How translation software works for a live event
A desktop application for Windows and macOS that installs at the production desk. It listens to the audio you already have, translates it, and sends it wherever your production needs it.
- platforms: Windows and macOS
- 2platforms: Windows and macOS
- languages in the catalogue
- 58languages in the catalogue
- different outputs
- 4different outputs
- free to try
- 1 hfree to try
What does live translation software actually do?
Three things in a chain: it turns speech into text, translates that text into one or more languages, and delivers it to screens and devices. What separates one product from another is not the first or the second (most use similar providers) but the third: where it comes out, and what it does when something fails.
Four questions before you sign
- Does it come out inside your video signal, or does it stop at a full-screen web page you have to screen-capture?
- What does it do when the connection drops: fade to transparent, or leave the last caption frozen in front of the room?
- Does it charge per attendee or per language? That is what decides whether the third language gets approved.
- Where is data processed, how long is it kept and who are the sub-processors? If they are not published, you do not know.
The setup, start to finish
Install the app on the desk computer
Windows or macOS. Both are signed, and the Mac build is notarised by Apple.
Choose where the audio comes from
The desk’s card, this computer’s own audio, or both summed together.
Choose source and target languages
Or automatic detection of the spoken language. The catalogue holds 58 languages.
Open the room and show the QR
The code can be reserved up to ninety days ahead and printed in the programme.
Press GO ON AIR
Hours are metered from there and stop when you press STOP, so breaks cost nothing.
The output reaches your switcher
Over NDI with a real alpha channel, over HDMI with a chroma key, or on any TV.
What the audience gets
Read in their own language
Scan the QR, choose from the event’s languages, change whenever they like.
Listen instead of reading
The phone reads the translation aloud using the device’s own voices.
Ask questions
They reach whoever moderates, and only the one they choose goes up on screen.
Vote
Yes/no, A/B/C/D, or up to six answers, with the tally on the venue screen.
Where it shows
It goes in the signal, not beside it
An NDI output with a real alpha channel composited over programme, as well as the keyable web page.
It fails clean
If the connection drops, the audience output fades to transparent instead of freezing.
It is driven from the AV desk
A Bitfocus Companion module with a real on-air tally, plus a local TCP and HTTP API for Crestron, AMX or Q-SYS.
It does not charge per person or per language
Five hundred people in twelve languages costs what twenty in one costs.
Event Pro
Translation into all 58 languages and two microphones. If you only need untranslated captions, Accessibility; if four people speak at once, Broadcast Multi-Mic.
Frequently asked questions
What do I need to try it?
A Windows or macOS computer and the event’s audio. The free trial is one hour of air time and it does not expire. You can spend it next month.
Does it work offline?
No. Speech recognition and translation run in the cloud, so the desk needs a connection. The audience needs their own only if they are going to read on a phone.
Do attendees have to install anything?
No. They scan a QR code and it opens in the browser.
Does it integrate with my video switcher?
Yes, as an NDI source, and it is tested inside vMix and OBS: the transparency composites over programme exactly like any other lower third. The alpha channel is real in the frame itself (we verify it on every release by reading it back off a genuine NDI receiver) so TriCaster and any other switcher that receives NDI take it the same way, as one more input.
How large an audience does one room take?
Five thousand concurrent phones, measured against the deployed system. We recommend selling five hundred to a thousand per event.
For your kind of event
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Try one hour free
One hour of captioning and translation on one microphone, no expiry, no card. Enough to prove it on your own rig before you pay.