Best Subtitle Extension ?

[Tuning]

I'm using vobsub,WMP 9 ,Media Player Classic 6.x.xx.The question is which subtitle extension is good for these condition?.I noticed the .srt files looks pretty good while .ass files look bigger on vob sub's default settings.So while including subtitles as seperate files and for ease of including it ,which extension is the best?Any remarks are appreciated.:cool: .Thanks.
What kind of subtitle extensions do you use?

[Manao]

What the purpose of such a poll ?

The different formats have all there use, depending on the situation :

* idx are the biggest, but they are just pictures, which makes them usable by mpeg4 hardware player. They don't need ocr.

* sub are the smallest, but they need the film to be at the right framerate. They are easy to edit

* srt are small, not framerate dependant, and ogm requires this format as input, which makes me use them exclusively.

* I never used ssa and ass ( never need it ), but from what I collected, are more complex and powerful than the others text formats. Moreover, they should be soon ( if not already ) usable with mkv. They are definitely the future of text subs.

[unmei]

yes SSA can be muxed into matroska (srt as well) in any number you want - lisachans group made a mkv with SSA subs in 16 languages :D
(ogm is likely to support SSA muxing soon, no gurantee tho, just a rant)

if you just want text (lets say just copy over subtitles from a DVD), srt give you the least work to do, but they cannot have different styles (italic and color is possible but not very compatible at the moment).
If you want your subtitles to look good, use SSA/ASS but note, if you softsub those it will use more processing power (obvious, no?) and may not run well on slower systems (i dont know if anyone here uses as slow comps as i do :)).
In the same segment as SSA/ASS, there is a new format USF which is currently under development, but you might want to note the name for the future. Kovacs endre and me are currently developing editors for this format and VSfilter does play it as external subs or with Textsub() in AviSynth for hardsubbing but you cannot yet muxing it (and you should not use it for anything but tests ATM!). USF will be muxable into matroska as soon as someone writes the software to do it (it was initially THE matroska subtitle format but was delayed because of its complexness/experimental status and ppl want the formats they know supported first:)

forget anything frame based. This will just give you timing problems. Plus they are incompatible with a) variable framerate and b) matroska wich is entirely timestamp based. Just let them go the way of dinosaurs...

[ppera2]

There is no 'best', as is stated many times & in forum rules.
It's obvious even from couple posts in this thread.

All depends from what software, video formats you use.

I must tell that I disagree with unmei - framebased format is very good and compact. I know only one - MicroDVD format, what usually has extension sub (rarer txt). It is quite good, no any timing problem, and I never saw variable framerate movie in my life.

Other disagreement: Manao - it's not true that sub needs right framerate. Contrary, this format, better said MicroDVD format is only with which you will have synced title for 25 and 23.976 fps movie. Reason if simple - title needs to appear at correct frame, not in 'correct' time, because time depends from playback speed, what is not same by PAL and NTSC. If your DivX is at 29.97 fps it will stay not of course, but noone informed converts film in that framerate.

In any case you need to convert time-based sub if it's for PAL and your movie is NTSC or vice-versa.

[Manao]

ppera2 : thanks for the explanation, I always thought that PAL and NTSC movies had same durations. I was wrong.

[unmei]

ppera2: i'm sorry for spreading my prejudges, i wrote this probably without thinking.
My only explanation is in my habits: i use ssa to style up even subtitles from DVD and i write this USF editor. Now when you compare the synthax of ssa and usf to sub format you might see a huge difference, and you might even understand why i can't take it serious. But i admit it might have it's appliance in fields i don't walk..

[ppera2]

Sure that sub title format is primitive, especially when comparing to some new formats.
But how it looks in praxis: you live in small country and want to watch movie with subtitle. You find lot of them on the Net, and what - they are 99% in sub or srt format. Who will care about some styles and effects, when you are happy if title is well made, complete, without lot of typing errors and stupid translations...

[Liisachan]

well, i guess subbers and wathcers feel in different ways. like you said, i would be happy with plain subs like in SRT, as a wathcer, as long as the translation is ok. but, as a subber, i have to point out some technical problems with SRT:

(1) If you use SRT, 2 persons cannot speak at the same time in subtitles. (Sub Collision) This happens often in a movie when 2 persons are arguing eagerly, or someone is talking while radio or TV is on in the background. (Actually, there is a hack to realize this even with SRT, but it's much more easier to use SSA to solve sub collisions
(2) Subbers sometimes want to put small notes at the top of the screen to explain something...like a pun which cannot be translated. It's very easy to do this with SSA, but not satisfactory with SRT

I don't like SSA/ASS's fancy effects like Karaoke so much. Rather, I'd be angry to see SSA subs with a lot of brilliant effects but full of silly mistranslations. a plain SRT for accurate translation is much better. What is most important about subs is not file format, but translation quality.
anyways maniac subbers wouldnot be very happy with (1) and (2). Besides, you can convert SRT to SSA within 1 sec, very easily. So personally I would not use SRT unless I have to (like, when I m going to embed it in OGM)

Just in order to backup DVD, maybe the easier the better. If your hobby is subbing--creating your own subs--, probably you'll feel in a different way.