Solved Generating a subtitle track

I have created subtitles for a video using media generators in Vegas Pro 14. Now I want to export this track for use in DVD architect 6 as a subtitle track so that viewers can turn them on or off in the DVD player. How do I do this?

You cannot create a Subtitle track using this method.
All you have done in Vegas is added regular text, I'm sorry to say.

You have 2 options to fix this. I don't have time to write detailed instructions for you, so will share one method only today.
1. Manually copy and paste your Text events from Vegas into DVD Architect
OR
2. Use a program called Subtitle Edit to create an official subtitle track which can be imported into DVD Architect
I recommend you learn how to use Subtitle Edit - this is the program I use and it is great!
Website here: www.nikse.dk/subtitleedit
Download latest version from here: github.com/SubtitleEdit/subtitleedit/releases
The version you need to download and install is this one: SubtitleEdit-3.5.9-Setup.zip

For today, I will teach you how to copy text into DVD Architect
Open DVD Architect and import your video.
After you have added your video to the Menu screen, double-click thumbnail for video to open Timeline Editor for the actual video.

1. Add a Subtitle Track.


2. With Vegas Pro also open, you now will copy and paste each line of text as a subtitle.
Press Insert Subtitle Text Event


3. Open the text event for first subtitle in Vegas and copy text.

4. Back in DVDA, click Text in subtitle timeline, then click Text in Menu and finally click Edit Text.
Then press CTRL + V to paste text into DVDA.


5. Go back to Vegas and find beginning of #2 subtitle - take a not of TIME.
Copy Text for subtitle #2
In DVDA, move timeline cursor to same TIME point for subtitle #2.
Press Insert Subtitle Text Event button, then go back to Step 4 and repeat.
Repeat this process until you have finished.

6. Finally, you need to drag the ends of each Subtitle Text in DVDA timeline to extend from one subtitle to the next.

Regards
Derek

I was afraid of that. I will learn SubtitleEdit. I have many subtitle projects to follow this initial one which is only 7 minutes long. Thanks for the recommendation. Are there any good tutorials for SubtitleEdit? Thanks again.

pauldr44 wrote: Are there any good tutorials for SubtitleEdit?

I have no idea. I never bookmarked the tutorials I watched.
I am planning to make tutorials on this software myself, but that wont be for a while.
It is an excellent program and is updated very regularly.

In importing my mp4 video into Subtitle Edit, I get the following error message. Is it a question of rendering the video in the proper format for Subtitle Edit? Other wmv files import fine. After trying many different renderings, I decided to try to use the copy directly to DVDA. Using DVDA 16, I cannot find the insert subtitle link you show. My screens do not look anything like what you are showing. Please help. Thanks, Paul Richards

I found the insert subtitle track by right clicking in the space to the left of where the video and audio tracks are shown. So I will go from there. Thanks. Paul

In importing my mp4 video into Subtitle Edit, I get the following error message. Is it a question of rendering the video in the proper format for Subtitle Edit?

You need to install VLC player if you want to play back video in subtitle edit.
www.videolan.org/vlc/index.html

This is what my settings look like:

I am stuck here. I installed VLC player and the VLC filters. I get the same error message. I cannot get started with this. I have looked around for tutorials and found them unhelpful. How do I add a video file to Subtitle Edit? How do I generate a subtitle file from it? Is the best option for someone such as myself who is clueless about all this to send it to a subtitle service and pay for it? If I do that, then I will get a srt file back. Then I add that file to the video editor, tweak it a bit and render it. Yes?
Thanks,

Paul Richards

Hi Paul

I have an idea :idea:
I just looked into my crystal ball and realized why you are experiencing this problem.
Sorry for not realizing this until now.

I guess you have been importing MPEG-2 video for DVD into Subtitle Edit. Is this correct ?
That's why the settings I gave you are not working.

When I use Subtitle Edit, I always render a .mp4 video which seems to play back better.
It's not important what type of video you work with in Subtitle Edit, because when you produce a .srt subtitle file, it does not get rendered with the video - it is just a simple text file that sits outside of the video.

You have 2 options to get things working for you.
#1. Go back to Options/Settings/Video player and set the Video Engine = mpv
This should get .mpeg video and audio working in Subtitle Edit.
On my computer, mpv setting is working OK with DVD video.
However! Also remember that normally video for DVD Architect is normally rendered as a Video file only with no audio in Vegas.
If you import video only into Subtitle Edit, you wont hear any audio!

#2. If option #1 still does not work, render a 720p .mp4 version of your video (just for use in Subtitle Edit).
Make sure you render to the exact same frame rate your mpeg DVD video uses, otherwise your timings will shift out of sync with the subtitles!

When you finally get Subtitle Edit working and have imported your video, you need to press the Subtitle Edit Timeline to create the audio waveform.
Make sure to set the Frame Rate to match your video's frame rate.
I have highlight the main areas of the user interface.

Thank you. Option 1 worked. I have imported the video with the sound waveform file. I did render it as an mp4 and the sound came with it. Now in order to get the captions, is it necessary to listen to the audio, type the words into the program and set the timing? Or is there a way to get the audio transcribed into words without this typing and import them with codes automatically generated? and then save them as an srt file? I can use transcription services like REV to get a transcript and then enter it as a txt file. That would be worth it. To send the video to REV and receive a srt file is more expensive but that would, I assume, get me the time codes and transcript assembled together in the srt file. Then I would have to adjust all the time codes before finally inputting the srt file into the video editor. I am not sure of any of this, but this is what I am thinking right now. I did input the captions directly into DVDA on a previous video following your directions earlier. That worked fine, although I did lose everything once and had to redo it all. My question at this point is what am I missing? Thank you again for your patience and help.