Published: November 30, 2021 | Last Updated: September 13, 2024
Closed captions and subtitles are similar in presentation but different in use. Both show the text of spoken words or sounds on screen.
This is not to be confused with graphics like MOGRT templates or other kinds of text that will appear on screen.
This article will explain the differences between closed captions and subtitles and how to create, edit, import, and export closed captions and subtitles from Premiere Pro.
If you’re new to Premiere Pro, I suggest you first look at Best Free Beginner Tutorials For Learning Premiere Pro Fast.
Closed captions vs. subtitles
As mentioned above, closed captions and subtitles are used to show spoken words or to display important sounds.
The main difference between closed captions and subtitles is that subtitles are used when another language is spoken on screen, while closed captions are used throughout an entire video or film.
For example, most films produced in the United States are spoken in English. However, some films may have selected scenes that were filmed in a foreign country.
The filmmakers can present those scenes in English or that country’s native language.
Subtitles would be used to translate the foreign language into English subtitles so the audience understands what is being said. The subtitles would be presented on the screen as those words are spoken.
Closed captions are like subtitles but are presented throughout the film or video. Their purpose is to make the film or video accessible to people who are deaf or hard of hearing.
The words are presented for the entire duration of the film or video. However, closed captions are not natively burned into a video like subtitles. “Burned in” means the titles are on the final exported video.
Closed captions require a separate file to be imported wherever the video is presented.
The most common closed caption file is the SubRip Subtitle .srt file, but there are a few others. This article will use the .srt file format because it is the most common.
Open Captions are the same as closed captions; however, the captions are burned into the video. We won’t be focusing on Open Captions in this article, but knowing about their existence is important.
Let’s look at creating a subtitle and closed caption file in Premiere.
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How to create a subtitle or closed caption file
Subtitles are simple because you can create a general text file. This is the easiest method of displaying a subtitle on screen, so I recommend it. However, you can use this next method to create both.
Creating closed captions is also simple inside Premiere. First, we will want to work inside Premiere’s designated Captions workspace. Go to Window > Workspaces > Captions.
On the left side of the screen, you’ll notice three options for captions: Transcribe sequence, Create a new caption track, or Import captions from the file. In this section, we will focus on the first two.
Transcribe sequence
Recent Premiere updates have included the ability to transcribe a sequence automatically into captions with machine learning.
This method isn’t perfect, but it will improve with future updates. Once you select this option, a popup window will appear.
Your selected sequence should appear in the top section along with the sequence length.
The following section allows you to customize the captions. You can select clips labeled Dialogue or clips on a specific audio track.
Note clips labeled Dialogue will need to be labeled as such in the Audio workspace. This article won’t focus on this aspect, but here is a brief explanation. Go to Window > Workspaces > Audio.
The Essential Audio panel will appear on the right side of your screen. You can tag selected clips as either Dialogue, Music, SFX, or Ambience, as shown in the Essential Sound panel. You can label the clips as Dialogue and then use those specific clips for your captions.
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Back to the captions, the following section you can adjust is the language.
The number of languages is limited to English (US and UK), Simplified or Traditional Chinese, Spanish, German, French, Japanese, Portuguese, Korean, Italian, Russian, and Hindi.
More languages will most likely come with future updates.
You can then choose whether the transcription should only happen between the in and out points, whether to merge the output with an existing transcription, and whether Premiere should recognize when multiple speakers are talking.
Once you are happy with the selections, select transcribe, and Premiere will begin transcribing the sequence. Once completed, a transcript will appear in the Captions window, and separate captions will appear on the sequence.
The captions are easy to edit. Simply click on the box in the Transcript window and correct any invalid captions.
In the essential graphics panel, you can also change the text styles, such as the font, size, and color.
You can also change the timing of the caption directly on the sequence. Click and drag the clip’s head or tail end until you are satisfied with the placement.
Again, you can use this method to create subtitles as well. Use the option of transcribing between a specific in and out point on your sequence.
Create new caption track
Creating a new caption track is a bit more complicated. This option will bring up a popup window with a few different options.
The first and main option is the Format. Although all of the options could be an article in themselves, we will stick with the standard for closed captions.
The current standard is CEA-708, and we will use Stream Service 1. We will make no changes to the Style as there are none.
To create a new caption, hit the Add new captions segment button in the photo below.
This will add a new caption similar to what we’ve seen with the auto-captioning used previously.
The Essential Graphics panel will be displayed on the right side of the screen. Here, we can adjust the caption’s placement, type, color, font, etc.
To create another caption, right-click on the current caption and select Create caption after. Repeat for all captions.
As described earlier, You can manually adjust the captions’ timing directly on the sequence.
Importing a caption file
As mentioned earlier, .srt files are the standard close caption files. These files can be created outside Premiere in other captioning software or with an online service such as Rev.com.
Select Import captions from file. Locate your .srt file in the import window.
The New caption track window will appear. You will have the option to select the Format, Stream, and Style just as if you were creating a new caption track yourself. You also have the option of selecting the Start Point of the caption.
Once imported, you can adjust the captions’ text, timing, and formatting just as with the other methods.
How to export closed captions and subtitles
The two primary methods for exporting closed captions or subtitles are burning them directly into the video or creating a separate sidecar file.
Subtitles more commonly have the text directly burned into the video. You won’t have to do anything differently using a regular text file, but there are a few extra steps if you use the closed caption method.
Burned in titles
Go to the Premiere’s export screen by hitting the keyboard shortcut Mac CMD+M or Windows CTRL+M.
Check out our guide to Premiere Pro shortcuts [PC/Mac].
Select your desired video settings. Select the Captions tab near the center of your screen.
The first option is Export Options, which includes a dropdown menu. You can pick None for no captioning, Create a sidecar file for creating a .srt sidecar file, or Burn Captions Into Video. We will choose Burn Captions Into Video.
Export like normal. The subtitles should appear in the video. This same method can be applied if you create an Open Caption file.
Sidecar .srt file
To create the .srt file, follow the same process as above. Replace Burn Captions Into Video with Create Sidecar file. Export the video like normal. Once complete, you should see both the video file and .srt file in the export folder.
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Why adding subtitles and captions is important for Social Media
Adding subtitles or closed captions is an important step in any video production, especially if you’re creating content for online use today, such as YouTube vlogs or social media ads.
Much content is consumed online in public places or on public transport without sound. To get your message through, it’s often a good idea to add subtitles or closed captions to your video content.
Conclusion
Closed captions and subtitles can be very complex subjects. We only covered the basics as there are many more aspects to both. This article should guide you through the basics of creating both types of files.
The basics are enough for creating YouTube videos or posting films on platforms such as Amazon Prime Video. The complexities emerge when content is posted to broadcast television or movie theaters.
Take your time, learn the basics, and you will be well on your way to adding another important skill to your editing tool bag.
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