Subtitle Edit manual spacing of lines

[loninappleton]

I am doing some end credits and would use three lines one for each actor in the video as they
take a curtain call in a group. Subtitle Edit forces centering on short lines since I can't seem to manually space the text.
The goal is to have three steps across the screen for actor one, actor two, actor three for clarity stepped on the three lines in the default format.

Is there a line command for manual spacing?

[Ennio]

AFAIK SE doesn't force anything. Please explain. And with "default format" you mean srt?

[loninappleton]

Yes I didn't think centering would be a default on it. In the Edit box I was trying to make one entry, then CR to the next line make the secondentry then CR to the third line with a single name entered on each. Then force some spacing to position the names in step fashion:

First
Second
third.

But the screen shows that any spacing is ignored and the three names stay at center.

It's a small thing. I just couldn't see why normal text spacing -- hitting the space bar-- gave no new result.

>>>> Progress. I may have it now. Today on reload I saw the desired positioning. I think the answer is: Use one continuous line entry
rather than the line brakes or CR's .

Here is a screen shot of what it looks like but may need adjusting....

[jagabo]

Centering is normal for SRT subs. And most renderers will remove spaces and other non-printable characters before centering. So you can't easily position subs like you want with SRT. There are some tricks you can use but they are not standardized so they don't work with all players. One is to use ssa position tags and overlapping times:

3
00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:6,900
{\pos(90,245)}left sub

4
00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:6,900
{\pos(180,265)}middle sub

5
00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:6,900
{\pos(270,285)}right sub

Unfortunately, those position aren't consistent. Different players put them in different locations (if they respond to them at all).


[Attachment 66677 - Click to enlarge]

If you want more reliable positioning you need to use another sub format. Like SSA or IDX/Sub.

[loninappleton]

@jagabo

Thanks for answering. This is a valuable tip. I'm happy with the result after knowing what works but I'll experiment with the positioning tags.


I noted on one Japanese film that they also put subtitles at screen locations to translate
images on screen like "barber shop" and so on which has a sign out front on a street.

[Ennio]

You could also consider going for an image-based subtitle format like PGS (aka SUP). A lot of players support it. Where, after export to an editable intermediate like XML/PNG, you'd only have to manually adjust positioning coordinates for that specific subtitle. And probably edit the corresponding image to proper spacings between the "text" parts and their line-up. It is a bit of workaround, but assuming this would be for one line only, it wouldn't take too much time.

Main advantage of image-based over text is that not a playback device, but the creator decides how subs initially will look like and where they'll be displayed.
There's also advantages of text over image. There's no restrain by resolution. Most players render the subtitle at output (screen-) resolution. IMO this proves a bliss when viewing low resolution video. And for anamorphic video you don't have to take the image H/V size ratio into account. The player will simply overlay the text 1:1 on the already properly scaled output image.

[loninappleton]

Thanks Ennio.

I don't know if Subtitle Edit creates or saves in the SUP format. Is other software required to get those effects or is it a matter of saving to a file type?

[pcspeak]

Closing credits (curtain calls included?) are not normally part of the subtitles.
Perhaps creating a small subtitle file for just the credits/curtain calls, aligned how you would like, and then burning them into the video.
This would help do away with the sizing and positioning problems of different video players.

Then you can leave them out of the normal subtitles.

Cheers

[Ennio]

Wouldn't that mean recoding the whole video? Maybe a bit much for one line, not mentioning possible quality loss. Nevertheless, indeed a valid option.

I don't know if Subtitle Edit creates or saves in the SUP format. Is other software required to get those effects or is it a matter of saving to a file type?

Yes, SE can save in SUP format directly by going File --> Export --> Blu-ray SUP. But SUP is a format you can't edit the images of directly. Therefore I suggested exporting to XML/PNG as an intermediate. You'll find BDN xml/png in the same export list. I advice to save the output in a dedicated target folder. The output will create a xml file and as many images as there are srt entries.

The coordinates are saved in the xml file. It takes some reading before comprehending and editing the coordinates for the subtitle. You can open & edit with a simple text editor like Notepad.
The image-file can be edited with any tool that can handle 32 bit PNG. Be ware to save it with exactly the same name, overwriting the original. And in the same format; 32 bit PNG carries a transparancy (aka "alpha") channel.

Once done, import the edited XML/PNG in SE by going File --> Import --> "Blu-ray (.sup) subtitle file for edit" (in the browse window, set the filetype box to "All files", otherwise the xml/png will not show.
Once opened, Go File --> Save as and choose filetype SUP.

Important: do not cross-use SE created XML/PNG in BDSup2Sub (and vice versa). The two tools assess & process timecode differently at some framerates. SUP files aren't a problem btw.

As always, be sure to work with disposable copies.

[loninappleton]

Closing credits (curtain calls included?) are not normally part of the subtitles.
Perhaps creating a small subtitle file for just the credits/curtain calls, aligned how you would like, and then burning them into the video.
This would help do away with the sizing and positioning problems of different video players.

Then you can leave them out of the normal subtitles.

Cheers

You certainly have a point. I guess I thought of doing this since the capture has no end credits. Also I may have been showing off.

On the other hand, even though I did this sub from scratch using a printed book text and Youtube to get the timings, I don't think there's a point in my adding a subscript about 'subtitles by loninappleton.' _That_ would be showing off.

[loninappleton]

On the file conversions, thanks for the detailed explanation but I think it's beyond what I can do at this point. And I wouldn't want to have to redo the the subtitle text line by line for the whole video at 2 and half plus hours.

[Ennio]

There is nothing you have to do line by line. The described workflow may look verbose and strike you as there'd be much work to do. The time it took me to write that post, is about what it needs to actually do it. Read the workflow and boil it down; the actual manual work consists of nothing more than changing one line of text with Notepad and editing one image. The rest is mouse-clicks in SE.

[loninappleton]

Ok, I'll have another look. But in the discussion I think it's a better solution to discard the jazzy end credits. I am able and do use notepad++ for timing problems on SRTs. I'm not familiar with XML and SUP and the like so what you've said is a simple procedure seems daunting anyway. I'll leave that for when it's needed for screen positioning.

But it does raise another thing. How is the grid of the screen determined? Where jagabo described the screen
positions, what is the start and end point of the grid horizontal and vertical?

[jagabo]

How is the grid of the screen determined? Where jagabo described the screen
positions, what is the start and end point of the grid horizontal and vertical?

Experimentally, the first number is the horizontal position, the second the vertical position. 0,0 is at the top left, 385,290 is the bottom right. The specified position is the bottom center of the line of text. If there are multiple lines it's the bottom center of the bottom line. It appears to be independent of the size of the video frame. These position tags work with MPCHC and PotPlayer. Other players ignore the tags and display the subs at the bottom center of the frame (ie, as if there were no position tags). Oh, they work with VSFilter in AviSynth too.

I highly recommend you don't use these tags unless you are doing so for your own use.

[loninappleton]

Yes I will take your advice. Though I may want to experiment it's an easy way to botch what I have.

thanks and onward.