What is the best tool or method for adding (and tuning) a text track to a
QuickTime 2.0 video? Are there any performance issues or other drawbacks
associated with adding a text track? Can you suggest a good example of a
product that has text in a video as a reference? How can I control where text
is displayed on the video window? How can I control the font, color, and so
on?
A You can use MoviePlayer to insert a text track into a video. Start with a text
file, with each line in the file being a "frame" of the text video. Next,
import it into MoviePlayer. This makes each line of the text file a printed
line of text in a movie (it stores the text, not the bitmap, so it takes up
very little space). Each frame of the movie is two seconds long. Then, edit the
length of each "frame" to make it last the duration that the text is sung in
the video, and add this text track to the actual video (like copying and
pasting).
There are instructions in the QuickTime 2.0 SDK CD on how to do this in a document entitled, Guide to MoviePlayer. This also describes how to position the text on the screen.
Note that you must add the text with MoviePlayer on the Mac, not in Windows. To make it playable across the two platforms, you have to use "burnt text". This is also described in the SDK, and there are some movie samples on the CD that include "burnt text" -- 'Assimilation+Burnt Text' and 'Beverage+Burnt Text'.
There is another good article in issue 20 of develop entitled,
Supporting Text Tracks in Your Application. The CD that accompanies
develop also includes sample code that demonstrates this technology.
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