How do I extract a PGS subtitle and then convert to SRT or ASS?

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1

Pardon my simple question as I have never really worked with subtitles before.

I have a bunch of episodes with subtitles that I’m having a hard time reading when watching them. The subtitles are using a gray font color and kind of blends in with the videos. I’d like to convert these subtitles to SRT so that it can be styled the same way as I have with my other media and make the subtitles easier to read (white font color with a black outline).

I loaded one episode onto MKVToolNix and found out that they are HDMV PGS which I believe are graphics instead of texts so they will always show the way they are made and cannot be restyled. I went through the menu of MKVToolNix but I couldn’t find anything related to exporting the subtitle only so that I can look for ways to convert it to SRT or ASS.

I’d appreciate any help even if it’s as simple as pointing me to a guide that I could follow.

2

Hello, if I understand correctly your question the subtitles you are referring to are actually image files. So to convert them to SRT you need an OCR integration. I have a nice tool I use for this but I need to check from my pc. I’ll post here a link to it.

3

Yes that is what I need to do but my question is more on how to extract the subtitles from the MKV files. I believe MKVToolNix has mkvextract but it is only available on Linux machines. I have a Windows machine so I don’t think I can use that one.

4

Sure, I understand.
I strongly suggest you to go to that website, this is where I found MKVToolnix in the first place. You’ll find lots of useful tools, from freeware to paid tools to edit your video. There I found a GUI Tool such as this one for windows to help extract streams from MKV: gMKVExtractGUI 2.6.4 Free Download - VideoHelp

For subtitle processing I use this:
Subtitle Edit 4.0.7 / 4.0.8 Beta Free Download - VideoHelp
You will find useful plugins to use for OCR as well as some dynamic Audio to text transcription.

1 Like
5

Thank you. It seems to be working for me!

6

Just a slight correction: all of the command-line utilities including mkvextract are available on all platforms. The only exception is the variant obtained through Microsoft’s Store due to how the Store works. See this FAQ entry for details. However, you can always download the full Windows version (installer or portable version) from the home page for free.