Captioning audio from another program and your microphone at the same time

Web Captioner can caption audio from other programs, but if you want it to do this while also continuing to listening to your own microphone, follow these steps.

Note about group meeting software like Zoom, Google Meet, or WebEx: If you are a member of a group call and want captions for yourself plus any other participants in the meeting, you have two options:

1. Follow the steps below to send both your own audio plus audio from other meeting participants to Web Captioner.
2. Or get a second computer and follow the steps for captioning audio from another program instead of the steps below. This may be a simpler option if you happen to have a second computer available.

• Windows
• MacOS

Windows

1. Download Voicemeeter (EXE file) for Windows.

2. Run the VoicemeeterSetup.exe and select Install.

   

3. Restart your computer.
4. Open the Voicemeeter application.

5. In the upper right, select A1 and choose the device you use for output normally. If there are multiple with the same name, use the WDM version if possible. In this example, I use "MME: Speakers (Parallels Audio Controller)".

   

6. Click on the "1" button and select your microphone. If there are multiple with the same name, use the WDM version if possible. In this example, my microphone is "WDM: Microphone (Parallels Audio Controller)".

   

7. Go into Windows Sound settings (open the Start menu, type Sound settings, select it). Under Output, select "VoiceMeeter Input".

   

8. After you do this, you should now hear your microphone audio in your speakers. In Voicemeeter, click the "A" button in the first column to unselect it. This will stop your microphone from being played in your main device (device A), but it will still be routed through to the virtual output (device B), which Web Captioner will be listening to after you complete the rest of these steps.

   

9. Go to Google Chrome Settings > Privacy and Security and select Microphone:

   

10. From the list, select "VoiceMeeter Output".

    

Web Captioner will now caption audio coming from both your microphone and any other programs on your computer, like Zoom or a YouTube video.

MacOS

Loopback for MacOS is the best program at the moment to do this on MacOS. It is free to try for 20 minutes at a time, and costs $99 for a single user license on one or more Macs.

1. Download and install Loopback for MacOS.

2. Set it up like this:

   

   On the left, under Devices, create a virtual device and name it something memorable. In this case, it has been named "Web Captioner Audio". Loopback comes with some example virtual devices when you install it. You can delete these if you won't use them.

   Use the plus button next to Sources to add sources. You should have at least two sources:

   1. Your microphone (in the example above, it is called Logitech Wireless Headset).

   2. The program you want to caption audio from (in the example above, we are capturing audio from Zoom).

   The Output Channels section should just have a single "Channels 1 & 2" output.

3. Go to Google Chrome Settings > Privacy and Security and select Microphone:

   

4. From the list, select "Web Captioner Audio (Virtual)", or whatever you named your virtual device in Loopback:

   

Web Captioner will now caption audio coming from both your microphone and the program you selected in Loopback.