Blu Ray Subtitling
by Steve Kirkham
on
Apr 11, 2008 at 7:02:22 am
Does anyone here have any experience with creating subtitles for Blu ray
We have the subtitles created for the DVD project and need to "port" them over to the Blu ray version.
One wrinkle is that we have subs moving around the screen (in some instances so that the onscreen graphics aren't obscured we have moved them to top of the screen).
So should we just be able to give the authoring house the STL file as created (externally) for the Blu ray (unfortunately we aren't authoring it ourselves).
Will all the commands which pertain to the on screen position be honoured or is there some software we can get that will export the STL file as the appropriate BDN XML file for use in Blu Ray with the associated graphics files?
Re: Blu Ray Subtitling by Max Kovalsky on Apr 11, 2008 at 12:30:56 pm
Steve,
In a BDN, you have to specify x/y coordinates for each title. These are based on the resolution of your video, which will likely be 1920x1080. I am not sure you can do this in STL at all, but if you can, your x/y will probably relate to a 720x480 screen.
Also, the subtitle files themselves are PNGs with alpha. In STL, you had to specify color mapping (white = transparency, red = white, etc..), with PNGs for BD what you see is what you get. If the disc is authored in Scenarist, the PNGs need to be parsed through their Designer tool before they will import into Scenarist. Not sure about the Blu-print workflow.
Re: Blu Ray Subtitling by Steve Kirkham on Apr 11, 2008 at 3:40:22 pm
Hi Max
Yeah it gets me part way there I think and i can see what you are saying re: sizing etc.
You can move the position of a sub in an STL file (so that a subtitle will appear at the top of the screen for instance). We normally create our subtitles externally (which is the preferred method for flexibility etc) hence why we have an already created STL file.
So are you saying there are no tools on the market that can create/convert the subtitles we already have and make the relevant BDN XML file (is that right?) with corresponding PNG files.
How do people create subs for Blu ray at the moment then? Aren't they created externally and imported...?
Re: Blu Ray Subtitling by Max Kovalsky on Apr 14, 2008 at 2:33:32 pm
In most cases authoring studios rely on specialty subtitling shops, which in turn use FAB subtitler. FAB can output the BDN and PNGs and also cross-convert any format to any other.
