Forum Discussion
Storyline Accessible Video Controls seem to make accessibility worse?
Opening this conversation up to hear everyone's opinion. Being that Storyline accessibility checker strongly suggests (based on WCAG) to enable video controls when you embed a video, I'm wondering if this is not ALWAYS the best solution.
For example, if I am a screen reader user, relying on the information provided to me through audio, and there are two timelines (the main one and the video timeline) wouldn't this cause confusion?
Furthermore, lets say you have set up some sort of visual where the video only takes up a certain amount(lets say 1/3) of the screen). On one side you have the video, on the other you have bulleted notes. Someone (using a screen reader or not) would click into there, meanwhile the main timeline is still playing!
The only conceivable idea where I think having the video controls could be applicable is when your video takes up a whole slide size running the duration of the slide.
Curious what I am missing from my thinking here, or what others think on this topic?
5 Replies
Thank you for opening this discussion, MichaelEtzel — this is something I’ve been struggling with for quite a while as well.
Interestingly, the situation you describe as a potential best case (a full-screen video) is actually where I encounter the most difficulty.
In my context, I build full-screen video modules where the on-screen text is layered in Storyline rather than baked into the video. When video controls are enabled, learners can pause the video while the Storyline timeline keeps playing, which breaks synchronization between media and on-screen content.
So far, my workaround has been to avoid video controls and rely on the Storyline timeline as the single source of timing. The downside is losing built-in features like transcripts and native controls.
So it feels like a trade-off between synchronization and user control, without a perfect solution in Storyline right now.
For your example with a smaller video alongside other content, I’d agree with MarisolCrdenasG — constraining the main timeline, managing focus order, and sequencing interactions seems more predictable.
I’d be really interested to learn more about how others are handling this trade-off in practice—especially in cases where synchronization between media and on-screen content is critical.
Hello! I just checked one of my current courses that has a video. I use the video controls, disable the slide playbar (although that's the only content on the page), and import the caption file directly to the video.
En los cursos que creo, mantengo la línea de tiempo de las diapositivas desactivada; esta función nunca está disponible. Por lo tanto, no preveo ningún problema, ya que cuando aparece un video, la única barra de progreso que se muestra es la del video. Esto se aplica a mi caso particular, ya que no es una función necesaria en mis cursos. Sin embargo, si la línea de tiempo de las diapositivas es esencial en su caso, la línea de tiempo del reproductor de video también es necesaria para la accesibilidad.
I always have video controls.
Having any content that auto plays, there must be a pause button if it is longer than 5 seconds.
Having something auto play without context could be very jarring for a screen reader user as well.
I will look through some of my projects but if you have any slides as examples that you want to send my way I can do a screen reader demo of how the screen reader interacts with the content and how it reads the video player.
I'm not sure I understood the possible issue with the timeline going while someone is on the video element. Are you referring to a slide with a lot of animation? Or is there other slide audio that isn’t the video? In that case I would not have that all on one slide as that could be overwhelming for a lot of learners. (But I may be totally misunderstanding the issue so please feel free to clarify!)
I would love to hear from any native screen reader users if we have any in the group!
Hey MichaelEtzel what an interesting discussion topic! I believe elizabeth Caitlin_B NaomiWest or SamHill might have some thoughts on it.
I also want to plug the Accessibility group as an option to get more eyes on this question.
