So... what if I actually WANT subtitles?

[JaddziaDax]

in the case of Media Blasters - they only seem to be doing it with the "gay" anime they are licencing >.< as they dubbed Green Green :/ which was released around the same time as Loveless :/ but for me it makes it cheaper so even though i do like to be lazy and watch a dub every now and again, i guess i cant complain too much (i got sukisyo for $30 total - entire series)

[comorbid]

It's an official, U.S. retail-release DVD that I bought at Tower video, not a bootleg. It's a live-action, Korean film, called 301/302, and it's not just this DVD that I have the issue with, I've tried with other discs that I own, anime or otherwise, all purchased from places like Tower, Best Buy, Sam Goody, etc., and have the same problem.

This is (basically) what I'm doing - here's DVD Decrypter in IFO mode (Gunsmith Cats was the closest DVD to my chair so that's why you see it in the screencaps, the specific title being ripped happens to be episode 2):

<img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/comorbid/pic/0008bsx4" width="559" height="353">
<img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/comorbid/pic/0008c17s" width="559" height="353">

When I choose to Demux the subtitles, it creates a .SUB file with a pretty detailed name. This is what it looks like in Notepad, if it matters (yeah, that's basically what the entire file looks like, all the way to the end):

<img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/comorbid/pic/0008d52f" width="490" height="444">

When I export the subs to a raw format, it creates a .SUB file with the same name, except with the addition of the word "RAW," Which looks the same in Notepad. I figured that was worth mentioning, because I've exported .MKV subs which showed up as plain text in notepad, but I don't really know how much of a difference there is in the two formats.

Anyway, when I choose "Direct Stream Copy," no file is output, and playing the .VOBs in VLC yields no option for subtitles. I can switch between audio tracks, but there are no subtitles, whatsoever.

After I run it though DGIndex, and load the .avs into VDM, and go to the filters, I (obviously) see this:

<img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/comorbid/pic/0008a540" width="519" height="332">

Then when I choose TextSub (mentioning the VobSub plugin here is pretty much irrelevant because it yields the EXACT SAME RESULT in the end - which is NOTHING), I get this dialog:

<img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/comorbid/pic/00089p8b" width="426" height="290">

I've tried it with every character set using both the demuxed and raw subs, and each time I click "Open," it goes back to:

<img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/comorbid/pic/0008a540" width="519" height="332">

Now... based on past experience with adding VDub filters... SOMETHING SHOULD BE THERE, but it's obviously not (which is why I didn't bother making a duplicate screenshot). All the other filters show up if I add them, just not TextSub or VobSub, and no subtitles show up in the output preview window.

Did I leave anything out?

[Purge]

somtimes you have to wait a bit to get the subtitle option to appear in VLC when playing vobs directly.

i think theres an added bit of complication when ripping subs from a dvd on account that they are stored as a sort of picture file on dvd's and are needed to be converted to acsii characters to be used with vobsub. you should be able to google some guides for dvd subtitle conversion. If i need subs i usually just search those dvd subtitle databases and they usually have it already in .srt or .ssa form so i can just use textsub filter to add it in.

[Qyot27]

Demux the vobs with the subtitles still in there - this is trivial with SmartRipper, I've not really dealt with DVD Decrypter enough to know how to do that. Then use SubRip and directly open the VOB or IFO (can't remember which; just make sure that your ripping program does write out the IFO also just in case you do need it) - it'll detect the subtitles, and then you have two options:

The Foolproof but Tedious way:
Set SubRip up so it outputs Bitmap files and an SRT script with image references. Then, manually go through the bitmap files and type in the correct dialogue yourself in the corresponding places (which is made much simpler because SRT is really just plain text - you can do this in Notepad).

The Less-Foolproof, but maybe less Tedious way:
Use the OCD functions of SubRip natively to do this, which means you have to 'teach' it what the letters look like and it'll convert the subs to text in an SRT without user input. The problem, though, is that often the 'teaching' doesn't stick and you have to keep giving it the same letters over and over, and even if it does stick there's the possibility that A) Things get misspelled due to font eccentricities or what-have-you; B) Proper spacing is ignored, making words and sentences run together; or C) Both - in all three cases manually fixing it is necessary for it to look right. I don't recall a single time I've ever used the OCD function that the resulting subtitle file came out without issues, which is why I usually stick to the Tedious way of typing it all up myself if I really care about it.

[Qyot27]

Demux the vobs with the subtitles still in there

Man, I'm tired. I meant to type 'Decrypt', and actually just meant not to demux anything when you save the file to the hard drive.

[comorbid]

Demux the vobs with the subtitles still in there

Man, I'm tired. I meant to type 'Decrypt', and actually just meant not to demux anything when you save the file to the hard drive.

You made that last post JUST as I was looking over mine... lol

But yeah, I got it pretty much that way:

I ripped it with DVD Decrypter in IFO mode, with stream processing enabled, but with the subs set to Direct Stream Copy.

After a bit more googling (like about 2 hours), I was made aware of SubRip, on Doom9's Downloads page (and I feel stupid for not thinking to look there myself), so I ran it, loaded the converted IFO, and ran the OCR sequence, exporting it to an .ssa file. It took a little bit of post-editing to "fix" some of the text (the only real problems I had were that it confused uppercase i's and lowercase L's, and couldn't figure out what a % was), but now I actually had something with plain text in it.

VobSub and TextSub still weren't doing it in VDubMod, so I went back to the AVISynth docs. I knew there was a Subtitle(), but it wasn't for adding multiple strings of text. Turns out I just needed to add vsfilter.dll to the plugins directory, and use TextSub(filename.ssa) - that did the trick. Now I can just convert the .avs with PSPVideo.

So basically, I got the answer the 4th time I R'd the FM.

And DVD Decrypter is pretty much the EXACT same program as SmartRipper, the only real difference I've notced (though I really haven't futzed with all the options of either porogram) is that SmartRipper defaults to IFO mode.

[Qyot27]

And DVD Decrypter is pretty much the EXACT same program as SmartRipper, the only real difference I've notced (though I really haven't futzed with all the options of either porogram) is that SmartRipper defaults to IFO mode.

Yeah, pretty much. I just prefer SmartRipper - I only go to DVD Decrypter when there are problems with SR, which has been just short of never for me. Although I would default to DVD Decrypter for burning ISOs once I found out about that function (of course now I've moved onto ImgBurn for that, but whatever).

[RosenRed]

VobSub and TextSub still weren't doing it in VDubMod, so I went back to the AVISynth docs. I knew there was a Subtitle(), but it wasn't for adding multiple strings of text. Turns out I just needed to add vsfilter.dll to the plugins directory, and use TextSub(filename.ssa) - that did the trick. Now I can just convert the .avs with PSPVideo.

If you have VobSub installed search for textsub.vdf (it should be somewhere in the installation directory... You can load it with VirtualDubMod as a filter and use it there without messing with your script (in case you want to do multiple exports for example)