Prime Video Deploys AI Program to Raise Movie, TV Dialogue Volume
You've almost certainly noticed in recent years that sometimes movies and TV shows have gotten incredibly hard to hear, prompting many to even use subtitles with everything they watch. A great expose on SlashFilm covers the topic and its causes for recent feature films, and now one streamer believes they've found a way to navigate the problem...kind of. In a new blog post, Amazon Prime Video has announced they're rolling out the feature "Dialogue Boost" which is available on select Amazon Originals worldwide. As you can imagine from the name, Dialogue Boost allows users to "increase the volume of dialogue relative to background music and effects."
"At Prime Video, we are committed to building an inclusive, equitable, and enjoyable streaming experience for all our customers," said Raf Soltanovich, VP of Technology at Prime Video and Amazon Studios. "Our library of captioned and audio described content continues to grow, and by leveraging our technological capabilities to create industry-first innovations like Dialogue Boost, we are taking another step to create a more accessible streaming experience."
According to Prime Video, the Dialogue Boost tool "analyzes the original audio in a movie or series and intelligently identifies points where dialogue may be hard to hear above background music and effects. Then, speech patterns are isolated and audio is enhanced to make the dialogue clearer." The "AI-based" tool apparently "delivers a targeted enhancement to portions of spoken dialogue" rather than just boosting the center channel of the audio.
Prime Video users interested in using the tool can find it under the audio and subtitles drop down menu, with available options including "English Dialogue Boost: Medium" and "English Dialogue Boost: High." As of this writing Dialogue Boost can only be used on select Amazon Originals. This includes TV shows like Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and Harlem; plus original movies including The Big Sick, Beautiful Boy, and Being the Ricardos. More titles will have the feature rolled out to them throughout the year. According to the blog post, the Dialogue Boost "is available across all devices that support the Prime Video experience."
In the coming weeks Prime Video will roll out their latest major investment with originals, the Russo Brothers produced Citadel. The series premieres April 28th on Prime Video, with new episodes released weekly every Friday through May 26th. It's unclear if the show will launch with the Dialogue Boost feature available when it