-
Customizing Closed Caption
Hi,
Have been waiting for better subtitle support in Vegas since V4, and very pleased that I can finally do it through closed captions. This will then finally replace my overprimitive hard subtitles Ive used for the last thee years. Ive used hard titles as I am dependent upon seeing the text in my editor, as the native language is often foreign, which I dont understand. The region subtitling option never worked well for me, partly because of lack of formatting options, and lack of ability to embed in video file. CC overcomes this, and additionally allows for export to traditional subtitle format for DVD.
While Vegas’ intentions are good, using an old but universal techniqaue, the system is primitive, and I struggle to customise the display. The default is already good, I can simply cut and paste text into the comment bracket, and linebreaks are placed automatically, like the 608CC1 entry below:
{RCL}{ENM}{R12In00Wh}Default display, but how do I {R13In00Wh}change background to transparent{R14In00Wh}white/black, and how do I change{R15In00Wh}the text to grey?{EDM}{EOC}
But for all the practicality, the narrow white text on black background looks way too agressive, taking too much attention from the underlying video.
When looking at the code options in the Vegas manual and help, however, I see I have the possibility of changing the text format {ITxt}, colour {GrTxt}, and background {BgWhSemi}.
However, I can not figure out where to put these codes. Ive searched online for formatting examples (like with html code in the old days), and simply placing the code in different places in the 608CC1 code above. But it doesnt work. I guess changing font is out of the question.
Can someone post an example code, that I could paste into the Vegas CC window, which would give me, say, two different colours of text, on white semi transparent background?
Thanks,
-
6 Replies
-
{RCL}{ENM}{R15In08Wh}{TabOff3}{BgWhSemi}{BlTxt}Test{RdTxt}Color{EDM}{EOC}
Do not worry about the black blocks at the beginning and the end,
they are for decoration purpose up to TV decoder. It would be better for them to match text attributes.Semi-transparency is treated as opaque in Vegas, while TV decoder
may give you real semi-transparent. -
Thank you very much. Just what I was looking for, and just in time for my newest subtitling project. Im sure others who struggle with the same will find this post useful.
I was just thinking I might want black semi transparent, instead of white semi transparent, but when i try replacing the {BgWhSemi} code with {BgBlkSemi}, the latter shows up as text, as if Vegas does not recognize it. Is it possibly a bug?
-
Yes, it is typo bug. Thanks for catching it. Tempory workaround is use {BgBlkSmei} instead of {BgBlkSemi}.
Also, please keep in mind “white text black background” CC is most simple, safe and popular. Not all TV CC decoders fully implement CEA608 standard.
-
Hi again,
A new problem have turned up. I usually use one timeline for importing all the footage, which I have now subtitled with the new Closed Captioning tool. I also use a second instance of Vegas for the final project, and I select, copy and paste media from the original importing timeline to the final version. With my old primitive hard subtitles, it works well to copy media from one instance to another, but now I see to my horror that it is still not possible to copy markers with media in Vegas. Somehow it is possible to attach them to media when sliding media back and forth, but any copy and paste leaves the markers where they are.
How on earth can that be? Either nobody works with markers, or nobody complains, because for sure anybody who works with markers or now closed captions in vegas must have complains. (Adding custom colour to different markers would be nice, for one).
I heard about the tip of copying the entire marker catalog from >View< >edit details< and “show commands”; clicking on the grey tabs immediately above and below the text entries you want, and pressing Control C, rather than rightclicking and copy (which copies a single cell entry). https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/24/869929
This indeed works, but I have now to manually do this for every media file I have, essentially quadrupling the number of actions for moving a simple media file from one instance of Vegas to another.
So, Sony Vegas developers, here’s what you should do (Please):
1) Have option of locking markers/regions/cc to media files.
2)Develop a function in Vegas that allows Vegas to “print CC/regions/markers to video media generated text files, (IE EDITABLE TEXT FILES), and
3) putting them where the cc/regions/markers were for a
4) custom period of time (say 3 seconds, until next marker, until next region etc), and
5) allowing the selection of multiple subsequent text entries, for customizeing font, size, background (not only stroke) etc parametres for all the entries.While your at it, why dont you
6) scrap the entire protype titler, (which is heavy, cumbersome and not user friendly), and upgrade the default legacy text editor, which is light, cumbersome, but user friendly) to allow for backgrounds for text (not just stroke), locking start position for any text for a template (as it is now, the text moves to new places depending on length of sentence, very annoying for subtitles and lower thirds).The print CC/Markers/region option, if printing customizable fields, and an overhauled text generator, would hopefully solve the the sub- and titling problems that still, after 8 years with Vegas Pro, continually dragging the otherwise excellent editor down. (Read other posts for reference).
Exporting the markers and CCs to various subtitle formats is of course great – But im nowhere near that stage yet, a bit because the process is still so cumbersome.
-
Hi, you might want to take a look at the Vegasaur Markers tool. It has some features that probably can optimize your workflow.
-
Thanks, I wanted to check it out for some time, and so I did. It seems like a great tool for fixing repetitive tasks, such as unsplit and fade from cursor, but for Markers it unfortunately only enables create/insert/delete/move/export options, but not, for instance “pair marker with media file on track so and so”, which is what I would need in this instance.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up