At Opal Transcription Services, we edit each transcript to remove stutters, false starts, and commonly used filler speech such as “um,” “ah,” and “like.” This transcription style is often referred to as intelligent verbatim style (as opposed to “strict verbatim,” which captures every utterance the speaker makes).
We also make minor edits to grammar for better readability; however, we don’t change the overall sentence structure, add or remove important words, or paraphrase speakers.
We edit out elements like off-camera chatter and small talk at the beginning of focus groups if they distract from the main purpose of the transcript. We use a [inaudible 00:00:53] tag to denote inaudibles, crosstalk, lyrics, video fragments if they aren’t essential to the purpose of the transcript, and foreign language.
Edited transcription example
Spoken: Okay, um … just pick one or two, because I’m … I’m trying to get, like, a feel for the, like … which ones they worked on.
Transcribed: Okay, just pick one or two, because I’m trying to get a feel for which ones they worked on.
View a complete interview transcript here.
Speaker labels and tracking
In files with just a few participants, speakers are tracked, or identified, by their name or role. To avoid misquoting speakers in files with many participants, our policy is to use generic labels: Participant, Male, Female, Student, Camera Crew, etc.
AP style
AP style is an editorial standard widely used by print and online publications. In general, we follow AP style guidelines for things like dimensions and numbers, titles of works, punctuation, and so on.