Trying to figure out how your exported subtitles are going to look in your final movie can be a bit of a challenge in InqScribe’s current incarnation (version 1.5.2). We are working on a better way to help you preview and edit subtitles, but in the mean time, here is a quick and dirty method that can save you a lot of time.

This won’t be a perfect preview, but it should help you get 90% of the way there.

Essentially, what we’re going to do is use InqScribe’s transcript window to emulate the width of the movie. Figuring out the actual width of the subtitles in the movie can be a challenge as well, so we’re going to export a subtitled movie and link your transcript to the subtitled movie so that you can view both at the same time.

We’re assuming you’re starting with a transcript with embedded timecodes marking where subtitles begin and end. The transcript should look something like this:

[00:00:03.00]
Everybody sing along!
[00:00:05.00]
[00:00:06.03] 
There was turtle by the name of Bert
[00:00:08.03] 

If you don’t already have a transcript, you should create at least one long subtitle that wraps so that you can see where the screen wraps.

Just in case you mess something up by accident, it’s good to first create a new copy of your document. Doing a File→Save As... with a new name will work fine. Eventually you might want to replace your transcript with this cleaned up version, but it’s better to start with a copy.

In order for the InqScribe Transcript window to emulate the display of your subtitles, you’ll need to put timecodes on individual lines.

So this:

[00:00:03.00] Everybody sing along!
[00:00:06.03] There was turtle by the name of Bert

...becomes this:

[00:00:03.00]
Everybody sing along!
[00:00:06.03] 
There was turtle by the name of Bert

Or better yet, also include end-points for the subtitles, by inserting a time code with an empty line:

[00:00:03.00]
Everybody sing along!
[00:00:05.00]
[00:00:06.03] 
There was turtle by the name of Bert
[00:00:08.03] 

If your transcript has timecodes embedded with the text, the easiest way to get timecodes on their own lines is to do a Edit→Find.... Search for ] (right square bracket with space) and replace it with a right square bracket with a carriage return (copy and paste a right square bracket with carriage return into the field).

We’re going to export a subtitled movie here to do two things: first, we need to set the font and display characteristics of the subtitle, and second, we want a reference movie with a subtitles in it for positioning the transcript window.

a. Go to File→Export Subtitled Movie....

b. Select your font, size, position, and padding of your subtitle. (Note that using a Bold font might throw off this method as we can’t set a bold font in the Transcript window).

c. Write down the settings for font and size. You’ll need these later.

d. Click Save As... to set the filename and location of the exported subtitle movie. Note where you save it as we’ll need this later also.

e. You can leave Save as Self-Contained Movie unchecked. There’s no need to create a self-contained movie at this point. We just need a reference movie.

f. Click Export to save the movie.

It’s pretty easy to point your InqScribe document to alternate movie sources. We’re going to take advantage of that and point your InqScribe document to your exported subtitled movie. This way you can see what your current movie looks like exported, and use the Go to Time... feature of InqScribe to quickly jump to view specific subtitles.

When you’re done, you can reset the InqScribe document back to your original source movie.

a. Click on the name of your movie in the upper left corner of the screen, right above your movie. (Or select Media→Select Media Source... from the menu).

b. Click on Select File... and select your exported subtitled movie. You should see your movie with subtitles in your InqScribe document.

We need to set the font and size of InqScribe’s transcript window so that it matches the font and size of the exported subtitles. We’ll rely on wrapping in the transcript window to estimate the wrapping in the subtitles.

!!! This is a critical step – if you forget to set the transcript font, it won’t match your subtitles at all and would be useless as an estimate!!!

What we’re going to do now is find the longest subtitle text in your transcript and use that as a reference point for resizing the InqScribe Window.

a. Find your longest subtitle. You can easily do this by either quickly ‘scrubbing’ through the whole subtitled movie, or by scanning your transcript for long lines.

b. Make sure your movie is displaying the longest line. On a Mac, option-click the timecode for the longest line. On Windows, ctrl-click the timecode for the longest line.

c. Resize the width of the InqScribe Transcript window so that the text wrapping in the transcript window matches the text wrapping in the movie.

You want to make the window as small as possible while matching the text wrapping.

Your window should look something like this:

Notice how the subtitle wraps at the word “with” and the transcript is also wrapping at “with”. You should check multiple lines (e.g. make sure the “and” on the second line is wrapped correctly as well) to match the wrap of your exported movie as best as you can.

Your transcript window is now a reasonable approximation of the width of the subtitles in your movie. Now you can go through and edit the subtitles as needed, wrapping subtitles to new lines, etc.

It’s important to note that you still need to review all of your subtitles to make sure they are correct as this method will not give you 100% accurate wrapping, but it’ll at least make it easier to identify the problem spots.

Note that the font and size setting for the transcript is not retained with your project. So next time you open it, you’ll need to set the font and size again before you edit. (We’re fixing this in a future release.)

Once you’ve finished editing your subtitles, before you export your subtitles again, you’ll need to change the Source Movie back to your original movie. (Otherwise you’ll end up exporting a movie with two sets of subtitles).

a. Click on the name of your movie in the upper left corner of the screen, right above your movie. (Or select Media→Select Media Source... from the menu).

b. Click on Select File... and select your original source movie.

Now you’re ready to export again and test the results.

If you often need to make subtitles, we suggest the following:

• Set the Preferences for the default transcript font and size to match your usual subtitle settings. This way you won’t have to reset the transcript window’s font and size every time you open the transcript.

• Note which line you used for your reference width. You might copy this line to the top of the transcript and use it to resize the width next time you open the transcript. Future versions of InqScribe will remember the transcript window settings.

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