Help Identifying Narration Track

[moviefan]

Hi,

My issue is with the "Bad Words" Blu-Ray, but I would imagine the solution would apple to any DVD with a Director's Narration track.

I am trying to create an MKV version of the movie "Bad Words" using Makemkv. I really only want the Stereo version with Subtitles. But when I deselect boxes with mixes and languages I don't want. subseqent playback always contains the Director's narration over the dialogue. My question is, how do I identify this track in order to deselect it?

Thanks in advance!

[Radiocomms237]

Typically, the commentary track will be the only track that is in stereo, I'd guess that the main movie soundtracks are all surround as there aren't that many discs that offer the choice these days.

If you really want only stereo audio then you would need to rip the file with the surround sound track intact (generally the first track in the list), then extract it, convert it back to 2 channels, then remux it back into the file, setting it as the default audio track.

There are many pitfalls in that little operation though, not the least of which would be re-syncing the audio with the video. And whichever software you use to do the audio conversion would need to process the surround channels correctly (IE. keeping the LF & RF channels, but also dividing the center & rear (& any other) channels and merging them into the front channels).

You would also have to take into account the dynamic range, which is generally much lower on a stereo track. Otherwise the dialogue, which is usually the center speaker's output, may be very low in volume compared to all the explosions and such?

Most players these days will do all that for you "on-the-fly" if they detect only two speakers, is there any particular reason you have to have stereo audio only?

[moviefan]

Thanks for the detailed reply! Extremely helpful.

The intended stereo only rip will be for playback on a laptop using stereo headphones, and will be condensed down using handbrake to make it a bit more portable. I thought ripping the 5.1 soundtrack would result in too large of a file size.

I will try with the 5.1 and test.

Thanks again!

[Radiocomms237]

Generally speaking, the video track(s) account for the bulk of the .mkv file's size.

I haven't actually done the exercise but I'd say the difference between a 5 channel surround and 2 channel stereo audio track would be almost inconsequential. You could make a far greater impact on the file size by using different audio codecs/compression/bit rates/etc., depending on the quality required of course.

I don't use Handbrake so can't really comment, but it wouldn't surprise me if there is an option to convert audio tracks built-in? Hopefully someone who knows the software will chime in.

There are a lot of headphones around now (mostly for gaming) that will actually make use of surround sound tracks too, they're not as 'spatial' as a proper home theatre system but far better than those old-fashioned stereo headphones.

[moviefan]

Thanks so much. Your explanation really explained the situation well. And you were also correct in that the 5.1 didn't add appreciably much to the size the the file. When I ran that mkv file through Handbrake, I was able to select the option to down mix to stereo. Sounds great and in sync. The only part that didn't transfer was the subtitles. But I found the .srt for it online.

Thanks again!

[dcoke22]

The only part that didn't transfer was the subtitles. But I found the .srt for it online.

Handbrake defaults to the .mp4 container, which can not hold subtitles. However, you can get Handbrake to output in a .mkv container and that can hold subtitles.

There's nothing wrong with finding a .srt online (or making your own). Using the .mkv container can save step, however.