capblaster
[updated 2011-01-29]
capblaster (currently released as beta version 0.81) is a Web app that adds live captioning (aka subtitling) features to VidBlaster (a state-of-the-art live video production tool). See below for screen shots.
This is a small project, that hopefully will do some big things when it comes to captioning/subtitling of livecasts.
An installation package is available as capblaster_v081.zip, containing the files to be installed in any web directory.
Read this carefully before you try the app!
The current version is released ”as is”. We take no responsability for its functioning or anything that might happen to the user’s computer. VidBlaster does not (yet as of v 1.21) support Web sockets, therefore the user must have Java installed, and bypass the security warnings (about insecure/unsigned certificates). Recommended browsers are Chrome, Safari and Firefox.
Ready to try?
Read the above, then go to capblaster.org (the password for saved subtitle files is ”capBlast43″)
We appreciate all comments and feedback, please send them to feedback@capblaster.org.
Features and limitations
capblaster is (currently):
- free to use (with VidBlaster, note the Broadcast version is required)
- requires the captioner(s) to be located at the live production site
- limited to open captions/subtitles (mixed into the video signal)
- handles national characters (utf-8) only from VidBlaster v1.22 and upwards)
- logs captions in the SubRip format only
- released as open source
Known issues
- The logged times drift slowly away from the actual time in the video (can be fixed afterwords with SubTitle Workshop 2.5.1).
We are looking into this problem.
Some background information about the project can be found in LiveCaptionApp-spec2.pdf. See Wikipedia for more about Subtitles, closed/open captions and the SubRip format.
If you require closed captions, multi language support, and remote captioning, you might find SubPLY’s live captons services useful.
Credits
- Richard Gatarski (idea and project management)
- Peter Nguyen (programming)
- The Swedish Post and Telecommunications Agency, PTS (financial support).
Screen shots
