Captions and transcription

Most video on a phone is watched without sound, at least at first. Captions are the primary channel there, not a courtesy.

Opening the editor

Captions in the toolbar, or Tools → Captions and Transcription.

Transcribing

Choose an Audio clip to transcribe, then Transcribe Clip. It runs in the background and the queue shows progress, with Cancel Transcription if you change your mind.

CPU threads decides how much of your machine it uses. More threads finish sooner and make everything else feel slower while it works. Save Transcription Settings keeps your choice for next time.

Transcription gets names, places and technical terms wrong. Read every cue before you ship it.

Editing cues

Edit Captions opens the list. Each cue has its text and its timing.

  • Add Caption makes a new cue.
  • Split Caption breaks one into two, for when a cue runs too long to read.
  • Merge with Next joins two, for when transcription broke a sentence in an odd place.
  • Remove Caption deletes one.

Two lines maximum on screen at once, around 40 characters a line. Break lines at natural phrases rather than wherever the count ran out. "The county commissioners voted / three to one on Tuesday" reads. "The county commissioners voted three / to one on Tuesday" does not.

Importing and exporting

Import Captions takes an existing SRT, which is how you bring in a transcript someone else produced.

Save Captions SRT writes the file out. SRT is plain text and every platform accepts it. You can open one in Notepad and fix a typo in ten seconds.

Burned in or a separate file

Caption output decides which you get.

A separate file is better wherever the platform accepts one, because the viewer can turn it off, the platform can translate it, and you can fix a mistake without re-exporting.

Burned in is necessary where the platform will not take a file, and it is what you want when the caption styling is part of the look. The cost is that it is part of the picture forever.

Appearance

Caption font and Caption position control how burned in captions look and where they sit.

On a vertical platform preset, keep them out of the bottom fifth, which the platform's own interface covers. Turn on Safe Zones and place them inside the box.

The caption track

Caption track chooses which track the captions belong to when you have more than one speaker or more than one language.