[MEncoder-users] adding subtitles

[The Wanderer]

Evgeniy Stepanov wrote:

> On Monday 28 August 2006 09:38, Mark Longridge wrote:
> 
>> I looked through the faq and I'm still not sure how to add
>> subtitles but keep the original encoding.
>> 
>> I tried:
>> 
>> mencoder file.mpeg -o file-with-subtitles.mpeg -oac copy -ovc copy -sub subtitle.srt
>> 
>> which didn't add the subtitles. Is there a way to add subtitles and
>> still keep the original encoding?
> 
> Subtitles can be muxed as a separate stream with programs like
> mkvmerge.

Although not into an MPEG container (or an AVI, which is what that
command line actually creates).

Also, embedding "hard" subtitles (burned into the video, rather than
rendered by the player at playback time) cannot be done with -ovc copy,
because it involves altering the video stream. If you want to add
subtitles to a file, you need to either A) mux into a container which
supports soft subtitles (MKV, OGM, NUT, others?) or B) transcode the
video; there are no other options.

(I ignore the alleged abilty to support soft subtitles in AVI, because
it is inherently broken by way of an utterly idiotic design choice by
the person who invented the 'spec'. In any case, MEncoder does not have
the ability to create such files, nor should it.)

-- 
       The Wanderer

Warning: Simply because I argue an issue does not mean I agree with any
side of it.

Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.