Microsoft has announced a sign language view for Teams to help signers and others who use sign language. The information on screen will be prioritised on centre stage, in a consistent location, throughout every meeting.
When sign language view is enabled, the prioritised video streams automatically appear at the right aspect ratio and at the highest available quality. Like pinning and captioning, sign language view is personal to each user and will not impact what others see in the meeting.
With sign language view turned on, the video feeds of the individuals each user has designated stay visible on centre stage as long as their video is on. Other participants can also be pinned or spotlighted without encroaching on the sign language interpreter.
When someone shares content in the meeting, the prioritised signer video shifts positions, but remains high quality and at a larger size than the video feeds of other participants.
In the new Accessibility pane in the Settings menu users can turn sign language view on by default across all meetings, and pre-identify a set of preferred signers that users work with inside their organisation on a regular basis – for example, regular interpreters (or for interpreters, or regular clients). The pane also provides an option to toggle captions on across all meetings. Setting these preferences in advance makes it easier to join calls more quickly, so users can catch those first few minutes of chitchat or dive right into a deeper conversation.