The royal theater of Britain purchased Epson video glasses for the audience with a hearing disorder

On February 26, 2019 it became known that Royal theater of Britain purchased Epson video glasses for the audience with a hearing disorder. Smart Moverio video glasses Epson are used for viewing synchronized credits in settings of National theater.

As of 2018, in Great Britain there are 11 million people with a hearing disorder, and, according to data of the Action on Hearing Loss UK organization, by 2035 their quantity will increase to 15.6 million. Considering unfavourable forecasts, the National theater decided to adapt settings for needs of people with similar violations. For a year service was tested on the audience with different degrees of a hearing disorder, and since 2019 viewing credits using Epson Moverio BT-350 video glasses is available in settings of National theater.

Epson Moverio BT-350 video augmented rReality glasses are used for an output of the transcription of dialogs and sounds synchronized with settings to displays of points.

The service is developed by National theater together with the partner in innovations – the Accenture agency. Credits can be looked, sitting in any place in the hall, thanks to the Open Access Smart Capture technology developed by technical specialists of National theater in cooperation with experts in language and the speech under the leadership of professor Andrew Lemborn. The technology is based on use of the special software recognizing the speech and synchronizing credits with the text of setting. Also for exact calibration the program reads out light, sound and videos of a tag unique for each setting.

Experts of Accenture and National theater jointly worked on creation of the intuitive interface. The audience will be able to configure the type size, color and arrangement of credits at discretion.

Smart Epson Moverio BT-350 glasses will allow National theater to offer the audience access to credits in real time. The national theater and Accenture selected points because of simplicity of their use, reliability and availability.

Specialists of National theater cooperated with experts in creation of credits of the Stagetext organization which aims to provide access to theater and culture for people with hearing loss and also with cluster of spectators which have a hearing disorder that allowed to consider possible wishes and comments at all stages of process. During 2018 work on improvement of synchronization and accuracy of credits was conducted, in new settings it is going to finish these indicators over 95%. For 2019 work and on the software is continued, points can be used for generation of credits in real time that will allow the audience to attend with a hearing disorder not only performances of National theater, but also other actions – from meetings with theatrical directors and actors to children's and family rates of drama skill.

The next stage of tests is planned for 2019, with assistance of Epson, the National theater is going to begin cooperation with Leeds Playhouse theater – it will become the first step of the project on distribution of technology of creation of credits in other theaters of Great Britain. The national theater will also continue to implement experience of creation of credits using smart points during the guest performances.

Smart points will become a part of the project of the National theater aiming to make art available – along with visible credits from Stagetex, audio-guides on settings and tactile excursions for the visually impaired audience, performances with the translation into the British sign language and also the theatrical programs typed by a large print and Braille's font, the infrared speaker system with an induction loop, the head and cervical headset.

"For a year of participation in tests of smart points I understood that their importance is almost inexplicable to people with normal hearing. For people with a hearing disorder, use of points is a difference between an opportunity to visit theater at any time and its absence. A large number of deaf people does not even represent that such opportunities exist and that they can, as well as other people visit theater therefore use of these points will become this break". Dave Finch, representative of test group of hearing-impaired people

"The national theater constantly works on being available to any audience. Development of credits using smart points – a significant step to this purpose as we provide to people freedom of visit and a possibility of the choice". Lisa Burger, chief executive of National theater