Australian theatre-goers who suffer a hearing disability will now have the opportunity to enjoy a more enriched live-theatre experience as a result of cutting-edge technology.
Pioneered by The Captioning Studio, the world's first captioning application for smartphones and tablets was launched by the Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers, Senator Jan McLucas, at the Canberra Theatre Centre yesterday.
Australian-owned and operated, The Captioning Studio has earned a reputation as a trailblazer in captioning technology. Now the ground-breaking captioning application, Go Theatrical!, will give deaf and hearing-impaired patrons access to live-theatre captions on smartphones and mobile devices.
''Enjoying a night out at the theatre is something that many of us don't think twice about but the fact is that there are many Australians who haven't been able to enjoy this popular past time,'' Senator McLucas said.
For the convenor of the Canberra branch of Better Hearing Australia, Sue Daw, her hearing disability has prevented her from enjoying theatre for 23 years. Theatre captioning has since helped rekindled her love for the performing arts and extolling the virtues of this revolutionary application was easy to do.
''For me and people like me, we'll be able to sit anywhere in the theatre and access the captions. This means a fuller enjoyment of the plays because I can immerse myself in the experience,'' she said.
According to The Captioning Studio co-founder and director, Alex French, it is this freedom in seat-selection that is a pivotal feature of the app. It enables deaf and hearing-impaired patrons the same choice and mobility enjoyed by other theatre-goers.
''Until now, we've used plasma screens to display captioning and in order to be able to see the captioning people generally need to sit in selected seats, and quite often those seats are the higher costing seats,'' he said.
ACT Minister for the Arts, Ms Joy Burch, said yesterday: ''We are proud that the Canberra Theatre Centre will be among the first venues to implement this new technology.''
Go Theatrical! will be available for the March 17 matinee performance of Canberra Theatre Centre's Summer of the Seventeenth Doll.
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