Subtitle Help
#1
Question 
I have just spent a large part of the afternoon trying to get my head around the way subtitles are handled, in ripping, converting and playing.

Currently I have ripped my DVDs complete, nothing left out, I have then converted them with Handbrake...

...here is where my problem starts. I didn't pay too much attention to subtitles as everything I watch is in English, but what I didn't allow for is the other languages in films which are subtitled, I have therefore been missing out on some subtitled scenes!! (idiot!)

As the subtitles were not originally carried across when I converted the DVDs, I have now gone back to the DVDs to figure out what I need to do.

I have currently figured out that (for those who don't know, I didn't):
Burned = always on, and as long as I select the correct subtitle track I only get the subtitles when I want them (for the foreign language scenes) not for the English parts as well.
The other option I have in Handbrake is Default, this allows me to turn off the subtitles if I want.

Here is what I have currently:
Image

This is the default version where xbmc is (I believe) creating the subtitles from a track. This problem is the font and colour, I can't adjust it, I have changed it in the Video settings and it makes NO difference.

For comparision here is the one which is burned in:
Image

As you can see this one is much better, but I want to figure out why I can't change the subtitle settings in xbmc

Here is my debug log, I have had a look, but to be honest I don't really know what to look for!
Pastebin

Any help is appreciated.

Steve

Edit: Added Debug Log via pastebin
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#2
Hi, Can anyone offer any help with this issue, in simple terns I would be happy if I could get the selectable subtitles (the ones I can turn on and off) to look like the burned in versions (pictures above)

Any thoughts welcome.

Thanks in advance.

Steve
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#3
I'm no expert on the subject but I'll give it a shot:

I don't know why they look different depending on if you use hard burned or soft subs, either way I don't think you'll be able to alter how they look in xbmc:

Hard burned subs are part of the image and can't be altered in any way once they've been "burned" into the movie.

DVD subtitles aren't text, they are actually just bitmap images of the text, so you can't change the font used or anything like that even when they are "soft subs" (which can't be turned off).

My suggestion would be one of the following:
1) Use a subtitle add-on that downloads subtitles from the web, these are in a textbased format and can therefor be styled.
2) Manually download the subtitles in a text based format, such as .srt, from any of the huge number of subtitle websites available.
3) Rip the subtitles from the DVD and turn them into a text based format through OCR. This can be done in Subtitle Edit.

Hope this helps.
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#4
Thank you for your reply, it has helped me to understand how subtitles work.
I understood that 'Hard' subs were part of the image, thats fine (as long as I choose the correct subs track when I burn them, but thats ok)

I didn't realise that the subs weren't text (as I could turn them off (soft subs), I thought it was a text file embeded with the video files that xbmc was reading, thanks for help with that point.

I will have a look at your suggestions, I had already trialled point 3 but thought it was a bit hard work (especially as the subtitles would only be a on for a short time for most films I watch) and the OCR thing was a bit of a pain.

I guess of I am using a srt file then I can adjust the look of them IN xbmc, I had wondered why changing the settings hadn't made a difference before.

I think the downloadable subtitles sound like a good idea.

Thanks again,

Steve
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#5
XBMCs subtitle settings are in settings/video. colour, font etc can set from there.

there are a few apps that can rip your subs from dvd, subrip and vobsub are two good ones. both these apps will rip all the subtitles from your dvd and leave you with two files - 1 sub and 1 idx. these can be multi language files and xbmc can handle that, but if you want just the single sub that you need then an app called VobSubStrip can do that for you.

if it were me that is the road i would go down as it is way faster than re-encodeing your dvd with hardcoded subs, plus you wont have any sync issues as both your rip and the subs come from the same source.

if you choose to dl your subs then subtitleworkshop is an invaluable tool for editing, correcting and syncing a multitude of text based subtitles.
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