Awesome. I just need to find out how/if my Mac Caption lite will create thest files. Or how to convert my mac-made scc file. I don't think it can encode mpg though. I will have to check on this. You know, you bring up a great point. I don't know what the MAJOR differences between subtitles and CC, ecept the subtitles will look better.

It's pretty much the same as the last time you asked about CC

http://tinyurl.com/2rsecl

I'm also struggling to make closed captioned DVDs. At present I make DVDs that have SDH-style subtitle tracks, but would still like to have the movies closed captioned as well. (Some institutional customers in U.S. insist on closed captioning). Do do this I use a free utility (the Mac OS9 version is free, anyway) called MPEG CC Insert (http://homepage.mac.com/dvd_sp_helper/PDF/MPEG%20CC%20Insert.pdf) which inserts the .scc (Scenarist -style captions) file into the .mpg to create an m2v. These files play somewhat in DVD Architect (it crashes while playing longer files, >15 mins) but the resulting DVD carries the closed caption info. I'd appreciate any thoughts on improving this process!

I found something for the PC here, although I have not had the chance to try it.

Yeah, the SCC Tools program are command-line tools, a little complicated for me. I'm sticking with exporting an .m2v file from Vegas and then adding the caption .scc file through MPEG CC Insert on the old Mac.

Also, on another thread I learned that the crashing of DVD-A 4 while playing long m2v files is fixed by uninstalling the old (4.0) version and reinstalling the later ones (now I think it's 4.0b). That worked for me. As long as DVD-A doesn't recompress the files, the closed captioning survives into the final DVD.

J Schultz

The ability to insert CC is really a bit rare... I mean to the extent that checking out that link of yours I'm seriously thinking of getting MAC OS running in a virtual machine on my system.

My understanding is that it's mostly done in hardware, though Encore is now supposed to support it [tried Encore once -- wouldn't work on my machine -- never have looked at it since so I have no idea how well it works, or doesn't]

Currently I'm settling for subs because in my experience CC playback is a bit iffy on many (most) of the lower cost players... cuts out after a few minutes. Also have read of the CC being lost with progressive players or because of the connection type used between the player and TV. Maybe that will help to convince your customers to cut you some slack...

That said, the mpg2 stream carries the CC data the same way it carries flags for things like aspect ratio or pulldown, only with CC there isn't a specific place for it; DVDs usually conform to common practice, but DVB & DVD Recorders don't always, though hopefully newer stds will help. At any rate it shouldn't effect playback at all, so if it's dying in DVDA it's probably a result of the extra CPU & memory resources it costs to mux the streams and preview near real time -- you're better off to render to hdd and play there. [note: check your resources in task mgr or similar previewing in DVDA vs. Power DVD]

DVDA does have one bad point re: CC... Like many other authoring apps it turns off CC display, so you can't turn it on in a player. To turn it on, render your project to hdd, then open IFO files in Ifoedit [other editors can handle this too, but for this operation, Ifoedit is quickest]...

Start with the main DVD *TS* IFO file, & on the 1st screen that opens in Ifoedit, scan the top 1/2 of the window for any titles with CC... Double clicking the title opens a window where you can check the boxes for CC, then click save & save the IFO. You have to repeat this for each title (with CC) IFO as well. To check it, open the DVD on hdd in a player like Nero or Power DVD and see if CC can be turned on. How this effects hardware players I have no idea, as I've never created a CC DVD without this modification -- feel PC playback is as important if not more so than hardware.

IF it might help, SCC Tools includes command line utilities to convert between scc & the srt format often used for subs & sub tools. Subtitle Workshop does a decent conversion to the txt format DVDA requires. After importing subs into DVDA, reload the project to get proper line spacing. DVDA does a great job creating graphical subs, but, it does not use the common 4 color scheme for masking -- DVDA subs may not work the same with other DVD mod, conversion, or editing tools [I often spend an extra 20 minutes or so in Nero Recode to create a Nero Digital version of titles for convenient reference & DVDA subs don't get converted the same way as DVDs authored elsewhere] DVD Lab Pro has an advantage in letting you create wide and FS subs, but DVDA's syncing and positioning abilities outweigh that IMO.

Edit: I'm slow posting, so didn't read your 2nd post...

Had the new version of DVDA 4 crash on me last night, so I'll stick by my suggestion to preview from render to hdd when practical (not setting chapt etc.)

Regarding the SCC Tools... Not sure where I got it -- been too long but I think I've seen it in Microsoft Power Tools -- but have it set to *open command window here* right clicking any folder. Copy the needed apps to the folder with whatever I'm working on, and makes it pretty easy. You DO NOT however want to use the tool for muxing in CC, as per the docs it's slowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

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DVDA does have one bad point re: CC... Like many other authoring apps it turns off CC display, so you can't turn it on in a player. To turn it on, render your project to hdd, then open IFO files in Ifoedit [other editors can handle this too, but for this operation, Ifoedit is quickest]...
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Actually, DVD Players can still play the CC even if you don't update the CC Present indicator usinf IFOedit (well, your TV has to be set properly to display them). The only reason you would need to update the CC in IFOedit is to be able to toggle them on/off in a DVD Software player such as PowerDVD. But as usual, ymmv depending on your playback equipment...

Thank you all for your information! I hadn't realized that I would need to change a setting within a DVD file to acknowledge the presence of closed captions.

There are (as usual) a lot of quirks. My version of PowerDVD displays what it calls "Closed Captions" from my DVD-A-created disks, but I think it's actually displaying the subtitle track (because "English" appears as an option). I try to include both "real" closed captioning as well as SDH subtitles ("Subtitles for Deaf & Hard of Hearing", which are DVD subtitles which conform to the grammar of closed captions).

Which brings me to another wrinkle, don't know if it's of interest to this thread, but I'll put it out there: to increase the legibility of subtitles, I turn off the Outline mode and use a semi-transparent gray background behind them. One of my gripes with most subtitles is that they're nearly illegible, and this is my attempt to emulate what closed captions look like. However, when I import my subtitles into DVD-A subtitle track, I can't find a way to simplify the re-sizing of this background to my text (by this I mean the background defaults to filling the width of the screen---sometimes I have a 2 word title that is just lost in this wide background...). My method is to re-size each title by hand---does anyone have any better way? (And for that matter, is there any way to select multiple titles and, say, italicize them all at the same time? My hand is getting tired...)