Converted (.SRT -> Encore Subtitle text script) never Sync.

[Cdrazar]

Hi all,

I've searched for two days on the web but still no answer.

I'm making a BluRay Disc of a collection of TV Show episodes. I add these episodes as an .m4v file into Encore, which works great. These videos will be transcoded the the appropriat format at the end.

The only problem I encounter is the subtitles: I have an .srt file which runs perfectly sync with the .m4v video file (when I just play it in i.e. VLC, so no Adobe Encore is used)

But when I open the .srt file in a Subtile Editor (Subtitle Workshop, Subtitle Edit, Jubler (MAC) ) and hit ' Save As' Adobe Encore Text Script and import it in Adobe Encore, it starts of as a good sync in the first few seconds of the TV Show episode, but is way out of sync at the end of the episodes... (Sounds like me as an FPS problem?)

I've tried everything, from all different types of FPS output of the subtitle file, to all different project FPS settings.

My main project is 23,976FPS BluRay NTSC, my VIDEOFILE.m4v is 23,976FPS and my subtitles are 23,976FPS.

I really hope someone can help me out here.

Thanks in advance.

Sincerely,

Christiaan.

[Stan Jones]

Drop frame vs non drop frame has been an issue for some users with this issue. Does the exported file have colons or semicolons?

[Cdrazar]

When I Save As the .SRT as an Encore subtitle text script it's set to semicolons. I've already tried to replace those with normal colons, to check of it differs somehow, but then Encore can't process the subtitle file with the error "Line 1 is not correct (or something like that)  [CANCEL], [SKIP ALL], [SKIP]" and when I skip line 1, it gives the same messages with Line 2, etc...

So normal collons don't work with Encore I gues...

[Stan Jones]

Semicolons is correct for NTSC/drop code.

This isn't PAL is it?

[Cdrazar]

No, I've set the BluRay up as NTSC 1920*1080 with 23,976 FPS. All my imported videos are also 23,976 FPS.

And the subs are created on the 23,976FPS Video file.

[Stan Jones]

How far off are the times by the end of the movie? And how long is it.

[Cdrazar]

The video file is 54min 31s long. And Adobe Encore shows it is 00:54:28:08 (hh:mm:ss:ff, whereas f=frames, not milliseconds)

This is the subtitle information outside Adobe Encore (just to clear the difference), as expected the .srt has 3-decimal miliseconds behind the collon, and the Encore Text Script with 2-decimal frames behind the semicolon:

subtitle.srt                                        VS          subtitle.txt (Adobe Encore Text Script (*txt)

1

00:01:01,725 --> 00:01:03,526                       1 00;01;01;17 00;01;03;13 Brother?

Brother?

2

00:02:25,763 --> 00:02:28,230                       2 00;02;25;18 00;02;28;06 Did you send the raven?

Did you send the raven?

499                                                                 499 00;52;47;17 00;52;52;06 I'm Barristan Selmy.

00:52:47,693 --> 00:52:52,263                       Kingswatcher from your Father.

I'm Barristan Selmy.

Kingswatcher from your Father.

500                                                                 500 00;52;52;09 00;52;57;20 Allow me to accompany your kingswatch

00:52:52,363 --> 00:52:57,834                       and I won't let you down.

Allow me to accompany your kingswatch

and I won't let you down.

And now the information how far off the subtitles are by the end of the movie:

Like I said, they start off in sync, so Line 1 and 2 from above are in sync.

But when I get to line 499 and line 500:

Line 499 Is spoken at 00:52:44:20, but shows at 00:52:47:17. (A difference of almost 3 seconds)

Line 500 Is poken at 00:52:49:08, but shows at 00:52:52:10. (A difference of slightly more than 3 seconds)

And here is some information about the videofile. While I doubt that has something to do with this problem...

Video

ID : 1

Format : AVC

Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec

Format profile : High@L4.0

Format settings, CABAC : Yes

Format settings, ReFrames : 4 frames

Codec ID : avc1

Codec ID/Info : Advanced Video Coding

Duration : 54mn 31s

Bit rate mode : Variable

Bit rate : 5 102 Kbps

Width : 1 920 pixels

Height : 1 080 pixels

Display aspect ratio : 16:9

Frame rate mode : Variable

Frame rate : 23.976 fps

Minimum frame rate : 23.810 fps

Maximum frame rate : 24.390 fps

[Stan Jones]

Your video file is variable frame rate. I don't know if that alone is the issue, but that is a problem for Encore. What is the transcode status in Encore? Do not transcode, untranscoded?

I suspect that is the issue in the video length vs encore video length.

[Cdrazar]

The videofile transcode status is untranscoded. I already tried to build the BluRay with Encore, withouth subtitles (just to see if the menu works properly), and then it transcodes to videofile.m4v to the correct format.

[Stan Jones]

While that is good, the problem is that, I assume, the subtitles were synced to the m4v's you have that are variable frame rate. But since the nominal, and I assume average, frame rate is 23.976, I would expect minor variations in subtitle sync, not 3 seconds.

Encore sees your file as 3 seconds shorter than its properties as gauged by (looks like) media info? I would try to clean up the frame rate outside Encore, so it is more likely to have the subtitles sync.

[Cdrazar]

Alright, thanks for the advice. I'm gonna try that.

Do you perhaps have an suggested program which I can use to clean up that variable framerate? (Windows or OS X is both fine).

[Stan Jones]

No idea. I might just try exporting from Premiere/Adobe Media Encoder, which will give a constant frame rate. If that doesn't match the real video length, I don't know what to suggest.

You'll see some complaints from editors about VFR, but it is clearly a popular way to stream various content.

[Cdrazar]

Alright, thank you very much for all your help! I'm going to try to transcode the videofiles.m4v on itself, and try to synchronize the subtitles to this trancoded files.

I will post my results when I've figured it out. Other people might find it usefull.

Again, thank you!

Regards,

Chris.

[RyanWM]

I have been doing a lot of projects with subtitles and continually have issues like this.  Video is 23.976, SRT file was supposedly done at 23.976.  When I convert to Encore txt in Jubler or Subtitle Workshop, sync is good at the beginning but about 7 seconds off at the end (video is 109 mins).  If I use AVISynth to hard code the subs, using the original video file and the SRT it comes out perfectly.  I don't really want hard subs but that has been the "solution" lately.  I've tried changing semi-colons to colons and this works sometimes but not always, I think usually doesn't work on 24p video.  Very annoying.

[Cdrazar]

Hi RyanWM,

I've also considered hard coded subs as my last option, but then I've made a formula to easily resync my subtitles.

For example:

My subs was offsync by around 3 seconds. Then I've calculated the difference in frames and seconds, made a whole formule.

The result the formula gave me was eventually; When I overall delayed the whole subtitle file with 99,37428% (In my case, different with every videofile) It became PERFECTLY sync.

If you are interested in the way to calculate the offsync percentage, I can show it to you.

- Chris.

[Stan Jones]

Thanks for that update. Where did you apply the 99xxx%?

[Cdrazar]

I'm running Windows in Bootcamp, and used Subtitle Edit. There's an option to called "Sync by percentage" (which normally is ofcourse a 100%).

This way adjusts every lines, starting time, duration, and endtime with those percentage. This way makes sure the beginning is still sync (when you take a look at the difference, you'll see that those timecodes barely change) and the end also perfectly sync.

[Stan Jones]

A great option.

[RyanWM]

I would love to see the formula.  I've gotten Subtitle Edit (not sure how I missed this one, looks pretty good).

[Cdrazar]

Allright, maybe this way is not the fastest way to calculatie it, but it works every time for me:

First of all the crucial properties are that all my videofiles.m4v are 23,976 FPS and I've set my Encore BluRay project to BluRay NTSC 23,976 FPS.

I don't know if this works when different framerates are used...

Anyhow:

I'll go through these steps with an example I used, which I'm sure of it works.

NOTE: WE DON'T DO ANYTHING WITH THE SUBTITLE.srt FILE TILL STEP 7

1)

When you import the videofile.m4v into Adobe Encore, and look at the properties, you'll see it's FPS, but also the time in frames not milliseconds. Write down what time is displayed (in example: 00:53:18:19 which is hh:mm:ss:ff frames)

2)

When you look up the duration of the videofile.m4v outside Adobe Encore it'll display in milliseconds

(I used MediaInfo on OS X, but VLC will also display time. In my case it displayed the videofile.m4v as 53min22sec, and yes this is the same videofile.m4v as the 00:53:18:19 displayed in STEP 1 )

This 53min22sec = 00:53:22:000 (hh:mm:ss:mmm milliseconds)

What we want is the difference between the videofile.m4v in Encore, and outside Encore. This difference can be converted in percentages, which can be applied in Subtitle Edit to adjust the subtitles.

3) "Calculating the displayed frames displayed in Encore to milliseconds"

So, in my case, I'm dealing with 23,976 FPS (note: FPS = Frames Per Second)

Thus;

1 second = 23,976 FPS

1000 milliseconds = 23,976

In this example 00:53:18:19. We know 1000 milliseconds = 23,976 FPS, so we also know how many milliseconds 19 FPS is:

(19*1000ms)/(23,976) = 792,.....ms.

4) "Rewrite the Encore time in seconds"

We now know that 00:53:18:19 (in frames) = 00:53:18:792 (in milliseconds)

5) "Calculate difference in seconds between time shown in Encore (00:53:18:792) and time shown outside Encore (00:53:22:000)"

Difference in seconds = 00:53:22:000 - 00:53:18:792 = 3,208 seconds

Now we have to calculate what the percentage those 3,208 seconds is in respect the the whole videofile.m4v inside Encore.

6) "Calculate percentage"

We know the total time of the videofile.m4v in Encore is 00:53:18:792 (We just calculated that). That total duration is 100%, but being able to calculate with that value, we have to convert those hours:minutes:seconds:milliseconds into just seconds.

Easy: (53min*60seconds) + 18seconds + 0,792seconds = 3198,792 seconds

3198,792 = 100%, so we also know how many % 3,208 seconds is.

(3,208*100%) / 3198,792 = 0,100273472%

We know have calculated the difference between the videofile.m4v inside Encore, and outside Encore.

The subtitle.srt is synchronized to the videofile.m4v outside Encore, and not inside Encore (duh, that's the whole problem)

But when we open Subtitle Edit, open the subtitle.srt and choose for the option to resync with percentage, you'll see it's normalle set to 100%. This value has to be adjusted with our corrected % we've calculated in STEP 6.

So, 100%-0,100273472% = 99,89971214%. Makes sure that it's set to apply on all subtitle lines, and hit ENTER.

7)

Make sure the subtitle is set to 'Unicode' (can be done in Subtitle Edit, just in the main screen).

Then, hit "Save As" and save the subtitle not as .srt but as Adobe Encore NTSC.

You can now import this subtitle_Adobe.Encore.NTSC.txt in Adobe Encore, and it will run Perfectly sync.

Good luck!

P.S.

Sorry if I described it a little bit long, but this will make sure you understand it correctly. I hope.

Let me know if you have any questions.

- Chris.

[RyanWM]

That is pretty darn good.   My end result was a tad off but then I just keep changing the percentage ever so little to get it to the right spot.  I brought my m2v file into Premiere to get the non-Encore time as MediaInfo wasn't giving me seconds cause my run time was over an hour (it was just saying 1hr 42mins).

Now a tool that you could just plug in both numbers and it spits out the %, that would be nice.

Excellent job!

thanks

[j77h]

I'm 2.5 years late to this party, but can't help mentioning ...

Cdrazar wrote: "The video file is 54min 31s long.

And Adobe Encore shows it is 00:54:28:08"

Note1: Encore sees the video as 3 seconds shorter.

Note2: "00:54:28:08" has colons, not semicolons.

3 seconds per hour is about the difference in playback speed between 23.976 and 24.000.

24.000 is a faster rate, so the video finishes sooner, i.e. is shorter.

Colons indicate non-drop-frame timecode,

i.e. a whole number fps, like 24 or 30.

Although Cdrazar says the frame rate is 23.976,

the data he posted show that it's variable, from ~23.8 to ~24.4

So it looks like Encore processed his video at an average speed of 24.000 fps,

while he created subtitles in an app that presented it at 23.976 fps,

and that fps difference caused the problem.

Would this be a good way to avoid this kind of problem:

• Before you start making subtitles, load the video in Encore
  and find out what frame rate Encore sees it as.
  Check the duration, see if it's different from in the subtitling app.
  
• Maybe make a new master that has a fixed frame rate
  that matches what Encore sees.
• At least, make a proxy for subtitling with that fixed frame rate.

// jon

[chrisdlemon]

Looks like I'm a little late to this conversation but this post helped me tremendously!  I made a little spreadsheet in Excel that helps speed up the process of converting the time codes.  I used all the math that you posted here Cdrazar.  Here is a link to the download.  Hope it helps someone else!

http://goo.gl/wHHaKB

I left a couple of examples in there that I used this for to help it make sense.

Just type in the hours, minutes, seconds and frames from Encore, and the Hours, minutes and seconds as shown in VLC and it will let you know the scale factor that you can use in Subtitle Edit.

[RyanWM]

I am working on a project with 5 sub tracks, this is awesome!  Thanks much for taking the time to do it.