Captions in Premiere Pro 13.1.2 have several problems.

(Windows10. May be different on Mac.). Here is a thread of all of the problems I've found in captions so far. While there are several threads already that point out individual issues, I'm hoping that bringing all of the issues together in a single mega thread will help get captions Adobe's prompt attention. Here we go!

1. NO BURN IN: Exporting a video through Media Encoder doesn't burn in captions even if the "Burn Captions Into Video" option is selected in Premiere Pro's Export Settings. The captions only get burned in if the video is exported directly through Premiere Pro.




2. DUPLICATES: If a captions file is duplicated in the project window, any changes done to the duplicate don't appear in the Program Monitor. In order to have changes appear, Premiere Pro needs to be restarted.




3. SELECT ALL: The Captions window is missing the standard CTRL-A keyboard shortcut to easily select all captions at once. This strange omission makes it unnecessarily difficult to select all the captions in a clip to make global appearance changes.




4. LEADING CONTROL: Captions need an easy way to control the space between lines, such as a Leading control that can work on individual captions, or all of the selected captions at once. (See illustration “Captions 1”) The current "Set Vertical Position (%)" option only works on a single caption at a time and requires the user to manually select the text in the second line. This takes far more time and effort than it should for something so simple.




5. DEFAULT LEADING: The default leading in captions is far too large and therefore ugly. The default leading between caption lines should be reduced to an aesthetically pleasing amount (See “Captions 2”)




6. KERNING CONTROL: The Captions window is also missing a way to control the spacing between characters in a caption. A Legacy Titler-style Kerning control is needed for Open captions.




7. MOTION SETTINGS: Copy/pasting the Motion settings of one captions clip to another in the Timeline does not work.




8. OFF-CENTER: By default, captions are off-center to the right by 5 pixels. When using captions in a narrow format video (1x1, 4x5, etc.) in which captions can stretch out to the edges of the frame, this error can become apparent. This incorrect centering can also become apparent in any sized video when captions line up with another title or graphic that’s centered on screen. (see “Captions 3”)




9. SPACING: If a two line caption is turned back into a single line, the space between the last character of the first line and the first character of the second line becomes incorrectly large. Even if characters are added or removed from the caption, the larger gap remains (see “Captions 4”)




10. MULTI-MOVING: It’s possible to select and even Shift-select multiple captions in a captions clip. So why isn’t it possible to do anything whatsoever with this selection? At the very least, Premiere Pro should let editors move a selection of captions up or down the captions clip for retiming purposes. Imagine having a video with 100 captions, only to have the client request that something be added or removed halfway into the video. This currently requires the editor to manually correct the timing of all captions beyond the change one by one… by one… by one… by one… This is sheer insanity and needs to be fixed ASAP!




11. BIGGER HANDLES: Captions and handles remain the same tiny size in the Timeline, no matter how much the video track is expanded. This makes it all too easy for users to accidentally move the captions clip itself when trying to retime a caption/handle. Captions and handles should grow accordingly when increasing the size of the video track they’re on. (see “Captions 5”)

Do you know of any captioning issues I missed? If so, please add them to the list!

Please vote and comment to help get Adobe’s attention on this matter!

In this day and age of Facebook/Instagram videos, open captioning has become a must. We need captioning tools that work properly asap!

It's 12:01AM and I would have been finished with my edit hours ago if it were not for the numerous bugs related to closed captions. I'll just list one here: edits in the captions are not reflected in the program monitor. I can create a new caption or change the timing of a caption, and it will not be shown when I play the video. I can delete words and the captions will not re-center themselves (okay, that's a separate bug, but worth mentioning here too). And sometimes the formatting is just completely wrong. The spacing will be too tight between lines and adjusting Line Spacing has no effect. These bugs have been in Premiere for years now from what I've read. Why are they not fixed by now?

https://adobe-video.uservoice.com/forums/911233-premiere-pro/suggestions/38080990-everything-wrong-with-captions-in-premiere-pro-13

The above link is a post detailing issues with captioning. Here are some more that I would like to add to the list:

1.

The most egregious failing of the system is the text-editing inabilities of the Captions panel. The text box does not respect standard system keyboard shortcuts for caret navigation. All of the following standard text-editing shortcuts, that see heavy usage with document editing, do not work as expected:

• Home/End: Instead of moving the caret to the start/end of the line, it selects the first/last caption in the list.




• Up/Down: Instead of moving up/down a line, it selects the previous/next caption in the list.




• Ctrl+Home/End: Instead of moving to the beginning/end of the text, it selects all the captions before/after.

Shift+Home/End: Instead of selecting text to the start/end of the line, it selects all the captions before/after.

Ctrl+Backspace/Delete: Instead of deleting the previous/next word, it deletes the current caption.

There are probably more. Please use a standard text box implementation for the captions so all standard shortcuts work within them.

2.

You cannot use standard editing shortcuts to retime the captions (ripple edits, extending in/out points, adding/subtracting time, etc.) Since all the captions live within a single container clip, you are required to click and drag on the small handles on either end to adjust timing.

3.

The timing of the captions on export is determined by the in point of the container clip, and not by the in point of the first caption. This is an obtuse and un-intuitive mechanic and it required me to Google how to globally fix the timing, after I realised everything was out of sync (which only shows up on export, mind you, and not in the timeline itself while you're captioning).

4.

The captions do not wrap automatically. For long captions, you are required to manually create line breaks, or else they go off the screen.

5.

You cannot directly select any caption in the Timeline. Even with the mouse cursor placed directly over a caption, it will first only select the container clip. You need a second click to select the actual caption.

6.

There is no way to define a global style. Any global change requires you to select all the captions. If you want any captions to not be affected by that global change, you have to manually de-select those.

7.

In the Captions panel, clicking a caption will not actually navigate to that caption in the timeline, so you cannot immediately see a preview of your edit. You have to take the extra step of navigating the playhead to that clip manually.

8.

For whatever reason, you cannot select more than 2 captions in the timeline simultaneously. Even then, you cannot move them both at the same time.

9.

You cannot undo any value change in the Captions panel (e.g. font size, colour, etc.) unless you first deselect the caption. If you don't deselect the caption, hitting Undo will unexpectedly undo the last text change you made.

Hi all,

I've now split my caption bugs into two reports. This one is about captions not updating.

This isn't something that happens every time, but it happens almost every time. Basically, captions don't update.

This might be when changing font details, like type, size, colour, etc, but also when changing the content of the caption, or its timing, or its placement. So, the problems are kind of across the board.

It should be noted that I'm referring to Open Captions, with a sequence appropriate frame rate, and resolution. This applies to imported .SRT files, and captions created directly within Premiere.

Sometimes restarting Premiere fixes the problem, but not always. When that doesn't work, sometimes I can temporarily modify the captions properties (change the frame rate, and then immediately change it back), and that occasionally forces the captions to be read correctly. Sometimes nothing really seems to work.

What's super-frustrating is that I can see in an expanded timeline video track that the caption has been updated, but in the Program/Source monitor, it shows an out of date version.

Deleting render files, and clearing the media cache does not always resolve the issue. Regardless, having to do that every time I have to work with captions would be a pretty frustrating workaround.

Please note that these occurs on both Mac and PC, but I'm currently on a Windows system, so I will post the specs for this machine:

Premiere Pro 13.1.2, build 9
Windows 10 64-bit (1903)
Intel i9-9900X
64GB RAM
Nvidia RTX 2070 (431.36)
2x HP Z27 displays (3840x2160 @60Hz)

Any thoughts or ideas, please fire them through. If you require any further information, please don't hesitate to ask, and I will provide it as soon as possible.

Cheers,

Darren

Caption settings have been buggy for a while, but in Premiere Pro 2018 (v13.x) they don't even take unless you save your project, quit Premiere, and then start it again.

Setup:
- macOS 10.14.1
- Open Premiere Pro CC
- Import a video (I'm working with MP4's)
- Import a caption file (I'm working with DFXP)
- Move both to the Timeline and match them up (audio to captions) as needed.
- In the Timeline, click on the captions
- Open the Captions panel
- Right click on the first caption and then Select All
- Enter your settings... my example: Align Center. Set Background opacity to 100%. Open position caption block = Bottom Center. (PremCCcaps_01.png)

If you look at the preview the captions are still in their default state (PremCCcaps_03.png).

If you do Export Media*, the settings still haven't taken (PremCCcaps_03.png).

If you save your project, quit Premiere Pro, then launch it again and open your project, the caption settings have taken (PremCCcaps_04.png).

*Note in Premier Pro2017, Export Media would show the captions with the proper settings but you'd still have to quit/relaunch Premiere for them to show up properly.