Jason Livingston
Forum Replies Created
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[Bob Zelin] “but I will faint if Blackmagic or ANY OTHER SCOPE MANUFACTURER has ever considered including a close caption decoding feature on their scope (and this includes Tek, Harris, Leader, OmniTek, and all the others).”
Hey Bob, here’s a nice pillow to go with your fainting spell/enema/soak (hopefully not all at the same time…) 🙂
Look for CEA-708/608 or EIA-708/608 decode or display, all of the below have it:
Tektronix WFM6000/7000/8000 waveform scopes w/caption decoders:
https://www.tek.com/products/video_test/wfm/wfm6000_7000/Harris TVM-4MA and others w/caption decoders:
https://www.broadcast.harris.com/productsandsolutions/TestMeasurement/TVMMultiformatSignalAnalyzers/default.aspOmniTek OTM-1000 too:
https://www.omnitek.tv/products/video-test-measurement/otm-1000.htmletc…
Although I cannot vouch for the decoder accuracy of any of the above.
Jason Livingston
CPC Closed Captioning -
Hello Ryan,
It sounds like you’re trying to use a .scc file or a black movie to caption an HD video. Both of those technologies are strictly for standard definition video only.If you want to print to HD tape via your AJA card, you need a HD closed captions track. This can be generated by anyone using CPC’s MacCaption software. If your service company doesn’t have MacCaption, then CPC can convert your SCC file to the necessary format for a small fee.
However, these kinds of captions only work when printing to tape through an AJA/Blackmagic card in FCP7, or when playing the file in QuickTime player. The captions will not work if the file is used for something else, i.e. recompressed or converted to any other format. You might want to give CPC a call to discuss your goals and what workflow is best for you.
In the meantime, please see our website for more information.
Hope this helps,
Jason Livingston
CPC Closed Captioning -
Hi Robert,
Unfortunately this is one of the changes that Apple made to Final Cut Pro 7 when implementing their new closed captioning workflows. FCP7 adds the ability to insert new closed captions into DV video when printing to tape via firewire, but it lost the ability to preserve existing DV captions. (This only applies to DV/DVCPRO and not analog formats that use a true line 21.)CPC’s MacCaption software does have a workaround for this issue. It can extract the original DV captions from your captured files and convert them to the new format needed for FCP7. It even supports batch conversion and scripting if you need to process a large database of DV files.
If you need to edit these videos we have an Assemble Captions feature that can automatically conform the new caption track to your edited sequence. Or, if you only need to convert the existing captions without any changes, you can use one of our lower cost Encoder versions.
Please contact CPC for more information.
Hope this helps,
Jason Livingston
CPC Closed Captioning -
I suggest one of the iPod presets from QuickTime Pro. This will make a relatively small file with decent quality.
If you want to get more specific, use H264 320×240 at 200kbps, with AAC audio mono 32kbps.
Hope this helps,
Jason Livingston
CPC Closed Captioning -
What format are you working with? HD? SD? DV? Mixed?
If you are working with HD or any 720×480 SD format (DV, MPEG-2, etc.), then no, the captions will not be preserved (unless special measures are taken).
If you’ve got 720×486 full raster SD with line 21 closed captions (white dots flashing at the top of the frame), then the captions will stay there as you edit, with the following limitations:
1) Any filters, transitions, motion effects, etc. which alter the line 21 data will damage or delete the captions from that segment.
2) You will lose the captions for about 3-5 seconds before and after each cut or altered segment.
3) The captions can go back out to tape but will not be preserved if you output your sequence to another video format, DVD, etc.
To get around the above issues, you can use closed captioning software or a service to extract the original captions and create captions for whatever output formats you need to deliver in. For more information, click the link in my sig.
Hope this helps,
Jason Livingston
CPC Closed Captioning -
I used Alex’s title filter by rendering it in a sequence at 4x the resolution of what I needed, i.e. 3840×2160 for my desired output resolution of 1920×1080. Then I exported the sequence using the QuickTime Conversion export to ProRes at 1920×1080, and brought the new file into my main sequence. The 4x oversampling smoothed out the flickery edges, and QuickTime Conversion does the best job of down conversion.
Also you should try to stick to sans serif fonts since the serifs tend to flicker the most.
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Hello Kyle,
Sorry if this reply is too late to help.If you capture the video and then compress it to MPEG-2 for DVD, the captions will be lost. This is because MPEG-2 for DVD is 720×480 and doesn’t include the line 21 area where closed caption data is stored for analog video like BetaSP. The captions are stored separately as metadata on the disc, so they need to be extracted and converted using a special process.
The easiest option would be to use a set-top DVD recorder (like a VCR that records on DVDs). These internally convert the analog line 21 caption data into DVD closed captions when recording. If you need to have custom menus or chapters, you could then extract the MPEG-2 (which will include the caption metadata) off that DVD, and re-author a new DVD without re-compressing the video.
Another option would be to send the tapes to a caption service company which can extract the closed caption data and e-mail you a .SCC file, which you can bring into Adobe Encore or another professional DVD authoring program to author a DVD with closed captions.
If closed captioning is something you deal with a lot, you might want to consider purchasing software so that you can author & convert captions and subtitles on your own system.
Jason Livingston
CPC Closed Captioning -
Blu-ray only supports 24p, 50i and 60i. You can compress 30p video in a 60i stream. It will still look like 30p on playback because there is no temporal shift between fields. This is sometimes referred to as “Psf” (progressive segmented frame) because the progressive frames are broken up and delivered in two fields instead of one frame. You definitely don’t want to convert 30p to 24p as even the very best frame rate converters will cause a big reduction in quality and smoothness. Just pretend it is 60i when you compress it.
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Hi Jim,
.SCC files are specified in the “Print to Video” or “Edit to Tape” dialog of FCP7, under the new Closed Captioning file selector.This workflow works for Firewire (to a DV device) and for AJA KONA cards in standard definition sequences only.
The .SCC file needs to have a time code relative to 00:00:00:00 even if your sequence doesn’t start at 00:00:00:00. However the opposite is true for DVD Studio Pro and Compressor, so in many cases you actually need 2 separate .SCC files with different timing.
In the future you might want to consider MacCaption closed captioning software, which can edit previously captioned masters and re-purpose the captions to many other formats without having to manually edit the captions or have them re-done from scratch. See: Assemble Captions
Hope this helps,
Jason Livingston
CPC -
Hi Walter,
I respect your opinion and certainly captioning is not something that everyone should get into. That’s why caption service companies exist and there are some great ones out there.However, I think you could make the same argument for going 3rd party for color correction or audio finishing. There are a lot of specialized companies who can do color correction & audio finishing with fast turnarounds and reasonable pricing, so why should anyone do them in house? Probably because you want to maintain creative & quality control, because deadlines only get tighter never looser, and because the on-going costs cut into your profit margin.
The OP was asking for a solution that would take them all the way to a broadcast-ready master. I would argue that closed captioning is just as necessary as color correction, if not more so, because captioning is a legal requirement for broadcast and color correction is not.
Other than saving time & money, some of the other reasons it is important to bring captioning in-house:
If there are any last-minute changes needed to the video, a 1-2 day turnaround might not cut it.
If you need to make multiple versions for different markets, or re-edit a previously captioned master, or deliver in multiple formats (Web, podcast, tapeless, etc.), having the capability to at least edit & re-purpose captions in-house can save you a ton of money, time, and grief, even if you use a service for the bulk of the captioning work.
Jason Livingston
CPC