioning - The CaptiView system consists of a small OLED display on a bendable support arm that fits into the theater seat cup holder. The easy-to-read screen is equipped with a high contrast display that comes with a privacy visor so it can be positioned directly in front the movie patron with minimal impact or distraction to neighboring patrons.

ST - Subtitled - Textual versions of the dialogue are displayed in English on the bottom of the screen.

DV - Descriptive Video - Descriptive narration in specially equipped auditoriums is fed via infrared or FM transmitter to a small portable receiver, enabling blind and visually impaired moviegoers to hear the descriptions on headsets from any seat in the theater. 

I know of a theater that has captioned showtimes but Captionfish does not show it. Can you add it?

We can try. Contact us and let us know. Also let us know where you're seeing the captioned showtimes advertised. We'll do what we can to get the theater added to our results. 

If you have a captioned trailer for a movie, does this mean that the movie will have captioned showtimes?

Not necessarily. We try to provide captioned trailers for all of the major releases but it's up to the individual studios to decide whether to provide captioning. Some studios are proactive in doing this, others are not. 

Why aren't there more captioned movie options in my area?

It'd be nice to have a variation in the movie titles offered but unfortunately that doesn't always happen. There are usually one to two new movies every week with captions and different theaters receive them at different times. Some get them the first week of release; others don't get them for a few weeks. A lot of it depends on demand. We're hoping that by getting Captionfish out to the larger Deaf and Hard of Hearing community, more people will take note of the captioned showtimes, and will go and watch the movies. This could lead to the theaters providing more showtimes, a better movie selection, and hopefully encourage the studios to caption more of their movies. 

When I open Captionfish, my default location shows as Seattle, WA or some other location that I'm not from, or near. Why does this happen?

When you first come to Captionfish, we try to best guess your location based on your IP address so we can present you with immediate results. Sometimes your IP address cannot be determined. In that case, we default to Seattle, WA, because that's where we're located. If you don't like the location that Captionfish has determined you are in, you can change it by entering a more accurate location in the location box on the top of the main page.

Captionfish said that there was a captioned movie showing at a theater near me, but when I went, they said that there was nothing playing. What can you do about this?

This does happen sometimes. We try to be as accurate as we can be but this isn't always possible. Schedules change at the last minute, equipment breaks, or the theater decides to stop showing the movie, and we don't always catch the changes or the theaters don't update their schedules. This is why we recommend that you call the theater(s) to confirm the showtimes before going out. 

I have a feature request. Can I share it with you?

Many of our current features were requested by users like you. Due to limited resources, we cannot promise that we'll be able to implement every feature request that comes our way, but we still want to hear what you have in mind. Get in touch with us and share your thoughts! 

There are no captioned showtimes at any of the theaters in my area. Is there anything I can do to change this?

Check out our theater directory for a list of theater chains that have captioned showtimes at their theaters. If there are any theaters from these chains near you, get in touch with their management and see if they're willing to consider adding captioned showtimes to their lineup. If they do, be sure to let us know!

Why do you not list movies more than 7 days in advance?

Theaters normally do not release showtimes any more than 7-10 days in advance. We stopped by a local theater to inquire about this process and were told that they wait and see how movies do over the weekend before they plan out the schedule for the following week. There are other factors that play into their decisions when it comes to captioned movies, e.g. they don't always know when they'll get captioned prints or the DVDs that they need to project the captions.

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