ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO - Help

1. Getting Started

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO is a professional subtitle editor that supports over 300 subtitle formats. After installation, launch SubtitleEdit.exe to begin.

System Requirements

• Windows 7 / 8 / 10 / 11 (64-bit recommended)
• .NET Framework 4.8 or later
• At least 512 MB RAM
• 50 MB disk space (plus optional components like Tesseract, FFmpeg)

First Launch

On first launch, ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO will set up default settings. You can configure language, video player (MPV recommended), and other options under Options > Settings.

2. Opening Subtitle Files

Use File > Open or drag and drop a subtitle file onto the main window.

Supported Input Methods

• File > Open (Ctrl+O) - Open a subtitle file
• File > Open Video - Open a video to work with
• Drag & Drop - Drop subtitle or video files onto the window
• Recent Files - Quickly access recently opened files

You can also open subtitles embedded in video containers (MKV, MP4) via File > Open Video.

3. Editing Subtitles

The main editing area consists of:

• Subtitle List View - Shows all subtitle lines with number, start time, end time, duration, and text
• Text Editor - Edit the currently selected subtitle text
• Time Controls - Adjust start/end times and duration

Common Operations

4. Video & Synchronization

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO supports video playback for real-time subtitle preview. Recommended video player: MPV (can be downloaded from Settings).

Visual Sync

Use Synchronization > Visual Sync to align subtitles with video by setting two sync points.

Adjust All Times

Use Synchronization > Adjust All Times (Ctrl+Shift+A) to shift all subtitle times by a fixed amount.

Point Sync

Use Synchronization > Point Sync for multi-point synchronization when subtitles drift over time.

5. Supported Formats

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO supports 300+ subtitle formats including:

And many more! See File > Save As for the full list of supported output formats.

6. Spell Check & Fix Common Errors

Spell Check

Use Tools > Spell Check (Ctrl+Shift+P) to check spelling. Hunspell dictionaries can be downloaded for many languages.

Fix Common Errors

Use Tools > Fix Common Errors (Ctrl+Shift+F) to automatically fix issues like:

• Empty lines and overlapping times
• Missing periods and incorrect casing
• OCR errors (0/O, l/I confusion)
• Dialog formatting (dash placement)
• Hearing impaired text removal

7. Translation

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO supports multiple translation engines:

• Google Translate - via API key
• DeepL - via API key
• LibreTranslate - open source, self-hosted
• OpenAI / ChatGPT - AI-powered translation
• Ollama - local AI models

Access via Auto-translate > Auto-translate... (Ctrl+Shift+G)

8. OCR (Optical Character Recognition)

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO can convert image-based subtitles (Blu-ray SUP, DVD VobSub) to text using OCR engines:

• Tesseract 5 - Open source OCR engine (recommended)
• Tesseract 3.02 - Legacy OCR engine
• nOCR - Built-in character recognition with learning
• Binary image compare - Pattern matching

The OCR dialog includes tools for correcting misrecognized characters and building custom dictionaries.

9. Text to Speech

Generate audio from subtitle text using various TTS engines:

• Piper - Fast, local neural TTS
• ElevenLabs - High-quality AI voices
• Azure TTS - Microsoft Cognitive Services
• AllTalk - Local TTS server

10. Keyboard Shortcuts

All shortcuts can be customized under Options > Settings > Shortcuts.

11. Waveform / Audio Visualizer

The waveform view shows the audio track and allows visual timing of subtitles. Toggle it with Ctrl+W.

Features

• Drag subtitle boundaries to adjust timing visually
• Generate waveform from video (requires FFmpeg)
• Shot change detection and display
• Spectrogram view
• Zoom in/out with mouse wheel

12. Networking (Collaborative Editing)

Multiple users can edit the same subtitle file simultaneously over a network.

• Networking > Start new session - Host a collaborative editing session
• Networking > Join session - Connect to an existing session

13. Command Line Options

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO can be used from the command line for batch processing:

14. Linux

ESOFT SUBTITLE STUDIO can run on Linux using Mono or .NET.

Requirements

• Mono 5.0+ or .NET 6+
• libmpv - For video playback (sudo apt install libmpv-dev)
• libvlc - Alternative video player (sudo apt install vlc)
• FFmpeg - For waveform generation (sudo apt install ffmpeg)

Running on Linux

Using Mono:

mono SubtitleEdit.exe

If you encounter video playback issues, ensure libmpv or libvlc is installed. You can configure the video player under Options > Settings > Video Player.

15. FAQ

Q: How do I download FFmpeg?

A: Go to Options > Settings > General and click "Download FFmpeg". It will be downloaded and configured automatically.

Q: How do I change the subtitle format?

A: Use the format dropdown in the toolbar, or go to File > Save As and select the desired format.

Q: Can I edit Blu-ray subtitles?

A: Yes! Open a .sup file, use OCR to convert to text, edit, and save in your desired format.

Q: How do I report a bug or request a feature?

A: Email us at support@esoftsolutions.co.in