Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
recently launched captions feature.
Users should be able to write their captions online while logged into
youtube. The upload option should still be there but it would be
easier to have an online editor to add captions. There could be
options for people to enter captions in english,spanish etc. They
could tick the language boxes that they enter text in so on the
youtube player caption button only the captions languages that the
person typed in will be able to be chosen.
There should be a range of caption designs with different
borders,fonts,colors etc. Like a normal rectangle box with a black
background with white text, and another design of a wide star shaped
box like they have in cartoons when someone gets punched.
The captions should be able to be positioned just under the middle of
the video and also near the bottom of the screen.
There should also be a caption news ticker type thing like CNN etc
have at the bottom of their screen. But instead of the captions
scrolling, they could just be appearing.
The default language should always be set to ENGLISH.
When users upload videos to youtube, there should be a "language"
category, and the default language should be set to English, then
there should be a drop-down box that lists all the other languages
like turkish,swedish etc.
P.S
Can you please add a "SEXY" category so when users upload videos of
bikini contests etc they can choose this category. And add this
'SEXY'
category to the categories on the left hand side of this
page:www.youtube.com/browse?s=mp
> Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> recently launched captions feature.
Thanks for adding the captions option. I have not used this yet
because I have been using the Annotations as my captions. From what I
read we need to purchase our own captioning software and then upload
the file to make it work. That sounds cool and who knows one day
YouTube might offer this service. Still, I like the annotations
because I can use them without the need to purchase software. I have
attracted many new deaf viewers to my channel and currently I am
annotating my older videos. I love YouTube and keep the great new
ideas comming. This is why YouTube is the online video leader.
> Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> recently launched captions feature.
You don't actually need special software to create closed captions: a
text editor will do fine. It's just a lot easier and less error-prone
with special software.
I think it's a great idea, and a boon for those of us who actually
post in two different languages. I haven't tried it yet, but am
certainly going to experiment when I have the time.
It might be a good idea to make a bit more obvious that captions/
subtitles are available, and how to turn them on. Right now, you have
to know that the little pointy-up arrow indicates that captions are
available, and four separate clicks are required to turn captions on
and select a language -- more if you're not fast enough and the menu
closes up again.
And now for my famed nit-pickiness. The German translator translated
"captions" as "Zwischentitel", which is the definition you may find in
a dictionary. However, technically, "Zwischentitel" actually means
"intertitle", which is an entirely different thing altogether. I think
the confusion set in because in everyday speech, "caption" can be used
to refer to any kind of subtitle or intertitle, or the translator was
struggling to differentiate between "captions" and "subtitles" in
German. However, there is no difference in German: "Untertitel" is the
word used regardless of what language they're in. In fact, this
translation error makes a whole nonsense of the German "Captions /
Subtitles definition" page.
hi, you don't require to purchase any software. Go to this page:
[ http://www.urusoft.net/products.php?lang=1 ], and download "Subtitle
workshop". It's freeware, and what I use...
I used annotations before the captions feature came in (and was
greatful for), but I wanted subtitles, and using YouTubes captions
featured proved extremely time consuming.
> Thanks for adding the captions option. I have not used this yet
> because I have been using the Annotations as my captions. From what I
> read we need to purchase our own captioning software and then upload
> the file to make it work. That sounds cool and who knows one day
> YouTube might offer this service. Still, I like the annotations
> because I can use them without the need to purchase software. I have
> attracted many new deaf viewers to my channel and currently I am
> annotating my older videos. I love YouTube and keep the great new
> ideas comming. This is why YouTube is the online video leader.
> On Sep 4, 10:22 am, YouTube Timmy wrote:
> > Hi guys,
> > Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> > YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> > recently launched captions feature.
> hi, you don't require to purchase any software. Go to this page:
> [http://www.urusoft.net/products.php?lang=1], and download "Subtitle
> workshop". It's freeware, and what I use...
> I used annotations before the captions feature came in (and was
> greatful for), but I wanted subtitles, and using YouTubes captions
> featured proved extremely time consuming.
> Hope this helps,
> Kurtis
> On Sep 5, 11:00 am, HappyCabbie wrote:
> > Thanks for adding the captions option. I have not used this yet
> > because I have been using the Annotations as my captions. From what I
> > read we need to purchase our own captioning software and then upload
> > the file to make it work. That sounds cool and who knows one day
> > YouTube might offer this service. Still, I like the annotations
> > because I can use them without the need to purchase software. I have
> > attracted many new deaf viewers to my channel and currently I am
> > annotating my older videos. I love YouTube and keep the great new
> > ideas comming. This is why YouTube is the online video leader.
> > On Sep 4, 10:22 am, YouTube Timmy wrote:
> > > Hi guys,
> > > Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> > > YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> > > recently launched captions feature.
OK, a few small issues. I experimented with the SubRip format, which I
created myself in Notepad.
1. One important piece of information missing from the help pages is
that YouTube requires the caption index number for each caption:
without that, the file is rejected. The correct format would be:
Index number
Time codes
Text
Blank line
2. Couldn't the lines be longer? Generally speaking, two lines of text
is the maximum, because it takes a significant amount of time to go
from the end of one line to the beginning of the next, especially with
centred (or, incidentally, right-justified or ltr languages) text.
3. A strange bug: If I put a comma at the end of any line except the
last, the comma is doubled, like this:
First line,
next line.
Is displayed as:
First line,,
next line.
4. The timing is slightly off. The titles appear several frames
earlier than specified.
Here are the fruits of my labours, if anyone's interested:
the closed captions on the embedded player is not listing the
different language captions. It just shows blank options. Also the
Youtube logo is cut off.
This example video has captions in five different languages but the
caption menu shows blank...
> Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> recently launched captions feature.
Here's an annoying niggle for anyone not using the English language
interface.
When uploading a file, you choose the language it's in from a drop-
down menu. This is arranged with "English" at the top, and all the
other languages in alphabetical order. So far so good.
But if I use a different language YouTube interface -- German, say --
the language names in the drop-down list are translated, but they're
still listed in the same order. That is, in alphabetical order of
their English translations.
So, while in English part of the list goes:
Byelorussian
Cambodian
Catalan
Chinese
Corsican
Croatian
Czech
Danish
Dutch
> OK, a few small issues. I experimented with the SubRip format, which I
> created myself in Notepad.
> 1. One important piece of information missing from the help pages is
> that YouTube requires the caption index number for each caption:
> without that, the file is rejected. The correct format would be:
> Index number
> Time codes
> Text
> Blank line
> 2. Couldn't the lines be longer? Generally speaking, two lines of text
> is the maximum, because it takes a significant amount of time to go
> from the end of one line to the beginning of the next, especially with
> centred (or, incidentally, right-justified or ltr languages) text.
> 3. A strange bug: If I put a comma at the end of any line except the
> last, the comma is doubled, like this:
> First line,
> next line.
> Is displayed as:
> First line,,
> next line.
> 4. The timing is slightly off. The titles appear several frames
> earlier than specified.
> Here are the fruits of my labours, if anyone's interested:
In Navigation. I think instead of (more) you should have arrows
pointing up and down. Generally, down would mean "more" and up would
mean going back to the previous choices.
The arrows would be placed so: down would be in the very bottom of the
list and up would obviously be in the very top. Also, if you are in
the very top or bottom of the menu, the correct arrow would become
inactive (grey).
I think that one OBVIOUS thing that should be there would be a
possibility for the video owner to enable captions on certain video by
default. The captions can play an important role in the video, and
users usually dont understand turning them on.
> 4. The timing is slightly off. The titles appear several frames
> earlier than specified.
I've found out why that is. I thought the time code was in the format
Hours:Minutes:Seconds,Frames. It's not: it's
Hours:Minutes:Seconds,Milliseconds. So a time code like 00:00:10,24 is
actually 10.024 seconds, not almost 11 seconds, as I'd expected.
Personally , I find captions annoying to videos posted ... I came to
watch the video ...not be interrupted by someones cute or '
informative ' opinions ...
But , that's not why I'm here ; I was disgusted when I saw an
advert . using this service over the lower part of the video ...
COME ON YOUTUBE !
There are much better ways to have advertisers on your site without
destroying the quality of posted videos ...
As a deaf user, I want to say congratulations on the new subtitling
feature - it has just opened up a whole new spectrum for me. I have
just had a wonderful time watching The Guild episodes!
I do have a couple of suggestions however:
1. Can you please add the "Type" filter to the Advanced Search box.
2. Can you please provide some way to have the "Type" filter (and
perhaps other filters too) to persist between SIMPLE searches. I
just want to set a few filters once only, and then just be able to
keep typing new search phrases in the search field, without having to
click into the advanced search every time. This seems to me a very
common user scenario.
Excellent work so far, looking forward to seeing the future of this!
I think you should do like dotsub.com. Over there if you want you can
let other users to add the subtitles to your video and translate them
in other languages.
I agree with mykoro76 - I am also a deaf user and I am very excited
to see captions on these YouTube videos....
HOWEVER, I believe that the captions should be available on the video
itself before a user is allowed to post a video with "Closed
Captioned" in the title or description - I looked up "Type: Closed
Captions" in order to find all of these wonderful videos with closed
captions, and the first few I found had NO captioned feature available
at all. There is no reason to be posting a video and advertising it
as "Closed Captioned" when there are none! It is misleading and
leads to more frustration among those who are searching for the "real
closed captioned" videos.
I think the Closed Captions are absolutely great.
It helps me attract a way bigger audience, since people from all over
the world can now understand my videos, even if they can't understand
English.
However, making the captions is quite frustrating.
I agree with Whizz4u. You should be able to write them online while
logged into YouTube.
I use the programme recommended by YouTube: Subtitle Workshop.
It's free and easy to use. However, the captions made in that
programme appear different on YouTube than they do on the programme
itself.
For instance, I get nice clear 2 lines of text on Subtitle Workshop,
but 3 or sometimes even 4 lines on YouTube. And some lines only
contain 1 word!
It's very frustrating to keep fixing this, re-uploading the subtitles,
checking them again, editing them again, re-uploading, checking ect.
ect. It's very time-consuming.
Especially when you plan om making subtitles in multiple languages.
(for instance, I make them in German, Dutch, French, English and
Norwegian)
I don't want my closed captions to be 3 or 4 lines, because it makes
the text it's acting as a subtitle for harder to read, sometimes it
has them overlap. And I don't want to change my videos.
I guess I have to keep doing it this way but it would be great if
you'd try out Whizz4u's idea.
That would sure make things a lot easier.
It would be great if you could also add subtitles to other's videos
cause its very likely you want to translate something really cool you
see into your own language.
So there could be Subs by CREATOR and subs by OTHER USERS specifying
all the languages available... Additionally subtitles could be rated
and commented on. Users who upload subtitles could also collect a
"subber" rating (rating as an author of subtitles i mean).
> Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> recently launched captions feature.
Yes I agree. I was going to suggest the same thing.
There are many movies on YouTube that doesn't have subtitles but I can
download the SRT files from various sites. It would be nice if I had
the option of adding and viewing the subtitles on OTHER USERS' videos.
Maybe, I can even add the subtitles for other deaf and hard of hearing
viewers, providing that I get permission from users and YouTube.
I would like to have subtitles without downloading a program. Just
like annotations, I would like to make my subtitles on YouTube in my
language and for Google Translate (every single thing on YouTube is
Google now) to translate it automatically into all available
languages.
That would encourage users to add subtitles.
Also I would like to open up the list of available subtitles for that
video using an annotation with "CC" text. Not everyone would know to
click the arrow and then click CC. Linking to the menu would be
awesome.
I am enjoying the new captions (subtitles) feature enourmously. As
well as the
critical advantges for the deaf and hard of hearing, and the
internationalisation
effect...
I am a language teacher and I think that it will be a great help to
language
learners to see subtitles, both in the target language and their own.
Suggestions
1) Please put the subtitles in the black border around the
"letterbox"
When the uploaded video is letter boxing, because it is in HD format,
and there is
an area of black below the video then please put the subtitles in the
black
border below rather than put them over the video area.
2) VisualSubSync *Open Source* Freesoft
I tried Subtitle Workshop and it is very good but VisSubSync is even
better because
it shows a picture of the sound waveform which really helps with
timings. It is also
free software. This is the homepage
http://www.visualsubsync.org/ It also has the advantage of being Open Source Software, unlike
Software Workshop
which could become commercial software in subsequent versions. Anyway
to all subtitlers,
I really recommend it.
3) A Subtitling Forum
One of the advantages of Subtitle Workshop over VisSubSync is that the
former has
a forum, where I started a thread on Subtitling for Youtube
http://www.urusoft.net/forum/viewtopic.php?id=5648 Subtitling is quite technical and there is a lot of room for
cooperation so I would be
grateful of the creation of a caption/subtitling group here.
4) A text link and URL for subtitled videos
As rewboss points out the way to turn on captions with the up arrow
and "cc" is
far from apparent. So, could we have a text link to subtitles too,
perhaps in the
expanded details area with the names of the languages underneath a
heading?
That way we could send people a link to a subtitled video and not have
to tell
them how to turn subtitles on. I am thinking of something along the
lines of "&cc=1"
And as kasvayksin says, it is important to be able to set subtitles by
default.
5) Change subtitles without changing interface language (shugdenwss
says this too)
At the moment the subtitles follow the interface language. The Youtube
interface
laguage is notoriously difficult to set (it wanders). While language
learners may
want to see subtitles in another (the video) language, they may not
want to change
their Youtube GUI language. If text links were integrated or even if
not, it would
be nice to be able to set the subtitle language independent of the
quit language.
I am thinking of something along the lines of "&hl=en&cc=ja" for
Japanese subtitles
on an English language interface.
6) Two sets of subtitles.
This is something for the future but, for language learners it would
be nice to
be able to display two sets of subtitles at once. This would be
possible especially
if the ability to use the black border around letter boxed high vision
were possible
(see 1 above) with one set of subtitles above the video and another
set below.
7) Subtitle Horse online subtitling
As whizz4u has said on this thread, it would be nice to be able to
make subtitles online
This is possible at the web page
http://subtitle-horse.org/ Perhaps you could either buy this organisation! Or add similar
functionality to Youtube.
8) Subtitle new line a bit too frequent.
The Youtube subtitle line length is very short and goes onto two lines
too frequently,
more than both Subtitle Workshop and VisualSubSync. As someone else
says on this
thread, it would be nice if Youtube followed one of these two software
packages,
ideally the latter. But in any event, please make the subtitle line
length a bit longer.
9) Subtitling competion
To increase awareness of the feature how about a subtitling competion?
10) Subtitles from others
As Philoinfo and the DeafAlien say, if the video owner allows it, the
ability to upload
subtitles on other people's videos and to ask for subtitles to be
uploaded on one
own videos. Sure this can be abused but so can comments.
11) Text with autotiming
As RabdonFilms says, text would be cool. Subtitle Workshop offers the
ability to
load text and then set timings accordign to millisecond per word,
character or
perhaps line. Then people could just use textfiles for simple
subtitles, one line
per subtitle.
12) Translation!
Lathermiah's suggestion of google translations of subtitles is
excellent! Thank
you Lathermiah.
Subtitling chaning Youtube for the better. Thank you Youtube.
The new captions feature is great, but I have a suggestion for you to
improve the new Audio Swap feature. It would be really great if we
could browse and add our own audio track (from our computer). Please,
could you do this? It's really important for me. Please!!!!!
> Since many of you have been offering some great feedback about
> YouTube, we would like to ask if you have any thoughts about our
> recently launched captions feature.
