Managing subtitles in Premiere Pro CC 2015.3

[antoniocasado]

Hi!. Today I have tested the new version and one of the features that I wanted is the ability to create and manage subtitles (open caption). While the new creation and edit subtitles tool is amazing, there is some things to re-think, like the option to NOT to add that black (or colored) background, and add some text effects like shadow or border, to make readable. But that ugly block background surrounding the text...is a FAIL for me.

At least I can export to SRT, so I can use it in my workflows.

Another thing that it´s really annoying...I import a SRT file, and it loads like a clip at 720x480 resolution. Maybe Premiere want to ask the resolution that I want when import it (or later). Because is TEXT, you can render it to the resolution you want.

But the problem is when you can edit some text...It appears to do nothing. I edit the first subtitle and the original text is there. Also. I cannot edit anything. Premiere simply treat the subtitle like a video clip. I cannot use it 😞

I hope that next updates will fix this...thanks!

[Ann Bens · Accepted solution]

You can disable background color.

Select color and set it to 0%.

[antoniocasado]

Oh, I didn´t see the pertentage!. Thanks!. So one question solved! 🙂

[deeeeeeeee]

you should not disable background without the option of a border for the font! why not make that possible? almost all movies with subtitles have a nice font with a black border, only cheap films have the full black background.

and of course the option to change setting for all titles at once!! just crtl+a, and change font setting for all would be wonderful. why isn't this possible??? big oversight!

for subtitling i think premiere is nearly there... but sadly it's still not usable in a professional way.

d

[jochemdevet]

You can add a dropshadow effect on the caption layer. With the right settings that should solve your issue.

I totally agree on your other note: we should be able to change the style of all captions at once in a style template way or at least be able to select them all and change the style.

[simond48112824]

Just found out if you right click the list of captions in your imported file section in 'assembly' you can selct 'all' and change all fonts, background settings, size et al... happy days . . . . now I would like to be able to make the subtitles hi def.

[smithek]

  wrote

Just found out if you right click the list of captions in your imported file section in 'assembly' you can selct 'all' and change all fonts, background settings, size et al... happy days . . . . now I would like to be able to make the subtitles hi def.

Can you share a screencap? I am not getting this option (using 2017.1.2).

[jochemdevet]

almost all movies with subtitles have a nice font with a black border

All movies use closed captions, not open captions (read: burned in). Captions look different based on the media and player you are using to watch the movie. Luckely Adobe lets us create open captions with style abilities that we can choose to burn in or even export as .srt or .xml for normal use.

[deeeeeeeee]

when watch it on laptop, yes it's closed. but anything cinema or TV is burned, and often i need to deliver like that. it's not really a very excentric thing to do!   .. Although in the USA subtitles may be used much less anyway.

d

[antoniocasado]

This is NOT TRUE. Or almost. The subtitled created for DVD or Bluray are NOT BURNED to the image (so you cannot change it!). They use individual images for each subtitle, that is placed over the image when you activate the subtitle track.

In Digital Cinema you can use BURNED subtitled, but the usual is to make it REAL TIME, so there is a XML (Interop) or a MXF (SMPTE) that have these subtitles, that "render" the projector or DCinema server over the screen.

In TV, at least in Spain, the subtitles come from TDT signal (DVB) or in SAT, always in the metadata stream (like a M2TS).

Netflix use real time subtitles, too.

Youtube use real time subtitles, too

Vimeo use real time subtitles, too

But sometimes you need to burn the subtitles in the image (I have clients that want it), and the only solution for a nice subtitles is to use Subtitle Edit to export a XML+PNG images that you can load in Premiere and use it (but cannot edit it).

Adobe have do some good steps in subtitling, but it are weak as for now, in my opinion.

[simond48112824]

'Nearly there'? you've got to be kidding !!!! It's nowhere near there!

[deeeeeeeee]

drop shadow is not very good looking, as you always need to put it in one direction. a border is far better looking for subtitles. also it seems the font used as caption doesn't render so nicely. a bit blocky.

what i would prefer is the style options of the title editor, but the text-entry option of the caption screen. plus, of course, a way to select multiple captions and change the font settings at once.

[jochemdevet]

I didn't say it was the perfect solution, I only offered an alternative. I agree Adobe can do (even) better.

also it seems the font used as caption doesn't render so nicely. a bit blocky.

Set the resolution of the captions to twice that of your sequence and then resize in the sequence. So fhd captions for a hd sequence > 50% scale. They look smoother after rendering.

[deeeeeeeee]

appreciated!

[seventhsamurai]

I usually use Avid Media Composer's sub cap plugin to subtitle which is quite a comprehensive tool. So when I attempted to use the open captions feature in Premiere, that was the benchmark. Unfortunately, it fell far too short. We are producing content for global audiences nowadays, and subtitling is a key requirement for content producers. Here's hoping Adobe addresses this soon. At least it's a step in the right direction for now.

[dfrnz]

I'm having the same issues. I think they need to add the border option to the caption editor, rather than manually adding a drop shadow.

If you click "source settings", the media offline image appears and you can't get it back. This doesn't even make sense since it's text, not media.

The SD resolution doesn't make sense either. If you scale it up in a HD timeline it gets blurry. It also is stuck in 20% 4:3 title safety. I want to use 10% 16:9 safety.

The lack of global style options also is horrible. If I were to import a srt with 50 captions, I'd have to click every single one to change the style.

In its current state, I'd say this tool is useless. It's a shame because it could save me so much time, instead of having to render them outside of Premiere with an alpha.

[deeeeeeeee]

i fully agree. with a bit more effort it would be great though.

/full resolution

/border around font

/option to change all font settings at once

/import + export srt would be great.

right now it's not much different from adding a title (which has much better format options)

[antoniocasado]

You can already import and export SRT. I agree with the others suggestions.

[codys72658089]

I agree with what has been said and would also like to add that it seems like German SRT files are broken when imported into 2015.3

They appear with asterisks instead of accent marks, and in some cases random letters are missing. This was not an issue with 2015.2

Currently needing to create formatted subtitles from caption files in titler and the lack of global settings and poor German language support make any new changes to the captions a complete waste and an even bigger waste of time than manual subtitle creation.

[susannee2181622]

I had the same issue with asterisks instead of some special characters in danish, but when i saved my art as a UTF16, instead of UTF8 from my subtitleeditor, it worked.

I am also experiencing these problems with the resolution of my .srt when want to import my art to a 4K video. I hope there is a fix soon, or did someone find a trick?

[susannee2181622]

..and I meant 'srt' not 'art' off course..

regarding the resolution issues i found a workaround with the app "premiere art, which unfortunately cost a little bit - but worked like a charm, when I followed this tutorial: PremiereSRT - YouTube

It turned my srt open captions  into and xml, that I could import into premiere , and all my open captions were now 'titles' , and perfectly timed on a new sequence.. The fact that it is now titles instead of captions also gives me more options for editing the styles, fonts etc..

[cb835081]

Hi Everyone -

This thread is very helpful - Thanks for all the information!

I've successfully created my captions but I'm having some export issues -

As you can see from the pictures below, when burning in the captions some of them are getting cut off - this is one example, but in the 5 pieces I've created CC for, they all seem to be having this issue.  I'm on the updated Premiere Pro CC v9.2

I'm on a pretty tight deadline and any insight as to what maybe the problem is appreciated!

Thank you!

[joaodescalco]

Besides all the lack of basic functionalities already discussed (not being able to format ALL subtitles, the small resolution), I'm having a couple of issues:

- I have imported a SRT file and the sync is correct, but Premiere doesn't replace formatting tags (i.e. <i> </i>), which appear throughout the files. So every time a tag is used, it appears on screen.

I have tried to export the subtitles in every possible format and encoding (someone mentioned using UTF-16 instead of UTF-8) but no luck.

- Also, every time I make a change on a subtitle, the screen doesn't update. I have to quit and restart Premiere so the subtitle will update on the screen.

I'm talking about subtitles (burn in), not closed captions.

If any of you can help I would really appreciate it. Thank you in advance!

This could be a great tool but it's quite useless right now, for me at least.

[habitofseeing]

Same problem with 720x480 here: Problems converting Closed Captions to Open Captions in Premiere 2015.4

I also tried in CC 2017, same problem.

How can they even advertise converting closed to open captions as a feature?

[Mikey Watts]

Gotta say that subtitles for me is the most annoying thing about premiere - have enjoyed the switch from FCP, it's a great program, but why can't adobe make subtitling simple!?!  Just look at how they did it at FCP - really easy, the crucial difference is that you can copy and paste a subtitle and then change the text in the new one without all the others changing - saves SO much time, rather than having to create a new subtitle for each one.  Hopefully adobe can improve this some time soon.