Hello,
Rendered subtitle fonts have always been problem. Fortunately, the only working solution seems to be DVDFab, except that the fixed fonts, their sizes and colors are less than ideal. I've "tried" all kinds of programs (not in any particular order), Vidcoder/Handbreak, MediaCoder, AVCHDCoder, MeGUI, multiACVHD, etc., but the ONLY program that does work is DVDFab for rendering subtitles in videos, but this feature still isn't quite their yet.
Now first, let me say that what I'm trying to do is taking my purchased library of BluRay's and DVD's and converting (or ripping) them to files that I can put on my media server (Mezzmo) and stream to my PS3 as my DHCP client. The other issue is that neither Mezzmo or PS3 supports embedded subtitles (and I think that many new TV's that support DHCP streaming as well). As such, the only option (for me anyway) is hard rendering.
One other note, is that because I'm streaming to the PS3, I'm trying to stay with the m2ts format. mp4 is also a possibility, but it has file size limitations to 4GB.
Of all those movies, a small but important percentage has foreign subtitles that I want to hard render. On my PC, I exclusively use VLC, and it's built in subtitle font (for embedded, not rendered) subtitles looks perfect. However, in DVDFab, they are either too big, the color is just not right, or the font is just wrong. Here's an example of a BluRay test looking at DVDFab version 8168, 8178, and the current 8213. Note that the "This is a subtitle test." on the bottom is the actual screen cap from the test video. The sample font on the top are my best guess. Also the image is reduced 50% from a 1920x800 screen cap. I also added the same width "|---|" test brackets, just so you can see the displayed font widths.
As seen here, version 8168 uses what appears to be an 20 pt Arial Bold font. The size is OK, although it could be a little smaller, say 18pt, but the yellow color is just too much, as it stick's out like a sore thumb. A white, non-bold, 18pt Arial would be fine, but that's a guess.
Now for the current 8213 (and 8178), it appears DBDFab is using an Asian font type "KaiTi" which appears to be a mono-spaced font as opposed to the proportional Arial font. The mono-spaced font is just bad looking, especially on long or multi-line subtitles.
My Feature Request is simple for me (or anyone else) to seriously consider DVDFab for Ripping/Converting movies that need rendered subtitles, please offer an option to 1) Select the font, size, and color of these fonts (even if its a very limited selection), and 2) Select the option of its position from the bottom of the screen.
The second option isn't that big a deal, but some BluRay movies in 2.35:1 aspect ratio may or may not be mastered at ~1920x800, but instead may be 1920x1024, with black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. All this means is that the rendered subtitle would either be in the black area or in the displayed image area.
I don't think that this is too much to ask, but as more and more folks start to go to media server's to handle their multimedia needs, this is very important.
Thanks for your consideration.
Bill
Rendered subtitle fonts have always been problem. Fortunately, the only working solution seems to be DVDFab, except that the fixed fonts, their sizes and colors are less than ideal. I've "tried" all kinds of programs (not in any particular order), Vidcoder/Handbreak, MediaCoder, AVCHDCoder, MeGUI, multiACVHD, etc., but the ONLY program that does work is DVDFab for rendering subtitles in videos, but this feature still isn't quite their yet.
Now first, let me say that what I'm trying to do is taking my purchased library of BluRay's and DVD's and converting (or ripping) them to files that I can put on my media server (Mezzmo) and stream to my PS3 as my DHCP client. The other issue is that neither Mezzmo or PS3 supports embedded subtitles (and I think that many new TV's that support DHCP streaming as well). As such, the only option (for me anyway) is hard rendering.
One other note, is that because I'm streaming to the PS3, I'm trying to stay with the m2ts format. mp4 is also a possibility, but it has file size limitations to 4GB.
Of all those movies, a small but important percentage has foreign subtitles that I want to hard render. On my PC, I exclusively use VLC, and it's built in subtitle font (for embedded, not rendered) subtitles looks perfect. However, in DVDFab, they are either too big, the color is just not right, or the font is just wrong. Here's an example of a BluRay test looking at DVDFab version 8168, 8178, and the current 8213. Note that the "This is a subtitle test." on the bottom is the actual screen cap from the test video. The sample font on the top are my best guess. Also the image is reduced 50% from a 1920x800 screen cap. I also added the same width "|---|" test brackets, just so you can see the displayed font widths.
As seen here, version 8168 uses what appears to be an 20 pt Arial Bold font. The size is OK, although it could be a little smaller, say 18pt, but the yellow color is just too much, as it stick's out like a sore thumb. A white, non-bold, 18pt Arial would be fine, but that's a guess.
Now for the current 8213 (and 8178), it appears DBDFab is using an Asian font type "KaiTi" which appears to be a mono-spaced font as opposed to the proportional Arial font. The mono-spaced font is just bad looking, especially on long or multi-line subtitles.
My Feature Request is simple for me (or anyone else) to seriously consider DVDFab for Ripping/Converting movies that need rendered subtitles, please offer an option to 1) Select the font, size, and color of these fonts (even if its a very limited selection), and 2) Select the option of its position from the bottom of the screen.
The second option isn't that big a deal, but some BluRay movies in 2.35:1 aspect ratio may or may not be mastered at ~1920x800, but instead may be 1920x1024, with black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. All this means is that the rendered subtitle would either be in the black area or in the displayed image area.
I don't think that this is too much to ask, but as more and more folks start to go to media server's to handle their multimedia needs, this is very important.
Thanks for your consideration.
Bill
- Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790
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