Closed Caption Tools have been updated

[McPoodle]

I just finished a massive update to SCC_TOOLS (version 3.0). The most significant change is the addition of a new tool for muxing closed captions into an MPEG file. What this means is that now any DVD authoring tool can create closed-captioned DVD's. As usual with Perl programs, this tool is rather slow (perhaps a C++ programmer out there could volunteer to convert it and add a GUI?).

Here is a list of the major changes in this release:

Added new tool, CC_MUX, for putting captions into MPEG files in either DVD or ReplayTV formats.
Added new tool, DVR2SCC, for extracting closed captions from DVR-MS (Microsoft Media Center) files.
CCADI can now export subtitles in Adobe Encore format (use a file extension of .txt).
CCExtract and SCC_RIP can now successfully extract captions from DVD-VR files and from MPEG files created by the Hauppauge WinTV PVR-250. Both of these devices used a faulty version of DVD's caption storage method.
Improved timing for SUBRIP2SCC and added logic to automatically convert Subrip asterisks into Closed Caption musical note characters.
XDS handling was completely wrong, and now it is fixed. If you have a Field 2 CCD file from before this release, delete it and use the new CCASDI to re-create it from the SCC file.
The CCD version is now 1.3 (see above for why).
Channels 3 and 4 are now supported in CCD (I used to think Field 1 and 2 files were identical, but I found that they were not).
Added new tool, PAS2SCC, for converting CCWriter (DOS) caption files to SCC format.


As usual, all tools and documentation can be found here (http://www.geocities.com/mcpoodle43/SCC_TOOLS/DOCS/SCC_TOOLS.HTML).

--McPoodle43 (at) Yahoo.Com

[Dimmer]

McPoodle,
You are without a doubt the king of closed captioning! It seems like almost nobody else take this subject so seriously, while often it's a priceless resource of information, much more then just subtitles with dialog. I've been using your tools for several months to make DVDs out of TV captures, and the possibility to keep the CC still amazes me. Nowadays anybody could make a DVD with subtitles, but it's a whole new level of authoring to have your DVD closed-captioned.

If you just could update the zip file on your page with the new release, it would be perfect.

Thanks for all the good work!

Dimmer

[McPoodle]

I did put the updated tools online; they're here (http://www.geocities.com/mcpoodle43/SCC_TOOLS/SCC_TOOLS.ZIP). I usually just point people at the documentation (which begins by linking the zip), in the vain hope that someone might read something before mis-using my tools.

[Dimmer]

My apologies, the old zip file must have stuck in my browser's cache. I downloaded the new package, it's great! Thank you.

[yukichigai]

How does one add Closed Captions into VCDs. I know it's located in the CAPxx.DAT file, but what format should the file be? Do I have to convert it or can I just insert the DVD caption file?

[Dimmer]

Originally posted by yukichigai
How does one add Closed Captions into VCDs. I know it's located in the CAPxx.DAT file, but what format should the file be? Do I have to convert it or can I just insert the DVD caption file? It appears that no one has ever seen a VCD with CC or been able to add them to one. In theory, CAPxx.DAT should contain raw CC stream converted from .scc using McPoodle's Scc2raw utility, but in reality it doesn't seem to work. Whether it's a question of player compatibility or something else, remains a mystery.

[CZroe]

I'm having huge pains dealing with DVR-MS. I need to extract subtitles from the metadata and overlay them as hard-coded subtitles when I convert them to WMV9. Is there anyway your tools could add support for DVR-MS? There is a lengthy MSDN article but it's all way over my head...

http://www.thegreenbutton.com/community/shwmessage.aspx?forumid=26&messageid=113435#bm119270

Here's the DVRMS "Toolbox"

[McPoodle]

Alright, my major disadvantage is that I don't have a Media Center PC, so I have to give these directions blind:

1. Download GraphEdit (available for download somewhere on the Doom9 site, I believe).

2. Lauch GraphEdit.

3. From the Graph Menu, select Insert Filters. Click the "+" next to DirectShow Filters, then double-click on WM ASF Writer--this will prompt you for the name and path of the .wmv file you want to create. Once you provide this information, a box named "WM ASF Writer" will appear on the GraphEdit screen.

4. Scroll up and double-click on Overlay Mixer2 to add that to the screen.

5. Click on the close button to get rid of the filter dialog. From the File menu, select Render Media File to get an open file dialog. Select the DVR-MS file you want to convert.

6. All sorts of things will happen at this point. What I'm hoping for is that a bunch of boxes appear connected by lines, starting with the DVR-MS file, and ending with the .WMV file. I'm also hoping that Overlay Mixer2 box gets placed right before the .WMV file box.

7. The DVR-MS box has three output "pins" (bumps) on the right side of its box. The first one has a line coming out of it going through several boxes and ending up in the "Audio Input 01" pin of the .WMV box; the third one should go through the Overlay Mixer2 box to end up in the "Video Input 01" pin of the .WMV box; but the second one is probably not connected to anything. This is the closed captions. Also notice that the Overlay Mixer2 box has an unconnected pin on its left side.

8. Click on the 2nd DVR-MS pin and drag to the unconnected pin on the Overlay Mixer2 box. This should cause another box to appear between them.

9. On the off chance everything I've said so far actually worked, press the green play button arrow at the top of the GraphEdit screen. This will convert the DVR-MS file into a WMV file, with closed captions superimposed on top exactly as they would appear if the show was played on a television set.

Now, I'm positive that the above will fail somewhere, as GraphEdit is a very stubborn program to work with. Please report what failed, and I'll try to think of a solution.

Good luck!

--McPoodle

[CZroe]

Whoah! I didn't mean to derail your thread into my own personal help thread but thanks for the gesture and information!

Anyway, at the moment my Media Center PC has been formatted so I can make a proper Ghost HDD image so I have nothing to work with either. Perhaps my understanding is a little off but in the DVR-MS toolbox it references extracting Closed Captioning data from the metadata. If it is stored in the metadata, then it is probably not in the video stream like traditional CC, correct?

[mic]

In the hope that this helps out -- please note that I don't have access to a Media Center PC or any DVR-MS files etc. I'm unsure what you mean by traditional...

What you're likely working with is CC data sent alongside the video/audio streams you've captured, contained in a modified MPEG2 file (the DVR-MS format). Googling on [DVR-MS CC] got several hits, including the use of the toolbox app you've mentioned, so might want to pursue those.

There also may be tools available from your MMCPC manufacturer &/or Microsoft to convert your DVR-MS files to .wmv that will include the CC along with the video & audio. Instead of hard subs, WinMedia video (.wmv) files normally use a SAMI format text file that WinMedia Player will display (when that feature is turned on in WinMedia Player).

I believe McPoodle was trying to guide you towards finding a method for using Graphedit in a single step to re-encode your video to .wmv with hard subs. Unfortunately there's no easy way to predict which filters you have, or need to be used for your particular hardware -- these filters are often software and hardware specific.

That said, personally I'd look into converting a sample video to DVD MPEG2 -- should be a quick transcode as it's already MPEG2 -- and seeing if the CC data was retained. If it worked then you might use existing tools to create your winmedia video with hard subs.

mike

[adaml]

McPoodle, Can SCC_Tools encode CC data into a streaming mpg video input(live feed from a video camera) and then output it for realtime viewing

-Adam

[McPoodle]

No, I'm afraid they can't do that. The program I've written to encode closed captions into an MPEG takes about five minutes to process each minute of video, very far from real time.

However, closed captions of the broadcast variety are not usually used for captioning on the web. I believe the format for that is SAMI for WMP, or SMIL for QuickTime or RealPlayer. There's a tool called MAGpie for authoring SAMI and SMIL files--the site is http://ncam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpie/, and a good tutorial is at http://www.clickandgovideo.ac.uk/captions2.htm. I see no reason why the ASX wrapper format described in the tutorial won't work with MP4 (or whatever format you're using), just so long as Windows Media Player is used as the player. If you're depending on a different player, then you'll need to check the documentation on that player to see what kind of subtitles or captions it supports.