ISDCF naming convention issues - Full and Partially subtitled VF’s

[Schmidt]

Hi!

Im currently making a DCP with two subtitle VF’s. and ran into a namning convention puzzle…

Movie has two subtitles:

Subtitle1 is fully texted and in the same language as the audio.

Subtitle2 is partially texted (only subs when spoken parts is other than main language audio).

But now I have two very different subtitles VF’s using the same naming. And it will likely cause confusion trying to differentiate between a fully or partially subtitled VF. Any solution or best practices when it comes to naming?

Thanks

[Carsten]

Well, DCNC/DCP actually has ways to cover this - the problem is, the naming convention is there to help projection staff to make educated decisions, but this often fails when those rare cases have to be tackled.


While both subtitles AND open captions may appear on screen in exactly the same way, the DCP uses different tags to discern both - namely 'MainSubtitle' and 'MainCaption'.

https://files.isdcf.com/papers/ISDCF-Do ... 160211.pdf

You could create DCPs both way, and they would look exactly the same on screen.

The proper way to express this e.g. for an english language movie with french Subtitles and OpenCaptions would be e.g.


TaylorSwiftEras_FTR-1_S_EN-EN-OCAP_51-HI-VI_4K_TSP_20230930_DLX_SMPTE_VF

That clearly tells that this uses OPEN CAPTIONS, whereas

TaylorSwiftEras_FTR-1_S_EN-EN_51-HI-VI_4K_TSP_20230930_DLX_SMPTE_VF

is subtitled. It is generally assumed that subtitle and captions use the same language - at least for the purpose of the naming convention. Clearly, when OCAP is indicated, there can not be subtitles at the sane time.

Technically, it is possible to use different languages for both, or even multiple different languages for CCAPs. But that is beyond the scope of the DCNC to report. Sometimes you can only solve this with an accompanying letter. The DCNC was never meant to clearly define all available options.

Now - DCP-o-matic currently will not let you create 'MainCaption' - however, as MainSubtitle and MainCaption will appear identical, you could still use the differentiation in the naming. It is not 100% correct to create 'MainSubtitle' and name it 'OCAP' - but no server will complain, there is no technical check for compliance AFAIK.

And if you create two VFs and use these methods to tell both apart, you will have to accept that some cinemas will have trouble recognising the difference between the two. Sometimes, they will ask back for advice, sometimes they will ignore the issue and play the wrong VF, sometimes they will learn by trial and error which one to choose.

[Schmidt]

Thanks for your detailed advice and answer!

Both main audio and the two subtitles are same language.

Problem is that while Subtitle1 is fully subtitled for dialog, it is not technically a Caption (since it does not have any descriptions). Naming it OCAP would not be 100% correct, but as you say it would not fail any server.

There might however be some confusion if there are people going to the screening with disability and the projectionist thinks it contains a real OCAP with descriptions

[barber]

A DCNC non-compliant way I used (and seen) several times for such cases :
Subtitle 1 : EN-EN-FULL
Subtitle 2 : EN-EN

A fully compliant way would be to name both EN-EN with different versions (FTR-1 and FTR-2) and joining an accompanying letter for the projectionist.