How to get started in captioning

I often get asked the question:  How do I get started in captioning?  I put together this response:

Most of the work you will need to do to transition from court reporter to CART provider and captioner is done on your own. 

Coast 2 Coast Captioning offers the Broadcast Captioning Training (BCT) Series, a series of webinars which covers every topic you will need to know in order to be a broadcast captioner. There are nine webinars, two hours each. You can earn up to 1.8 NCRA CEU's. Visit my website to view the topics and to order: https://www.c2ccaptioning.com/bct.html.  

Once you have completed at least six of the seminars, you may apply for one-on-one follow-up training. At this time, you will have the opportunity to ask questions and I will offer you guidance on next steps. I will evaluate your practice files and give you advice. I am always available via email if you have questions along the way, however, so feel free to reach out. It is important that your realtime skills are at a certain level before the follow-up training, as most of that will be done on your own and at your own pace.

There are many webinars within the BCT series that will benefit you as it relates to your realtime training. So my suggestion to you is to order the CART Provider's Guide, https://www.c2ccaptioning.com/products.html, to get you started with the ins and outs of CART, and to complete the Broadcast Captioning Training Series, https://www.c2ccaptioning.com/bct.html.  I also recommend these free documents located on the Products page, https://www.c2ccaptioning.com/products.html:

Realtime Broadcast Captioning: Recommended Style and Format Guidelines for U.S. Programming

Consumer Awareness and Recommended Style and Format Guidelines for Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) Providers

I also recommend this free document located on the Products page, which I helped create during my time with the NCRA Captioning Community of Interest. A good percentage of this document was taken right from my Training Manual:

https://www.c2ccaptioning.com/products.html:

Realtime Broadcast Captioning: Recommended Style and Format Guidelines for U.S. Programming

The next thing I would tell you to do is join the broadcast captioners group on Yahoo, http://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/broadcastcaptioners/info. There is a great deal of information there.  Read through all of the past threads before posting a question though.  Chances are your question(s) have been answered.  Also peruse the Files section.  

NCRA has a Captioning group on Facebook:  

https://www.facebook.com/groups/47951054887/?bookmark_t=group 

and LinkedIn also has a Broadcast Captioning group:

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Broadcast-Captioning-CART-2259922?trk=myg_ugrp_ovr.

There is also a lot of information and related links on www.ncra.org.  Gary Robson is very well-known and has written a lot of articles on captioning. His website is www.robson.org.  I would begin changing my writing (a must).  Another great tool is Caption Accelerator, available at 

http://www.stenograph.com/Category.aspx?id=1470001&subid=4950001&childid=5030001. 

After you change your writing, begin dictionary building. There are two great tools for that – Dictionary Jumpstart, www.dictionaryjumpstart.com, and Catapult, www.CRRBooks.com.  But be careful not to begin adding all of these words to your dictionary until you have made significant changes to your writing or you’ll have to do it all over again.

There are also a number of captioning-related E-seminars offered through NCRA at http://ncra.inreachce.com/.   Another online training site is 

http://www.realtimefitnessonline.com/.

Finally, I suggest going to every seminar, workshop and/or boot camp related to captioning that you can find.  NCRA annual conventions will have at least 3 seminars related to captioning each year.  If your realtime is not up to par, you may want to attend an Anita Paul seminar.  Her web address is www.anitapaul.com.  

As far as equipment, Stenograph offers captioning software called BCS, which is an add-on to CaseCatalyst.  However, I highly recommend Eclipse AccuCap.  It is definitely a personal choice, though, and I would urge you to do some research before making a final decision.  There are other pieces of equipment required for captioning, which I also cover in my Broadcast Captioning Training Seminar series.

Broadcast captioning is a wonderful, challenging, and exciting career.  The journey from court reporter to captioner involves hard work, a lot of time, a great deal determination and dedication.  There are no shortcuts, and it is not easy; however, it is well worth the effort once you arrive.