This article is basically a guide to help you to download subtitles for various movies that you may have lying around in your home. Subtitles are basically used for movies where you may not understand the dialogues perfectly because of the accent, language, tone and so on. Mostly, subtitles are only given along with DVDs and not the VCD version of movies that you buy. Also, downloading a subtitle is not as easy as 1-2-3.

This is because of the reason that all subtitles are not the same. So, you may end up downloading and using a subtitle which would be totally out of sync with the movie. Thus, you may end up viewing half of the movie and half of the subtitle leaving you in an even confused state. Check out the list of sites to download the best subtitles as well. So, just follow the simple steps and have a wonderful time watching your favorite movies.

Finding and Downloading Subtitles:

• Check and note down if the movie consists of one, two or three CDs.
• Decide upon the language in which you want the subtitles to display. for example, if the movie is in French and the you want English subtitles, then you should be looking for English subtitles alone.
• Then, download this very useful video analysis tool called the GSpot Codec Information Appliance. This nifty tool gives you details about the codecs used in a video file and other details about the file such as frame rate, field rate, file length, audio characteristics and so on.
• Using this application, open the movie file for which you want to download the subtitle for. Usually finding this for 1 CD would be sufficient as the rest would have similar characteristics.
• Now, note down the values in the Frms/sec box. This gives the value of the frame rate of the video. The value is usually 23.976, 25, or 29.976. This plays a vital part in selecting the right subtitle.
• Next, visit one of the sites that I have mentioned in my post about the best subtitle sites.
• Search for the name of the film and the part that you are looking for (1,2 etc.).
• Under the list of subtitles that you get, find the ones with the language that you want.
• Next, look around and select only the subtitles that are the for the exact number of CDs your movie is in. You cannot merge a 3 CD subtitle and use it to view a single, full length file.
• Finally, verify the frame rates of the subtitles that you have shortlisted. It is essential that the frame rate of the subtitle you download and the movie you have is the same.
• Download only the subtitles satisfying all the conditions.

Using the subtitles in your player:

This will most certainly turn out to be a tricky affair. Windows Media Player and Real Player are problematic when trying to use downloaded subtitles. So, I would recommend downloading the VLC Media Player. It is one of the most versatile players around and plays a number of codec formats without additional files.

• Open up VLC media player.
• Go to File->Open.
• Browse and open up the video file
• Then check the box to use the subtitles.
• Unzip the subtitle you’ve downloaded. You will usually find a .srt file. This is your subtitle file. In case of more than 1 CD, you will have the appropriate number of files.
• Now, select the subtitle file corresponding to the CD that you are using.
• Finally click on OK and sit back and enjoy the movie.

If the right subtitle is not available, download one that is similar to the one you are looking for especially the frame rate bit. In VLC, when you are opening the subtitle file you are able to set delays. That is, if the subtitle for a dialogue displays, say, 2 seconds before the dialogue itself, then you can set a delay of +2 and so on.

Also, in case of Sub Rip format of movies, you are able to set the frame rate as well. Remember, in all other cases there would be no effect to this. And most VCDs do not come in such a format. But it may be useful nevertheless.

Do tell me if you liked this post. If you found this post useful consider sharing it, using the buttons below. Please leave your opinions regarding the post as well. Thanks for reading!

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