Caption Settings
Menu Command: Track | Add Caption or Options | Section Settings or
right-click a caption section
and choose Settings or choose the Settings button in the section's title bar.
A caption is any text shown in the video. It can be a single, stationary word or sentence or a long list of credits that
scroll during the end of a movie.
Use Caption Settings to:
- Edit the text, font, size, alignment, layout, etc.
- Set the display time
- Set the resolution
- Set the section's title bar colour
- Change the scrolling direction
Use Video Effects to add shadows, glows, or fades to the text.
- Caption text
- Enter text into the large black window. Editing feature are similar
to other text editing software. The font size, face, and justification can be
changed. Before choosing a font size, it is important to set
the resolution height first. The font size is scaled based on to the resolution.
If the font size is 0.10, then the font will be 10% of the screen
height. If the resolution is 540, the font will be 54 pixels high. Usually the
resolution height should be set to the same height as the final video.
The controls on the right side set layouts, rows, columns, margins,
background colour, and vertical alignment. The background colour is transparent initially.
Vertical and horizontal alignment control the alignment of the text within the columns and rows.
If one column contains more text than another, the vertical alignment controls how the text of
the shorter column is aligned. Add a Position effect to the section if you need to adjust the position of all the text on the screen (such as a ticker along the bottom).
- Display time
- The display time specifies the length of time
that the caption is shown on the video screen. It also controls
how fast the text will scroll, if scrolling is enabled. The entire caption
is scrolled over the given length of time.
- Title bar colour
- Sets the colour of the section's title bar. Use the font colour picker near the top to change the colour of the text.
- Resolution
- These set the level of detail used to draw the text. Use
higher numbers for smoother text. For best quality, these
should be set to the width and height of the final video.
The values should be set before adding any caption text since the size
of the text changes with these values.
- Scrolling
- This sets the scrolling direction for the text. If set
to None, the text will not be scrolled. Up
scrolling is useful for showing credits at the end of a
movie. Left scrolling is useful for showing a
"ticker" along the bottom of the screen. Use Video Effects
to adjust the position of the caption to the bottom of the screen.
Zoom
Changes the zoom level of the text editor to make it easier to enter text or see the entire width of the caption. This
setting does not change how the caption appears when played in VideoMeld. It only changes the area
shown in the editor window. When working with HD captions that are 1920 pixels wide, setting the zoom to "Fit" or less than
100% allows the entire width of the caption to be displayed in the editor.
Background colour
Sets the background colour for the caption preview to make editing dark or light text easier. This setting is used
only within the Caption editor and does not change the background colour of the text when the project is played or
melded. Use the Background colour setting on the
right side to change the actual background colour of the text.
See Also
Crossfade Video
Video Editing Basics
Video Effects