Subtitling a Video

Formatting and Corrections

Subtitle formatting (italic, dialogue, position) and automatic corrections.

Formatting

Each subtitle has three formatting options, accessible from the action bar in edit mode or by right-clicking:

Italic — used by convention for sound cues (phone ringing), voiceovers, or inner thoughts. Found in all professional standards.

Dialogue — automatically adds a dialogue dash (- ) at the beginning of each line. Toggling dialogue on or off updates the text instantly, no need to add dashes manually.

Example:

- Where are we going?
- To the movies.

Position — toggles the subtitle between bottom (default) and top of the screen. Useful when an important visual element occupies the bottom of the frame, or to distinguish two speakers.

Subtitles positioned at the top and bottom are treated as independent tracks — they can overlap in time without creating a conflict.

Automatic Corrections

One of Scene Cut's major strengths: the automatic correction engine works in the background to ensure clean text that conforms to professional standards.

What Is Checked and Corrected

The engine covers three areas, each with its own rules:

Timing

Rule	What it checks
Min/max duration	Flags subtitles that are too short or too long
Reading speed (CPS)	Verifies that the text is readable within the allotted time
Gap between subtitles	Detects insufficient gaps between consecutive entries

Text

Rule	What it checks
Line length	Flags lines exceeding the allowed character count
Forbidden characters	Detects `; ( ) [ ]` not allowed in subtitles
Ellipsis	Replaces `...` with the typographic character `…`
Dialogue dashes	Verifies dash formatting in subtitles marked as dialogue
Capitalization after punctuation	Checks capitalization after `.` `?` `!` at the end of a sentence

Text (language-specific)

Rule	What it checks
Typographic corrections	Quotation marks, cedillas, punctuation specific to each language

Languages with full correction support are French, German, Spanish, and Arabic. English has validation but no language-specific typographic corrections.

Line balance

When a subtitle spans two lines, Scene Cut checks for pyramid balance: the first line should ideally be shorter than the second
If the text is unbalanced, automatic redistribution is suggested, favoring breaks at natural points — end of sentence, comma, conjunction

Each of these rules can be individually disabled in Preferences > Validation. Disabling a rule hides the corresponding alerts but does not change the active profile's standards. This is useful for temporarily focusing on one aspect of the work, but it is recommended to keep all checks active to ensure compliance.

How It Works

Corrections are applied seamlessly:

While typing — quotation marks and capitalization are corrected as you type
Via quick fix — the magic wand button (or Cmd + K) applies all corrections to the selected entry
Via global fix — the Tools menu lets you apply corrections across the entire project in a single operation

Corrections respect the project language. Typography rules, linking words, and dialogue conventions automatically adapt to French, English, Spanish, German, or Arabic.

Text Redistribution

When Scene Cut redistributes text between L1 and L2, it follows a priority order:

End of sentence (. ? !) — the most natural break
Comma or colon — an acceptable syntactic pause
Space between words — as a last resort

This system avoids awkward breaks in the middle of a word or after an isolated article ("the", "a"), and preserves natural sense groups.

Create and Edit

The different methods for creating subtitles and editing their text efficiently.

Timing

Subtitle synchronization: reading speed, duration, gaps, snapping, and cascade.