BD Ripper (3D Plus) forced subtitles

[Ken62465]

I'm using the trial version of DVDFab Blu-ray ripper and having some issues. Seems whenever I have a BD that has a forced subtitle set on the disk I have no way to know and find myself ripping again until I sort out what is needed. I'm ripping to mkv's to put on my HTPC and play in WMC, via using shark007 codec pack to enable WMC to support mkv's. Now take these two titles

Rise of the Planet of the Apes
Iron Man 2

Both of these titles have needed forced subtitles. First one where the chimps use sign language and the second when Mickey Rourke speaks Russian. When we load the disk we see subtitles sets to choose from but how do we know? Maybe it's me and my approach is all wrong but right now I'm lost to figure it out. It would be nice if DVDFab showed what subtitle sets had the forced flag on/off or even the file size would be a slight indicator that the small eng set might very well be a small segment of a different language in the movie. Obviousely a large file size would indicate a full movie script subtitle. Can anyone shed some light on figuring out what subtitles are a must have? There's got to be a way to tell the user what these subtitle sets are on the disk.

[signals]

Each movie is slightly different in the way translations are handled. Often the translation subs are in the same stream as the main ones, sometimes not. These would be good features but would require that DVDFab take substantially longer to analyze a disc for a need that is not that frequent.

Usually, someone will go to the trouble to puzzle it out and post the results here in the forum.

For DVDs, you can use the free tool DVDSubEdit, which will rapidly scan a decrypted VIDEO_TS folder on your hard drive and show you any subs that are forced and show you which stream they are in.

[Ken62465]

Also I had experimented with the option in DVDFab "Display only forced subpicture" (unless that option is really nothing to do with what I'm after since you did not mention it?) But with both those titles I mention it did nothing previousley. Not sure what that meant but in both mkv's created neither contained the disired subtitle. I then thought maybe that option needs to be enabled before DVDFab reads the oroginal disk? The problem with that was DVDFab wants to read the disk right away when launched if disk is already in. So right now I first fired up DVDFab, no disk inserted, then checked off that option, then inserted disk to read. It's reading right now so I want to see if that makes any form of difference.

This forced subtitle issue is the only headache I have with making mkv's. Otherwise I like the program thus far. There's a few hiccups. That mini player seems to not respond with turning on/off subtitles. Sometimes they stay on for some time before flipping options and I can get it to respond to what I've selected. It's also crashed on me a few times and there are times it takes forever to read a disk, I mean like right now the Planet of the Apes is back in to experiment with and I ran out to the store and 15minutes later it's still reading and drive is showing a flashing light as if it is in fact reading data...that just seems like something is wrong and happens allot. Other times it takes maybe 1-2 minutes to read a disk.

Last thing I noticed was I wanted the created mkv file to just be <Volume> but no matter how many times I removed <Title> it kept putting it back.

Well had to close DVDFab as it never would read/load the disk. Started again and this time it loaded in maybe 30 secs. That option ("Display only forced subpictures") was automaticaly turned off and flipping it made no change in what subpictures were displayed. I have no idea how to figure out what is needed and it should be more simplified than this.

[Ken62465]

ahh sorry about the double post. I didn't see that little message that a moderator must review it first. Thought I lost it and would need to repost. Not use to seeing that on a forum but good way to keep it clean, and void out harmful attacks that you don't want seen by others.

[signals]

The delay (moderation) is only temporary, until we get to know you (and vice versa). Also helps keep the forum spam-free. It is a little worse on the weekends, when we have lots of posts from New Members and sometimes less forum staff available.

ahh sorry about the double post. I didn't see that little message that a moderator must review it first. Thought I lost it and would need to repost. Not use to seeing that on a forum but good way to keep it clean, and void out harmful attacks that you don't want seen by others.

[signals]

The "Display only forced..." checkbox filters the selected sub stream so that only forced subs get through. This is extremely useful since in most cases the translations are part of the main sub stream. If you select the checkbox and no subs appear, it means the stream had no forced subs. It can be selected at any time in the process--first, last, just before Start, makes no difference. Note that it only filters the single selected stream. It takes about 5 minutes to check all the streams in a DVD for forced subs with DVDSubEdit. I don't know of a similar tool for BD, so what I do is generally watch a little of the movie in TMT5 with all subs manually turned off. If any show up, I know they are forced.

By my count there are only 8 forced subs in the Apes movie and they didn't seem very important ("Are you hurt bad?" etc.) I may have missed some.

Forced subs are a headache for everyone. As I said earlier, DVDFab could scan all streams for the forced start command, but it would make the disc analysis take longer than most users would tolerate. Mayabe something can be done though, I will talk with Fengtao about it (again). My personal preference for most movies is to have them play with whatever subs they had when they were in theaters. An exception is for example a French film that has dubbed English, these I change to the original French audio with forced English subs.

I don't use the mkv remux feature, the files are too large. Someone else will have to help you with that.

[Ken62465]

signals,

That was a big help and very explanatory, thanks! I did not realize the "Display forced subpictures" worked on the created output only, as it sounds like what you are saying. I thought that option meant "display" meaning show me only forced subtitles so I kept ticking the box on different movies and seeing it do nothing and didn't get it. Sorry if I sound like an idiot I'm usualy pretty sharp when it comes to pc's and software. The option should be termed "include only forcd subs in rip".."display" threw me off

>>Forced subs are a headache for everyone. As I said earlier, DVDFab could scan all streams for the forced start command, but it would make the disc analysis take longer than most users would tolerate. Mayabe something can be done though, I will talk with Fengtao about it (again)<<
Personaly I like the idea. I think for those who might not like it give an option to turn off the feature so for them they don't add 5 minutes scan time. I'd turn it on and let it do it's thing while I go back to work. Your right...forced subs have been a huge headache for me.

>>I don't use the mkv remux feature, the files are too large<<
I used it at first because honestly I knew nothing of it, or understood bitrate much. I'm now testing different bitrates to see what works well and retains PQ. I was amazed when I tested one last night and used the default "5635" (I think). I think the movie only BD to mkv came out at 8gb's...huge drop. I tested it on my 60" Samsung LED D8000 set and I was hard pressed to see a difference, maybe subtle but I'm picky..extrememly and drives me nuts some times! I've been accused of OCD! Next I wonder if I should even bother experimenting with audio bitrates and is it worth it for a little more drop?

I just finished my HTPC build and DVDFab might just be a perfect thing I wanted to get my BD transfered over in mkv. Honestly I'm testing/trial others and Pavatube would not run at all for BD but DVD's were fine....crashed even trying to read a BD disk. MakeMKV was to weak. So far DVDFab is the frontrunner.

I installed a 2TB WD green drive and I've already eaten over half of it...arggg. Looks like I'm putting another 2TB in way sooner than I wanted

[signals]

Think of "Display only forced..." actually saying "Encode only forced..."

You should also try compressing the main movie to BD-9 size for playback (in BD Copy module). It looks really good.

[Ken62465]

I'm also having all sorts of issues getting subtitles to even play. They work fine in MPC-HC but not the new MP in Windows 7. I use the Shark007 codec pack and apparently the LAV decoder does not support external subtitles, or at least the Shark007 "setup and usage" says to use any other decorder for h264 besides LAV & PDVD for external subtitles. Well once I set that up use any other than the two listed it worked and solved playing the subtitles in WMP. I then setup the x64 config of Shark007 to the same method and once inside WMC it will not play the subtitles. Seems the only decoder option that will play these .sub external subtitles is the Microsoft decoder and that does not work well because then I loose all HD audio and it reverts to 2ch stereo only. So now I'm at a decision point....is it better the get this mess working with these .sub external file for subtitles or should I switch to a rendered subtitle in the mkv container? Which is better supported? Obviousely these .sub are not striking me as well support thus far. My problem with switching over to rendered is you need to know exactly what subtitle track to render...because DVDFab only lets you choose one or the option is not available...why is that anyway?

Having major problems with the movie 2012. When DVDFab reads/scans the BD it finds 3 full movie titles, which has always confused the heck out of me. Title1, Title34, and Title632 are the 3 movies titles it finds. The default selected movie title is the thrid and it only has one eng subtitle and I assume that's the full script? All I want is the forced set with the occasional foreign languages that are spoken at various times. I test ripping Title632 but no dice...then again I didn't have all this Shark007 sorted out so I should test again. Do you have any ideas on this movies and which subtitle is the forced set I'm after?