Subtitles on a vcd?

[Evil Twin]

Anyone know how I can put selectable subtiltes on a vcd?

Selectable meaning that I can turn them on or off as I see fit.

To save some time:
I tried dvd2svcd but all I can get are permanent subs. I cannot unclick the 'permanent subtitles' button on dvd2svcd.

[sterno]

VCDs do not support selectable subtitles. If you want selectable subtitles you will need to create SVCD and use subrip and winsubmux (I don't know if/how DVD2SVCD handles selectable SVCD subs).

[Evil Twin]

Thank you sterno for your quick reply!

I'll look into subrip and winsubmux.
I hope there are those progs available here on this site and a guide!

[sterno]

If they're not in the tools section you can probably get both off doom9.net. I don't think there is a guide, but it's not that hard. You just rip the subtitles to BMP files in subrip, save the .sub file as Phillips SVCD Designer format, delete everything above the first subtitle.bmp line in that file, and load that file and your MPEG in winsubmux. There have been several threads on this, search the forum.

A few notes -

Not all players can display SVCD subs. Check the compatibility list and burn one of the SVCD samples to check. Subs can be SVCD format or CVD format. CVD seems to have better compatibility. Some players only work with CVD, some only with SVCD, and some with both.

I found that my player tends to have problems with subtitles if the video bitrate goes too high, but if I encode with 1800k max it always works. I think that's just my player, but if you have problems it's something to check.

You'll also need to make sure you allow some space for the subtitles when you calculate what bitrate to use, it's pretty annoying to forget that and find out your MPEG is just a little too big after you mux in the subtitles.