Apple DVD Studio Pro 4 - Manual (Page 615)

About Subtitles and Closed Captions
Subtitles have several advantages: You can create them within DVD Studio Pro or using
a third-party subtitle authoring application, you can set their font and color, and they can
be displayed by any DVD player. Closed captions offer other advantages.
Subtitles generally provide a text version of the dialogue only—they do not describe any
other sounds that may be in the title (such as a dog barking or a phone ringing). Closed
captions typically include descriptive text along with the dialogue, which makes them
better suited for viewers with impaired hearing.
You can add descriptive text to subtitles and make them more similar to the content of
closed captions, and there are third-party programs that will convert closed captions to
a suitable subtitle format.
Closed captions require a decoder for playback. The decoder can be built in to the
television or it can be a standalone box. Computers typically do not have closed caption
decoders, so they cannot display captions. The font used by closed captions is determined
by the decoder.
Adding Closed Captions to a DVD
With DVD Studio Pro, you can import closed caption files as part of a track. This is the
most reliable way to include closed captions with your title.
Do not assume that just because the closed-captioning information was present in the
video during the MPEG encode that it will be available when the disc is played by the
viewer. Be sure to perform a test before relying on this method of adding closed captions
to your title.
Some MPEG encoders can create separate closed caption files that DVD Studio Pro can
use to add the function to your disc.
DVD Studio Pro supports closed caption files in the “.cc” and “.scc” formats.
615 Chapter 23 Using Advanced Features