InqScribe creates subtitled movies by generating a specially formatted text file and asking QuickTime to convert it to a QuickTime movie. This process is actually done twice during export: first, to figure out the overall dimensions of the subtitles, and later, to produce the final version.

This error message means that InqScribe asked QuickTime to convert the file to a movie and QuickTime couldn’t. This may happen because there are duplicate time codes in the transcript, or time codes not in chronological order: QuickTime is picky about those things.

This error can also occur if you are using square brackets [like this] for things other than time codes. While InqScribe understands that something like “[a:]” is not a time code, QuickTime can get confused, and we rely on QuickTime to do the fundamental conversion from text to a movie. So the best workaround – although obviously not ideal – is to make sure you’re not using square brackets in transcripts that you plan to convert to subtitles.