What font is good to use for a dvd subtitle??

[Pabloz]

I was wondering what kind of font is good for making
subtitles to a dvd. Most people say Arial 22 but i dont really like it

i also heard that a font for closed caption has a name of tiresias, but its impossible to find it.

Another thing,, does anyone know the name of the font in this
screenshot??
http://img108.exs.cx/img108/7883/Image177.jpg

[smiller667]

Tiresias is super-easy to find ... do a search for "tiresias font" in google :D. 24.75$ from Bitstream, BTW.
Don't know which font that is on your screencap, though.

ITC Tabula http://www.fonts.com/findfonts/findfonts_home.asp?nCo=AFMT&con=0403 was also originally designed as a subtitling font ... Verdana might be worth a try as well (and is completely free).

[rte5]

Just use Tahoma or Verdana. Verdana was designed for legibility on computer screens, but it's quite legible on paper and screen as a result. Tahoma was created immediately after with the Verdana mold, but with less letter spacing, and slightly less font width.

Verdana's extra width and letter spacing is needed for its legibility, especially at smaller sizes, but width is not needed as much at larger sizes, and perhaps with black on white on a TV screen.

Therefore I recommend Tahoma. It will give you more letters per line, and if stretched, will be practically Verdana anyway.

Arial/Helvetica does little to help with legibility on screen, but if you go with Arial, try Arial Narrow too.

I think Comic Sans MS is also legible, but typically inappropriate and ugly.

Trebuchet MS was designed after the US highway font Clearview, or whatever it is, which was designed to reduce halation, and I think trebuchet has inherited these properties, but Trebuchet needs more letter spacing I think, or maybe it just needs to be bigger. If you want something that looks attractive, try it.

Affluent was designed for TVs and has properties to reduce horizontal blurring, however it will cost you under 30$, and I've never used it.
http://www.typodermic.com/fonts/26.html

[McPoodle]

Looking specifically at closed captions (which are fixed-width), I find that Lucida Console 16pt Bold (white text on black background) works quite well.

[movmasty]

Originally posted by rte5
Just use Tahoma or Verdana. Verdana was designed for legibility on computer screens, but it's quite legible on paper and screen as a result. Tahoma was created immediately after with the Verdana mold, but with less letter spacing, and slightly less font width.

Verdana's extra width and letter spacing is needed for its legibility, especially at smaller sizes, but width is not needed as much at larger sizes, and perhaps with black on white on a TV screen.

Therefore I recommend Tahoma. It will give you more letters per line, and if stretched, will be practically Verdana anyway.

Arial/Helvetica does little to help with legibility on screen, but if you go with Arial, try Arial Narrow too.

I think Comic Sans MS is also legible, but typically inappropriate and ugly.

Trebuchet MS was designed after the US highway font Clearview, or whatever it is, which was designed to reduce halation, and I think trebuchet has inherited these properties, but Trebuchet needs more letter spacing I think, or maybe it just needs to be bigger. If you want something that looks attractive, try it.

Affluent was designed for TVs and has properties to reduce horizontal blurring, however it will cost you under 30$, and I've never used it.
http://www.typodermic.com/fonts/26.html
Very interesting, im just going to write some subtitles in a movie, thanks....Tahoma then?

[movmasty]

Originally posted by McPoodle
Looking specifically at closed captions (which are fixed-width), I find that Lucida Console 16pt Bold (white text on black background) works quite well.
Isnt Lucida a "weird" font??

[McPoodle]

"Weird"? Via Google, I learned that Lucida is one of the core Windows fonts at least since 1998, that it was designed to work well at low sizes, and that it is included in Unix and Mac OS X installations as well. The later two systems apparently have occational problems installing just Lucida fonts, and the Windows version is occationally overridden by a blocky version when you install Java. Other than that, what's "weird" about Lucida?

[McPoodle]

My sister just defined "weird" for me. Lucida Console is not "weird", it is a True Type font.

[mic]

I like to use Bold Arial Narrow. Helps to keep on screen at 20 - 22 sizes, and seems to have full character set... Converting CC to subs, I like to keep the musical note character, which I can do using Arial Narrow & saving to unicode.

[movmasty]

Originally posted by McPoodle
"Weird"? Via Google, I learned that Lucida is one of the core Windows fonts at least since 1998, that it was designed to work well at low sizes, and that it is included in Unix and Mac OS X installations as well. The later two systems apparently have occational problems installing just Lucida fonts, and the Windows version is occationally overridden by a blocky version when you install Java. Other than that, what's "weird" about Lucida?
bad readable in movies, and like normal text also

i used for my last encode "impact" fonts, in bold of course,

try it, very easy readable.

[rte5]

I forgot some things.

1. The font in the first posts screenshot is very close to Helvetica, but the t is flat topped in Helvetica. Arial is a clone of Helvetica and could be used, but I don't recommend Helvetica/Arial fonts because it was never designed for the screen; the closed lips are harder to read and render on screen.

About Arial
http://www.ms-studio.com/articles.html

Spot
http://www.ms-studio.com/articlesarialsid.html

Quiz
http://www.iliveonyourvisits.com/helvetica/

Game
http://www.engagestudio.com/helvetica/

I am also against that additional gray border and I think it looks tacky. I prefer the alias gray border but only the font smoothing type that you can get with MaestroSBT. Helvetica needs an alias to open those lips.

2. I just realized that Tahoma doesn't have a true Italic, but simulated Italic, but this shouldn't matter to most of you. If this concerns you, you could use Verdana instead; same font just 2 dots wider and it has a true italic. If you use italic, test Tahoma to see if looks ok. I've never had a problem with this though. Just means that windows will physically slant the font and it may or may not be as legeble as the true italic of Verdana.

3. Georgia, like Verdana/Tahoma was also designed for legibility on screen but I didn't mention it because serif subs are harder to render and read on screen. I would only use it for artistic reasons where it matches the material.

4. Monospace fonts, like Lucida Console, have failed in legibility studies and I can't recommend them. They also waste screen space. Only use them if you're trying to mimic captions, but most of the caption turned subtitles you see today are tahoma/verdana like. Take Jurassic Park 2 or was it 3, and The Rundown.

In fact, many professional DVDs today use a font that's so close to Tahoma/Verdana that the only way I can tell them apart is by the letter "I", and most of you are looking at the eye of Verdana now. If there are no serifs on it, then it's not Tahoma/Verdana. Serifs make words like "Ill" readable. Without them, the taller letter should be "l" as in IlIlIlIlIl...

[orion44]

I would also like to know what is the font type in OP's post.

It looks awesome.

Anyone know?

[Lyle_JP]

I like Alte Haas Grotesk (http://www.dafont.com/alte-haas-grotesk.font), particularly with bold. Looks very handsome with a drop-shadow; not video-like at all but more like what they used to always use on subtitles in films.