A couple of general newbie questions

[serpetary]

Hi guys,

Sorry if my questions have already been answered somewhere on the forum but I've been trying to find something relevant for about an hour with no luck so far.

I am new to subtitle authoring and make my first steps in that field. I create .srt subtitles from scratch with the help of Subtitle Workshop (have also tried some other tools).

I am concerned with the usability issues as I want to make my subtitles as good for people as possible. Therefore my questions are about how to break the script into subtitle lines and how to display them.

1. What is the minimum amount of time during which a line of subtitles should appear on the screen? I can make shorter portions of text displayed more frequently or longer lines displayed less frequently. Where is the optimum?

2. As far as I understand conventional limitations for the number of characters per one subtitle is at most 2 lines with at most 40 characters in each. Is that correct?

3. I am creating subtitles for university lectures. The professor sometimes uses words like "you know", "um", "eh", "right?", etc. He also repeats himself as he picks the best words to express his thoughts. Is it better to put all of those words into subtitles or skip insignificant words or find a compromise? What is the common practice in such cases?

4. Should the subtitle appear on the screen at the very moment the speaker starts to speak or should it come a bit earlier or later? What delay is the best from the user's point of view?

Hope to get help here.
Thank you for any opinions or insights.

[cdanddvdpublisher]

Check out this website. It has all kinds of information on subtitling. I hope it helps!

http://www.peak-translations.co.uk/ChapterTwo-Subtitling.doc

[kevin182h]

about number 4, i really don't like when they come earlier or later... imo they should always starts at the moment the person starts sayin

[serpetary]

cdanddvdpublisher,

Thanks a lot for the awesome reference!
The information in the document is exactly what I needed!

[cdanddvdpublisher]

No problem. Glad I could help!

[Johnson Nguyen]

To responses 3 and 4, I'd keep it professional and not put words or expressions like "uhm" or sighing. If justs a sore on the eyes and they'll eventually get the picture. With number 4, it should start with the speaker talking right away. I've watched video feeds of my professors and find it much more helpful when parallel.