ATI captions to subtitles

[Nelson37]

Tested and working. I tried the longer Graphedit method, several reboots when adding filters, got all the filters in but could not run with MMC up at the same time. It also looks as though ATI's cc capture text file should be able to be converted, it now contains timecodes, but I gave up on that. This method actually seems easier.

First you need to go to McPoodles site, http://www.geocities.com/mcpoodle43/SCC_TOOLS
and download his software. Then go to Doom9 and download Graphedit, you need the Dump filter which they have.

ATI card must have Coax connection and record in ATI's VCR format.
This only has 44k audio, but such is life. You may also see that ATI displays only single lines of the Caption text, but it does capture all.

Record the video, then drag and drop the VCR file into Graphedit. It will automatically create the filters, you will see one with a CC tag on the right, or output side. Add the Dump filter and connect its input to the CC tag. Name the file and press play, it will run in realtime and create the filename you gave, it should end in .BIN. This will be your raw caption file.

You can hex edit to fix the header, I just opened one of the sample files in notepad. You will see it starts with four "y" characters with the two dots over them, umlauts I believe they are called. Copy these four characters (only four!) and paste them into the beginning of your BIN file.

Then run RAW2SCC cc.bin, this will create a Scenerast subtitle file which is valid. Authoring steps may vary.

I then used McPoodle's CCASDI -s CC.SCC to convert to an SRT file. Open ATI library, seek for the media file, then right click and select Convert to MPG. Open the MPG in Vdub, Save wav, and use TMPGenc with SSRC and Toolame to convert to 48k MP2. Also demux the M2v.

In DVDAuthorGui, drag the M2V file into the main window, the audio will automatically be selected if you kept the names the same. Then add your subtitle file.

Make sure and set DVD Author for PAL or NTSC before doing anything else, you can't change this once files have been added.

Subtitles display perfectly and in synch, also they are selectable. I believe you could trim video and trim subs with Subtitle Workshop, Next task is to test this with edited commercials. That will be SOOOO much fun.

[Nelson37]

I was thinking of doing a regular Guide for this, with screen caps and all. Guess there aren't that many people interested.

Anyway, one tidbit I just learned is to NOT change the name of the VCR file, if you do the Library function will not open the file and you can't convert it to MPG. Even after naming it back to the original, no go.

Have successfully edited commercials and retained subtitles, method needs a little refinement but does work. Will post details after another test or two.

[compuser]

There is another program out there called mpg2srt... works good (v0.3)... 1 basic parameter... mpg2srt <input>

It will run through the mpeg and dump the captions to a srt which is compable with dvdauthor/dvdauthorgui

It will work with edited mpegs (dvd compliant) don't know about Mpegs captured through ATI though

EDIT:
https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=278743&highlight=mpg2srt

Link to mpg2srt
http://www.sage-community.org/index.cgi/attachment/wiki/SageFaq/mpg2srt_ver0.3.zip

[Nelson37]

Yes, but it will not accept the ATI VCR file, which contains the captions. If you convert VCR to MPG with ATI's Library program (the only known way to do it), the captions are removed.

If there was some way to directly edit the VCR file, that would be smooth. ATI used to include an Edit program years ago, I could not get it to work with newer MMC and Windows. Didn't spend much time on this, however.

Editing video and subtitles is workable, some things to know is that Subtitle Workshop will not re-time just a segment of the file, so you have to trim the subtitles for each video segment, then cut and paste them back together. Append each segment to the end of the preceeding one, as it adds lines AFTER the highlighted sub. Still working on this, it is doable.

[anitract]

I'm interested in a guide, Nelson37. But don't do it just on account of me alone.

[Nelson37]

Just wanted you to know I will be spending many sleepless nights, working my fingers to the bone just for you!!!

Seriously, I just want to figure out a good method. Thought this might be useful for the upcoming re-broadcast of Carl Sagan's Cosmos, it must have Billions and Billions of subtitles.

I have noticed many errors in the captions, but also a few bits of dialog that I did not quite catch or understand were clarified by reading them. Also as an aid for correct pronunciation for my 8-yr-old.

Ex. - in Gangs of New York, at one point DiCaprio's friend calls him "Benny", which confused me. The caption shows "Bene", which I think is Italian for "good", which makes much more sense.