Guide to convert PGS subtitles to idx/sub subtitles in osx

[kharder]

Hi,

I have found much useful information at this forum, so now it's time to bring my contribution. This is my first guide, so be nice...

I am using Plex mediacenter and want to have subtitles on my bluray rips. The problem is that there is no software at the moment which supports PGS subtitles, unless you want to try using svn or nightly builds etc. which does not always work.

To convert the subtitles from PGS to idx/sub in osx without the need for Windows, you need to download two applications. The first is mkvtoolnix >3.3.0 (http://jonthn.free.fr/MKVtoolnix/) and the other is BDsup2sub.jar (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=145277).

Here is how to do it.
1. Open the mkv file in mkvtoolnix, and look for the subtitles. The line begines with "S_HDMV/PGS (ID x, type: subtitles)". You have to click on them to get the language. Remember the IDs for the subtitles you want to convert.

2. In the terminal, go to where your mkvs are saved and write "/Applications/Mkvtoolnix.app/Contents/MacOS/mkvextract tracks "the name of your mkv" "the subtitle ID":"the name of your mkv.sup".

3. When the subtitles have been extracted, close the terminal and open BDsup2sub.jar.

4. When you load the .sup subtitles, you will get a box where you only need to click ok. Now save the subtitles and use the name of your mkv again.

Now you will see the subtitles when you play the mkvs.

[mrbass]

Yes this is way to do it and was gonna write a guide doing it this way. However, still waiting to see if PGS subs are going to be supported by WD TV live player for instance like the new VLC player and others. If so then no need for this method but this is easiest way to do it without using Windows as of last few months. Or of course finding SRT on the internet and downloading it and muxing it in with the mkv or when using handbrake.

[icedtrip]

Good guide, and you are correct about Plex. XBMC has PGS support in their nightlies, and VLC has it too (both using a more updated ffmpeg version with support).

For Plex, I opened a ticket for this. Visit the below thread and Plex lighthouse ticket. Post a message to the forum showing you want PGS support, and "watch" the lighthouse ticket. This helps keep it on their radar.

Thread:
http://forums.plexapp.com/index.php?/to ... ur-support

Ticket:
https://plexapp.lighthouseapp.com/proje ... as-support

[tdtran1025]

How did you demux the PGS? All I could do is to select a particular PGS track and tell it to save where, but the file is saved as mka and BDSUp2Sub can't read it. Unlike the Windows counterpart, which has an excellent GUI interface called MKVCleaver that slpits all the PGS select tracks into individual sup files.
I am at a loss here. If I could figure out how to extract individual PGS track into sup files, I am home free. No more switching between OSX and Windows.

[tdtran1025]

kharder wrote:
"2. In the terminal, go to where your mkvs are saved and write "/Applications/Mkvtoolnix.app/Contents/MacOS/mkvextract tracks "the name of your mkv" "the subtitle ID":"the name of your mkv.sup"."
If you please elaborate on this. Much appreciated!

[icedtrip]

kharder wrote:
"2. In the terminal, go to where your mkvs are saved and write "/Applications/Mkvtoolnix.app/Contents/MacOS/mkvextract tracks "the name of your mkv" "the subtitle ID":"the name of your mkv.sup"."
If you please elaborate on this. Much appreciated!

First, this assumes Mkvtoolnix is installed in you main Applications directory. Applications in OS X are not much more than just folders that contain executables, localization files, etc. In this case, we need to call the executable "mkvextract" from within the application "Mkvtoolnix.app." In reality, you could copy mkvextract from this location wherever you want and use it.

Here is the breakdown for step 2 if you have a movie named batman.mkv that has a PGS subtitle with ID "1" as discovered in the "ID x" portion from step 1. This assumes batman.mkv is located on your desktop. The commands are case-sensitive.

1. Go to your desktop in terminal using the below command, substituting "username" with your user name:

Code: Select all

cd /Users/username/Desktop/

2. Extract subtitle track using the below command:

Code: Select all

/Applications/Mkvtoolnix.app/Contents/MacOS/mkvextract tracks batman.mkv 1:batman.sup

What this does is extract only the subtitle track (in .sup format) from the MKV for processing in BDsup2sub.

[dpstjp]

You should try a programme called iMKVExtract (an MKVExtract GUI), very quick at extracting chapter files (so I can add the actual names of the chapters of the DVD if they exist) and subtitle files from MKVs.

[dpstjp]

I couldn't get BDSup2sub.jar 4.0 to work on my Mac (running Lion). It told me the file was corrupted. The previous version works fine, though.