Question how to increase subtitle size on DVD

[jimdagys]

I have a DVD and I want to increase the subtitle size. I copied the DVD to the hard drive and then tried to use DVDSub Edit, but that software only allows you to change the color and position of the subtitles, not the size. What is the most simple way to increase the subtitle size? I want to make a new DVD disk with the increased subtitle size.

[Baldrick]

I guess you have to OCR the subs to text(use dvdsubedit) and then create new bigger dvd subs using subtitlecreator.

[manono]

I OCR to SSA format text based subs using SubRip and then use MaestroSBT to set the size I like (along with font, positioning, etc) and use it to create SST subs for Muxman which I use for remuxing/authoring. Lots of ways to do it.

You could also extract all the BMPs as part of an SST file, crop and then resize them to make them larger using the batch function of an image editor like IrfanView or PhotoFiltre, and then use the SST with the now larger subs to remux. SubRip can save them out as either BMPs or as an SST file with all the BMPs. It's trickier to accomplish than an OCR, though, in my opinion.

[jimdagys]

Well, I can see there is no simple way. I was trying to avoid using OCR because sometimes on some DVDs OCR doesn't work well. The other method, could I use VSRip to extract the sub/idx files and then somehow make the subtitles bigger and then convert the sub/idx files to something that muxman can use? Also, you mentioned SubRip to extract the BMPs and make them bigger. I tried to use Subrip (see screenshot 1 , red circle ) "save subpictures as BMP".
The result was I got about 1000 .bmp files that seem to correspond to all the subtitles. See screenshot 2 for an image of one of the .bmps. You can see that it is blue and not so clear. Now, what do I do with these 1000 or so .bmp images? I want to make them bigger. You said to use Irfanview batch processing. How do I do that? Then, how do I convert the .bmp to SST for Muxman?

[manono]

The result was I got about 1000 .bmp files that seem to correspond to all the subtitles.

In addition to ticking the "Save Subpictures as BMP" box, also hit that blue jigsaw puzzle piece looking box just below and it'll give you a chance to save it as an SST file. That way you'll get the SST text file along with all the BMPs. Then you crop and resize the BMPs, replace them in the folder with the SST text file, and you're in business.

There's nothing wrong with those BMPs. That's how they're supposed to look. Make them 720x478 if for NTSC dialog subtitles. Also 4-bit color.

[AlanHK]

The other method

... is to let someone else do it.
See http://www.opensubtitles.org/en/search/idmovie-1859/sublanguageid-eng

From a quick look at the several choices, http://www.opensubtitles.org/en/subtitles/146856/roman-holiday-en looks like a good bet.
(Just click on the "Download zip" icon.)

Use Subtitle Workshop if you need to change the format (this is "SUB", you may want "SRT") or adjust the sync.

Very easy to do by comparison with your own OCRed version which you can refer to for timing -- often just get the first and last lines is enough.

[manono]

How'd you know it was Roman Holiday? Just from the one line from the movie in the BMP? If so, I'm very impressed.

[jimdagys]

Thanks for the info about ticking the other thing to get the SST file.
About the last comment, I don't want to use subtitles from another source. I just want to learn how to take the subtitles already in the DVD and make them bigger. I think this may be a useful recipe to have in my toolbox. You said,"Then you crop and resize the BMPs.." Are you saying that I have to crop and resize 1000 BMPs, one at a time? I won't spend the hours to do that. Is there a way to crop and resize all the BMPs, (in one operation) for example, with Irfanview? If so, could you tell me how to do this?

[AlanHK]

I don't want to use subtitles from another source. I just want to learn how to take the subtitles already in the DVD and make them bigger

Before you get too involved in this, do a couple by hand and see if the result is acceptable.
Subtitles are rendered at a pretty low resolution, and enlarging them is likely to give unpleasant, irregular results, (especially the outlines, which are probably one pixel wide) as you'll be doing it by an odd ratio (i.e., not 200%, 300%).

You will get a much more legible result by rendering new subtitles at the final size in one step.

Is there a way to crop and resize all the BMPs, (in one operation)

But if you insist: ImageMagick command-line options

[manono]

Are you saying that I have to crop and resize 1000 BMPs, one at a time?

No, I'm not saying that and I didn't say it. What I said was:

You could also extract all the BMPs as part of an SST file, crop and then resize them to make them larger using the batch function of an image editor like IrfanView or PhotoFiltre, and then use the SST with the now larger subs to remux.

I've never used IrfanView, but know it can be done using it. Maybe someone will come along and explain it to you (45tripp?). I've made subs smaller (for a PAL2NTSC conversion) using PhotoFiltre's batch function, and have also made them larger (can't remember why now). I assume IrfanView is the same. Open all the BMPs, set it to crop how you want, set it to resize back to 720x478, and it'll do the whole bunch in one operation.

Here are some IrfanView batch conversion guides you could have easily found:

http://granitelabor.com/tutorials/irfansize.html
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic50519.html
http://dragonnet.hkis.edu.hk/up/toolkit/tutorials/ifranbatch.htm

[jimdagys]

Thanks for the info. I'll let you know what happens. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to crop, or why it is necessary to crop. I'm not sure how to make the subtitles bigger in Irfanview, but if I can figure all this out, I am going to post the click by click recipe with screenshots that anyone can follow. I see from previous postings on this board, other people have wanted to increase subtitle size and presently is no simple recipe given to do this.

[jimdagys]

I managed to use Irfanview to crop and resize the BMPs. (See screenshot 1 and compare with above screenshot of original subtitle.) I saved all the larger BMPs (with same name as original) in a folder along with the sst in the same folder (see screenshot 2) . I used Pgcdemux and then Muxman and inputed the sst into Muxman (see screenshot 3) , but the result did not have any subtitles at all when played on Media Player Classic. Inputing the whole movie in DVDSubedit also did not have subtitles. Can you tell me what I did wrong? Is it OK to input sst (with BMPs in same folder) into Muxman? I know that Muxman normally just takes sup files. Is there a way to convert the sst/BMPs folder to sup? I could not do this with Subtitle Creator.

[manono]

Can you tell me what I did wrong?

Not offhand, as you haven't supplied near enough information. I know it must be frustrating, though, to get so near to the end and then have it not work. The Muxman.log in the root of the C Drive might have the needed information.

Is it OK to input sst (with BMPs in same folder) into Muxman?

Yes, I do it probably 2-3 times a week.

I know that Muxman normally just takes sup files.

It supports both SUP and SST files.

Is there a way to convert the sst/BMPs folder to sup?

None that I know of. SON files can be converted to SUP files using SON2VSub to create IDX/SUB and then converting VobSubs to SUP in SubtitleCreator. SubRip can create the SON files just as it does the SSTs.

https://forum.videohelp.com/images/guides/p1661328/son2vsub.exe

If muxman didn't accept them to begin with, it's usually because of wrong resolution (not 720x478) or wrong number of colors (not 4-bit=16 colors). If it accepted them but didn't mux them, it's either the numbering is wrong or the names in the SST text file don't match the names of the BMPs. The numbering must all contain the same number of digits:

0001
0002
.
.
0010
0011
.
.
0100
0101
.
.
1000
1001

and not:

1
2
.
.
10
11
.
.
100
101

The pics you provided don't say if it's OK or not. However, I suspect the main problem is bit depth. Each one of my 4-bit/16color 720x478 BMPs is 169 KB, not 1 MB like that JPG pic of your BMP I downloaded and converted back to BMP. And it says it's 24-bit, and not 4-bit as it's supposed to be. But maybe it got changed when I downloaded it and converted it back to BMP.

[jimdagys]

Thank you for the help. I looked at the Muzman log. (See screenshot 1 and 2) I think I found the problem (I named Sst folder "bat" instead of "batch". I am using Muxman again to see if this solves the problem. When I loaded Muxman this time (see screenshot 3) I got notation, "List of 938 bitmaps" , before I just got the word "free".

[manono]

Right, I didn't even mention anything about the paths having to match up as it's sort of a given that nothing's going to happen if they're messed up.

Also, in that first pic you see the BMPs are numbered the wrong way. I explained the right way before.

I hope you selected Wide and LB Modes in Muxman before doing the mux. You might also upgrade to ver. 16.6 as that warning is now in red.

[jimdagys]

Success. Apparently Muxman didn't care that the BMPs were numbered 1,2,3..10,11,12..100,101,102...
I am not sure what you mean by "selected Wide and LB Modes" in Muxman. I just used the default that came up. (See screenshot 1). Orginal DVD (screenshot 2) and increased size subtitles DVD (screenshot 3). Screenshots taken with Media Player Classic.

[manono]

Apparently Muxman didn't care that the BMPs were numbered 1,2,3..10,11,12..100,101,102...

Then I learned something also. Back when I was starting to crop and/or resize the BMPs, I sometimes had problems making it work, and decided one reason was the way the BMPs were numbered. I guess it doesn't matter how they're numbered, but that they're numbered the same way before and after.

I am not sure what you mean by "selected Wide and LB Modes" in Muxman.

I was referring to your earlier Muxman pic where it says, "Warning: Stream 1 has no modes selected". If you have a 16:9 DVD, and that's what Muxman says even though Roman Holiday is supposed to be 4:3, and you have one subtitle stream, and I think you do, then after loading the SST you have to hit "Wide" followed by "LB". But if you got subs, then I guess you did that already.

That is peculiar, though. The pics show a 4:3 video, but Muxman shows a 16:9 video.

Good going on your success.

[jimdagys]

I've use Muxman a number of times and never touched those buttons , PS, LB, Wide. I'm not sure what they do.
1) What would happen if they were incorrectly selected?
2) What is the procedure to know which ones to select?
Also, I have another question. When using Irfanview for the batch crop, I had a very time consuming job (about an hour) finding which numbers should be used in the crop before I arrived at numbers that produced a good crop. ( See screenshot). I seemed to just have to guess the numbers by trial and error. I used one BMP and kept trying different numbers until the subtitles were bigger and also positioned correctly on the screen. My question is, is there any faster way to find the numbers that give a good crop? Possibly another software instead of Irfanview might be better? Normally, cropping just involves sliding the mouse, but with Irfanview batch processing, you need to fill in those numbers. I suppose the numbers that I have already found (see circled numbers in screenshot) would give me a ballpark estimate for cropping any other movie, is that right?
EDIT: I have found that both CROP and RESIZE should be ticked, and Pal movies should use a resize value of
720x574 (width x height) and a CROP height of 396 (instead of 300 for NTSC). Below screenshot settings is for NTSC.

[manono]

1) What would happen if they were incorrectly selected?

You didn't select anything, but left the warnings in place and went ahead and muxed? I didn't think you'd get any subs at all. However, maybe you getting subs has to do with that movie, based on the pics you showed, being 4:3. But that still doesn't explain why it says 16:9 at the top, and why you got the warning in the first place.

2) What is the procedure to know which ones to select?

If it's 4:3, you just select the subs once and that's it. If it's a 16:9 movie, and if you have only one stream, you load it, hit "Wide", followed by hitting "LB". Each 16:9 track must have 2 streams. Sometimes they're the same one (and you hit "Wide" followed by "LB"), but often retail DVDs have one stream for display on a 16:9 TV set and a different one for display on a 4:3 set. I usually create 2 streams myself when preparing subs for a 16:9 DVD. In that case you load the 16:9 one and hit "Wide". Then you load the 4:3 one and hit "LB".

Sorry, but as I said before, I know nothing about IrfanView. But if, for example, you want to increase the sub size by 25%, you crop away 20% of the BMP. 20% of 720=144, so you'd crop 72 pixels from both the left and the right. 20% of 478=96. I think I'd crop most, if not all, from the top, maybe 80 and 16. Then resize the resulting BMP back to 720x478. You increased the sub size by more than 25%, it looks to me, and they look fine. Using those figures, if and when you have a similar project in the future it should go much more quickly.

[jimdagys]

I wasn't aware that 16:9 required 2 streams. And I've never paid any attention to those warnings.
I'll have to experiment with different settings.

[handyguy]

But how they look depends on what is playing them. Some players might make them bigger. Some players let you select subtitle size too.