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Saving italics in Subtitle Edit
Thread poster: Janica Lundholm
Janica Lundholm
Janica Lundholm  Identity Verified
Local time: 22:17
English to Swedish
+ ...
Jan 3, 2018

Dear all,
Does anyone know how to save italics in usf-files in SE (3.5.4)? I add italics the normal way with Ctrl + I and all looks well, but when I reopen the file the italics are gone...
Any ideas?
 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 17:17
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
Subtitle file type??? Jan 3, 2018

As I understand the subtitling process, particularly the 60+ subtitle file formats, there are two major opposing trends.

All non-proprietary subtitle file formats are TEXT files, so you can open them using Windows Notepad, to see what's inside.

A) represented by SSA/ASS
They contain all subtitle text formatting parameters, so that rendering the subtitles can be done by "lo-level" (i.e. cheap or free) software, like VirtualDub.

B) represented by differ... See more
As I understand the subtitling process, particularly the 60+ subtitle file formats, there are two major opposing trends.

All non-proprietary subtitle file formats are TEXT files, so you can open them using Windows Notepad, to see what's inside.

A) represented by SSA/ASS
They contain all subtitle text formatting parameters, so that rendering the subtitles can be done by "lo-level" (i.e. cheap or free) software, like VirtualDub.

B) represented by different variants of TXT
They usually contain only time-in, time-out, and plain subtitle text. All formatting has to be done on the "hi-level" (i.e. "professional" or "expensive") software like the defunct Ulead's DVD Workshop, or FinalCut, Adobe Premiere, Sony Vegas etc.

So if you are saving to a format used by some "hi-level" subtitle rendering program, SE will prune italic and other commands, as these would be taken for text, and explicitly appear onscreen, instead of being executed. Keep in mind that SE doesn't "know" which subtitle format you will be saving to until you actually do it.

Try saving your file to SSA, and then check if the italic commands stay there. If they do, this will be the answer. ▲ Collapse
 
Janica Lundholm
Janica Lundholm  Identity Verified
Local time: 22:17
English to Swedish
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Saving to ASS works and italics are saved (thanks!) but the customer wants delivery in usf-file... Jan 3, 2018

Thanks José,

I guess I'll just have to ask the customer if I can deliver in ASS insted of usf.

But it's surprising if they prefer "lo-level" file formats, since it's a very high-reputed company. Do you know if usf-files normally should keep italics? I suspect there's something wrong with my installation...


José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:

As I understand the subtitling process, particularly the 60+ subtitle file formats, there are two major opposing trends.

All non-proprietary subtitle file formats are TEXT files, so you can open them using Windows Notepad, to see what's inside.

A) represented by SSA/ASS
They contain all subtitle text formatting parameters, so that rendering the subtitles can be done by "lo-level" (i.e. cheap or free) software, like VirtualDub.

B) represented by different variants of TXT
They usually contain only time-in, time-out, and plain subtitle text. All formatting has to be done on the "hi-level" (i.e. "professional" or "expensive") software like the defunct Ulead's DVD Workshop, or FinalCut, Adobe Premiere, Sony Vegas etc.

So if you are saving to a format used by some "hi-level" subtitle rendering program, SE will prune italic and other commands, as these would be taken for text, and explicitly appear onscreen, instead of being executed. Keep in mind that SE doesn't "know" which subtitle format you will be saving to until you actually do it.

Try saving your file to SSA, and then check if the italic commands stay there. If they do, this will be the answer.


[Redigerad 2018-01-03 17:35 GMT]
 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 17:17
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
Holding the tail to wag the dog Jan 3, 2018

Janica Lundholm wrote:

Thanks José,

I guess I'll just have to ask the customer if I can deliver in ASS insted of usf.

But it's surprising if they prefer "lo-level" file formats, since it's a very high-reputed company. Do you know if usf-files normally should keep italics? I suspect there's something wrong with my installation...


Apparently SE "thinks" USF can't cope with the < i > commands, which is not true:
http://sweetkaraoke.pagesperso-orange.fr/Tutoriels/Tutoriel4_2a.html
(J'ai verifié, tu comprends bien le Français.)

So one way to circumvent that "safety" could be to save as SSA, and then use:
https://transcribefiles.net/other/pages/caption-subtitle-converter.htm
... to convert them to USF (unless there are non-disclosure issues involved).
 
Janica Lundholm
Janica Lundholm  Identity Verified
Local time: 22:17
English to Swedish
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Merci! Jan 3, 2018

Thanks again!

José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:

Janica Lundholm wrote:

Thanks José,

I guess I'll just have to ask the customer if I can deliver in ASS insted of usf.

But it's surprising if they prefer "lo-level" file formats, since it's a very high-reputed company. Do you know if usf-files normally should keep italics? I suspect there's something wrong with my installation...


Apparently SE "thinks" USF can't cope with the < i > commands, which is not true:
http://sweetkaraoke.pagesperso-orange.fr/Tutoriels/Tutoriel4_2a.html
(J'ai verifié, tu comprends bien le Français.)

So one way to circumvent that "safety" could be to save as SSA, and then use:
https://transcribefiles.net/other/pages/caption-subtitle-converter.htm
... to convert them to USF (unless there are non-disclosure issues involved).


 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 17:17
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
On hi/lo levels Jan 3, 2018

Janica Lundholm wrote:

But it's surprising if they prefer "lo-level" file formats, since it's a very high-reputed company.


They don't involve the company reputation, they merely define where the "burden" of subtitle formatting is located.

In SSA/ASS files, the formatting is done at the subtitle file generation step. Whatever software that will be used to generate those subs onscreen will interpret all those embedded parameters and commands, and do it!

In TXT-type files, the formatting is left to the subtitle generation software, so it only contains times and plain text.

These above are the two extremes of the continuum. There are many midway formats where, e.g. italics, underscores, etc, will be in the subtitle file, however font size, color, and position will be defined by the sub generating program.

Unless I'm mistaken, I did only one quick test of it, uou can upload subtitles to YouTube using SSA, ASS, or SRT. With SSA/ASS, the subs will come onscreen with all the preset features. With SRT, the viewer may config them from menus. Not sure about this, though.

Said Bazry
 


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