Suggestion on subtitles file format supporting colors

[riccardov]

Hello everybody,
I am searching for a way to display colorful picture subtitles over a movie without reencoding it
I tried creating VOBSUB and DVD subtitle files but they seems to support only 4 colors, and there seems to be no free video player that displayes subtitles in SUP or BDN XML format from external files
I actually do not need to use subtitles, just a way to see in my computer a video with image overlays; any subtitle-similar technology is ok

Your help will be much appreciated

BTW, the purpose is to color Japanese words based on grammar, for a study tool of mine (easyjasub, on sourceforge)

[Ai Haibara]

You can try the SSA/ASS format (use Aegisub to create the subtitles, for example). Most hardware players have limited support for SSA formats, and I'm not sure about their support for ASS... but it sounds as if you're wanting to use software players (on a computer), so you shouldn't have any problems (although you may need to install a subtitle handler/filter for some players).

[riccardov]

Many thanks but... I need to display picture-based subtitles, not subtitles in text format. I am generating the pictures with an application of mine.
With SSA/ASS format I don't have support to display kanji chars with furigana (afaik)

Hardware players are not an issue, the purpose is to use these subtitles as a language study tool, I am happy to view them with my computer.

[Ai Haibara]

I've seen it done with ASS (furigana+kanji) - at least I think it was done that way - but unfortunately, I couldn't tell you how it's done. Do you have support for it installed on your system? It might be worth an experiment, at any rate.

[riccardov]

I often use Aegisub and its documentation says there is a "Karaoke" support that allwos Furigana, but it seems for a very special use case
I will have a look at it anyway, thanks