Genuine Itunes Movies 'Closed Captions' only works on Quickplay....

[Greg2041]

... just wondered why? Can't seem to get WMP12, VLC or any other player to show the Closed Captions, even though I've set them up properly.

Is it possible to extract the captions from the M4V so that they appear as an SRT?

Many thanks

Greg

[Greg2041]

Just heard of CC extractor which can do the job. McAfee flashed up with a probably virus warning.

What do you think?

[Cornucopia]

How do you "know" that you set them up properly. The term "Captions" and "Closed Captions" are often interlinked with "Subtitles", but also confused with them. True "Closed Caption" format is in either a digitized version of the Analog 608 (aka Line 21) format, or in the DTV 708 format. With 608, the data should reside in "Line 21" of the VBI. Since VBI doesn't really exist in digital files, it just exists at the top of the frame (hopefully not visible) as white semaphore-type blips on the black letterboxed padding field/background. This is also how digitized SMPTE timecode appears, so there is also that confusion.

Converting that to standard subtitle files (such as SRT) requires specialty software (check out McPoodle's free apps, or much more expensive Cheetah or CaptionMaster apps).

DTV is usually in Auxilliary data packets muxed into a DV, MPEG-PS or MPEG-TS stream along with the video packets, or in a special user-data header/footer within the video packets. There are similar problems with exporting/converting those to standard subtitle files.

MP4 is based upone MOV format, and MOV format uses a muxed stream known as "Timed Text" for captions, timecode, and hyperlinks. Those can be converted easily to standard text files or subtitle files, via Quicktime Pro.

Scott

[Greg2041]

Okay. I guess I don't know but on other files I managed to show either subs or closed captions depending on the file but not the iTunes ones. I just wondered why?

I will have a play with some of those programs.

[Cornucopia]

One again, MediaInfo is your friend!

Scott

[Greg2041]

Does this help?

Text
ID : 4-CC1
Format : EIA-608
Muxing mode : Final Cut
Codec ID : c608
Duration : 42mn 49s
Source duration : 42mn 49s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Stream size : 0.00 Byte (0%)
Source stream size : 32.8 KiB (0%)
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2013-03-19 01:49:38
Tagged date : UTC 2013-03-19 01:49:55

[Greg2041]

Well, CC Extractor which links to McPoodle didn't work. Well, it tried but couldn't find the captions.

[usually_quiet]

I have seen tools for adding captions to MOV and M4V files, but have seen none for extracting them.

Development for McPoodle's Tools ended some years ago. CCExtractor superceded McPoodle's tools for closed caption extraction and has additional capabilities, but it only works for NTSC DVD closed captions and TV recordings containing EIA-608 N. American DTV closed captions. Itunes 'Closed Captions' uses a different type of captioning technology, iTunes Timed Text, and I doubt that McPoodle's tools or CCExtractor will work for extracting them. They probably can't even open the file since iTunes uses MPEG-4 and N. American DTV and NTSC DVDs use MPEG-2.

[Greg2041]

I have seen tools for adding captions to MOV and M4V files, but have seen none for extracting them.

Development for McPoodle's Tools ended some years ago. CCExtractor superceded McPoodle's tools for closed caption extraction and has additional capabilities, but it only works for NTSC DVD closed captions and TV recordings containing EIA-608 N. American DTV closed captions. Itunes 'Closed Captions' uses a different type of captioning technology, iTunes Timed Text, and I doubt that McPoodle's tools or CCExtractor will work for extracting them. They probably can't even open the file since iTunes uses MPEG-4 and N. American DTV and NTSC DVDs use MPEG-2.

That would explain why I can't extract them then. So is there another program which will do the business?

[poisondeathray]

Did you select mp4 in the input options tab? Are you using a fairly recent version ? 0.65 ?

If this is DRM protected, nothing will work

[Cornucopia]

Have you tried QTPro? I'm not kidding, that is the FIRST place to look.

Scott

[Greg2041]

Will let you know tomorrow as it is time to crash out. Thanks again for all your help.

[usually_quiet]

Did you select mp4 in the input options tab? Are you using a fairly recent version ? 0.65 ?

If this is DRM protected, nothing will work

I should have read the release notes at VideoHelp instead of the "About CCExtractor" page at SourceForge. The authors started adding some support for mp4 files with MPEG-2 video and iTunes-type captions in a separate stream beginning with version 0.62, but it looks like it still is a work in progress.

[Selur]

Is there a free available sample of such a video somewhere to download?

[Greg2041]

Did you select mp4 in the input options tab? Are you using a fairly recent version ? 0.65 ?

OOOPS. That is what I didn't do. It now works fine. Thank you.

Out of interest, is it possible to convert the srt file to another format so that when my elderly parents watch it on their TV that they can switch the subtitles on and off using the TV controller? I usually give them a memory stick with the movie on it.

[usually_quiet]

Did you select mp4 in the input options tab? Are you using a fairly recent version ? 0.65 ?

OOOPS. That is what I didn't do. It now works fine. Thank you.

Out of interest, is it possible to convert the srt file to another format so that when my elderly parents watch it on their TV that they can switch the subtitles on and off using the TV controller? I usually give them a memory stick with the movie on it.

To do what you want using video on a USB stick, the TV's media player and its remote would need to support turning .srt subtitles on and off like the closed captions/subtitles for broadcast TV. If it doesn't, you are out of luck. It is unlikely that the TV's player can display any form of closed captioning/subtitles other than .srt when playing a file from a USB stick.

[Cornucopia]

What does your TV's manual say? It should have SRT listed in there...

BTW, I must revise what I said earlier: QT/MOV (and probably by inheritance, MP4) supports 4 types of CC/Subs tracks!
1. Line21, Field1, quasi-608 encoded SCC files imported into a special CC track by a QT CC Importer plugin
2. Line21, Field1+2, Fully-608-compliant caption (non-SCC) files imported into special CC track by MacCaption
3. 608-compliant + 708-compliant caption (non-SCC) files imported into special CC track by MacCaption
4. "Timed Text" subtitle tracks

Only the last is easily extractable to Text by QTPro. The others can be stripped of their backing video and rendered on white/black to video/pixsequence, then OCR'd to standard subs tracks.
And it is likely that CCExtractor can get the SCC-type tracks and TimedText tracks converted out to SRT, etc., but I have doubts about the other 2 types.

Scott

[Greg2041]

Thanks Guys. Most helpful.

Greg