Tips for Preformatting Transcripts

MAGpie allows the user to import text that will be used for captions. However, spending a little time formatting the text to be imported can save time once you are in MAGpie.

General Formatting

Text is imported into a table in MAGpie. MAGpie determines what information should be imported into a single cell versus what should be broken up into multiple cells based on carriage returns:

A single carriage return is interpreted to mean "go to the next line of this same caption".
A double carriage return is interpreted to mean "create a new caption".

The following example will import into a single cell in MAGpie, which means that it will appear as a single caption, unless further editing is done.

I never saw a purple cow
I never hope to see one.
But I can tell you anyhow
I'd rather see than be one.

This example will import into two captions, each with two lines of text:

I never saw a purple cow
I never hope to see one.

But I can tell you anyhow
I'd rather see than be one.

And this example will import into four captions, each with two lines of text.

I never saw 
a purple cow

I never hope 
to see one.

But I can 
tell you anyhow

I'd rather see 
than be one.

More Tips

Wrapping

Another factor that determines how many lines will appear in each caption is the width of the video. If the video is wide enough for 20 characters of 12 point font, a 25 character line of text will wrap. Carriage returns will still cause a line break in the caption. The example below shows how a pair of two line captions...

I never saw a purple cow
I never hope to see one.

But I can tell you anyhow
I'd rather see than be one.

...will become two four line captions, as below. It is difficult to foretell what wrapping issues may arise, but it is very easy to reformat in MAGpie.

I never saw a 
purple cow
I never hope to see 
one.

But I can tell you 
anyhow
I'd rather see than 
be one.

Clearing a Caption

When dialog is continuous, a caption is usually removed from the screen by a new caption which replaces it. During scenes where there are pauses in the dialog, a caption can remain on the screen long after the corresponding speech is past. The way around this is to insert empty captions. In a text editor, this is accomplished by inserting an extra double-carriage return at the point where a clearing caption is desired. MAGpie will then create an empty caption row to which a timecode can be assigned.

The Last Caption

MAGpie tends to drop the last caption from a text import. Not a huge issue, but avoidable by adding an additional double-carriage return after the last line in the transcript.

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