Transcription
Developer: Bartas Technologies
Shareware: $19.99
Version: 1.1.1
Updated: 2006-07-26
Last Updated: 2007-02-04
Pros: Small, sleak, fast; Full-featured transcription tool; Automatically assigns time codes to transcript; Easily identify speakers in transcript; Allows user to assign key shortcuts to any action (start, stop, faster, slower etc...).
Cons: No full support of video files (only sound); Slowing down affects sound quality; Does not support Olympus DSS format.
Description
One of the most terrible tasks of a social researcher is to transcribe interviews. Often this job is done by secretaries, research assistants or individuals/companies specialising in transcribing, but there are still researchers who either prefer or are forced to do it themselves due to financial restraints. In this case Transcriva is the perfect solution, as for $20 it offers the functionality of a professional transcription system.
Small, sleak, fast - these three words describe
Transcriva's interface perfectly. The main window is where
you type; every time the speaker in an interviewer changes
you start a new entry automatically indicating the
respective speaker and the time code. You can define the
participating speakers in a separate window before
transcription starts and assign a shortcut and colour to
each of them. Thus, the transcript is not only being
structured while you type but once you are finished you can
actually listen to it while an indicator is jumping from
entry to entry, which is great for proofreading. Finally
you can export the transcript to RTF, optionally keeping
the speakers, colours and time codes.
The integrated audio-player has the usual start, stop
and pause controls as well as the possibility to speed up
or slow down playback, which can all be accessed through
customisable keyboard shortcuts. Unfortunately the playback
quality can suffer from slowing down too much, but it is
still good enough for most purposes. Transcriva uses
Quicktime to manage its audio capabilities, so it can
handle most file formats including MP3s, but not Olympus'
generic DSS format, which is used by the company's popular
Dictaphones. Transcriva's only real drawback is its failure
to play video files (one can only hear the sound, but not
the picture), but according to the developer this will
change with the software's next major update. Until then
Transcriva is just almost perfect.
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