Section A: Just Video, No Script

• Option 1: Use YouTube to get captions
• Option 2: Use Otter.ai to get captions
• Option 3: Transcribe your video yourself (or use some other third-party service)

Option 1: Use YouTube to get captions

• Log into a Google account (or create a new, throwaway Google account). Go to youtube.com. In the upper right, click the Create button, then click Upload videos. Choose your video file.
• We aren’t actually going to publish this video anywhere. Put something in the Title field (or you can just leave the filename). Click “No, it’s not made for kids.” Click More Options.
• Under Language, subtitles, and closed captions (CC), select your video language.
• Uncheck “Publish to subscriptions feed and notify subscribers”
• Under Comments and ratings, choose “Disable comments” and uncheck “Show how many viewers like and dislike this video. Click Next.
• Click Next.
• Under “Save or publish”, click Private. Click Save. Your video is saved!
• At this point, in the background, Google will start automatically transcribing your video. Unfortunately how long it takes depends on a lot of things — try coming back in 30 minutes or an hour (longer depending on the length of your video). You will know it’s ready when, from the Channel Subtitles section, the number of languages from your video goes from 1 to 2.
• When that happens: click on the drop-down arrow next to the “2” under Languages. You’ll see a line that says “(Automatic)” after the language name. Click on the part of the row that says “Published / Automatic”. This will bring up a subtitles editor.
• Under the Actions dropdown menu, under Download, click “.srt”. You’ll be prompted to save a file called “captions.srt”. Go ahead and save it. Bingo, there’s the plain text file that we need!

• If you don’t have a Google account or don’t want to create one, you can use a free account on Otter.ai. Go to https://otter.ai/ , click the Sign Up button, and create a new account. You’ll need to verify your email address.
• Once you have a new account and you’ve signed in, you’ll see a home page that says “Welcome to Otter”. Click “Import audio/video” in the upper right. Select your video file. (If you used OBS and have an mkv file, you’ll need to go back to the last step of that document and get an mp4.) Once upload is complete, click Done.
• Now you’ll see My Conversations with the name of your file. Click on the name of the file. You can make Edits if you want/have time.
• In the three dots menu in the upper-right, click “Export text” then choose “TXT”. Click “Continue”. Save the resulting file. That’s what you’ll upload to WisCon in addition to your video.

• If you don’t have a Google account or don’t want to create one, and you don’t want to use Otter or another system, you’ll need to transcribe your audio another way, either just doing it yourself or via some other service that we haven’t used. In any case, make sure to save your script as a plain text (.txt) file, and now you’re ready to upload your video and script.

Scenario B: Video with (Untimed) Script

Scenario C: Video with Script & You Can Help Caption

• Log into a Google account (or create a new, throwaway Google account). Go to youtube.com. In the upper right, click the Create button, then click Upload videos. Choose your video file.
• We aren’t actually going to publish this video anywhere. Put something in the Title field (or you can just leave the filename). Click “No, it’s not made for kids.” Click More Options.
• Under Language, subtitles, and closed captions (CC), select your video language.
• Uncheck “Publish to subscriptions feed and notify subscribers”
• Under Comments and ratings, choose “Disable comments” and uncheck “Show how many viewers like and dislike this video. Click Next.
• Click Next.
• Under “Save or publish”, click Private. Click Save. Your video is saved!
• Now, to get the captions added: Make sure you’re in the “Channel videos” screen. Hover over the file you just uploaded, and click the Details button (shaped like a pencil)
• On the left-hand side, click Subtitles. Then on the right (across from the language you selected earlier), click “Add”. Click “Transcribe and auto-sync”.
• Copy your script, and paste it into the text box (where it says “Type what’s spoken here”). Don’t worry about trying to play the video.
• Once your script is in the box, click “Set timings.” At this point, YouTube will start processing your video behind-the-scenes to come up with a set of timings for the captions you provided. You’ll see a page with your video on the left, and on the right you’ll see under My Drafts, the language you selected with “(setting timings)” next to it. If you click the little refresh icon on the right and YT hasn’t finished analyzing, you’ll get an error message; just click Exit.
• When it’s done, click the first item under My Drafts. Now you’ll see what you had typed in previously. This is a more sophisticated captions editor. You can edit what’s in each caption and use the rectangles over the audio wave file under the video to change how long each subtitle is displayed. You can play the video on the right, and see how the caption timings look or edit as needed. When you’re finished, click Save changes.
• Now you’ll see a video preview again with a line under “Published”. Click that again to open the editor. Click the “Actions” dropdown menu, and then under Download click “.srt”. You’ll be prompted to save a file called “captions.srt”. Go ahead and save it. This is the timed subtitles file that you should upload to WisCon along with your video file.

Questions about these instructions? Email the Online Con department at onlinecon@wiscon.net .

You should have received a link to the Google Form for uploading your video and captions/script to WisCONline via an email from a ConCom department (such as Academic Programs, Readings, Online Con) or from the Co-Chairs. If you can’t find that email or aren’t sure which department to contact, please email us at info@wiscon.net .

If you’re participating in the Academic track, Readings, or other asynchronous content recorded ahead of time (like a speech), we will need you to upload a video file of yourself doing your presentation/reading/etc.

You can use any method you want to record a video file, and we’ll accept any of the file formats that’s accepted by YouTube (like mp4, mov, and avi). If you already know how to record yourself to get a video file, you don’t need to use these instructions — this is just for folks who don’t.

If you have a computer with a webcam and you aren’t sure how to use it to record a video file, here are some instructions that use Open Broadcast Studio (available for Mac/Windows/Linux).

• Install Open Broadcast Studio (obsproject.com). By default, it will try to run the Auto-Configuration wizard. Click “optimize just for recording”, then OK. Click “Apply Settings”.
• Set up your Audio source: By default, it’s set to capture you default desktop audio and mic. If you aren’t using desktop audio, go ahead and mute it using the speaker button to the left of the settings gear under Desktop Audio. (Muting your desktop audio keeps your computer’s various alert sounds from being accidentally recorded in your video.)
  Under Mic/aux, you should see a sound meter moving back and forth when you use the mic. If it’s not capturing the correct mic, click the Settings gear, click Properties, and then choose a different device from the dropdown. Click OK.
• Add a video source: click the “+” under Sources . This will be “video capture device” for a camera, or Browser or Window Capture if you want to share your screen.
  • For a webcam, click Video capture device, then click Create New and name it (“Webcam”). Click OK. Make sure the correct device is selected.  For Audio Output mode, you can select which audio you want (if you have a headset you’re using); otherwise if you’re using your webcam mic, leave it alone. Click OK. You should now see a small window in red with your webcam feed. You can resize it to fit the black window.
  • If you resize and there are still black bars — there’s a gap between the video and the canvas size — you’ll have to change the settings on the canvas and the video source to make the resolutions match:
    • Click Settings in the bottom right, then Video, then for Base & Output resolutions, choose a resolution that’s closer to what you expect your webcam to be. Jot that down. Click OK.
    • Double-click your Webcam video source. For Resolution/FPS type, choose Custom. Then select the same resolution you picked for the canvas. If there isn’t one that matches, click the closest one, jot that down, click OK, and then go change the canvas size (as above).
• Check your output settings: This will change where your video file is stored. Click Settings in the lower-right, then Output. Change the Recording Path if you want. We recommend Recording Quality set to High Quality, Medium File Size. Everything else should be able to stay the same. Click OK.
• Do a test recording: Click “Start Recording” in the lower-right. Say a few words, then click Stop Recording. Open up the folder from the Recording Path, and you can play back the resulting video. Did your video and audio both record correctly? If not, you may need to adjust your settings for your Sources and Audio Mixer.
• Convert to mp4: Once you’ve done a recording that you’re happy with, it’s a good idea to convert it to the mp4 format. Click File -> Remux Recordings. Select your recording (ending in .mkv), and you should now see Target File ends in .mp4. Click ‘Remux’. When it’s finished, click Close.

Now that you’ve got your video file, it’s time to make sure you also have a script to submit.

Questions about these instructions? Email the Online Con department at onlinecon@wiscon.net .

You should have received a link to the Google Form for uploading your video to WisCONline via an email from a ConCom department (such as Academic Programs, Readings, Online Con) or from the Co-Chairs. If you can’t find that email or aren’t sure which department to contact, please email us at info@wiscon.net .