Sony Closed Caption Style Guide – Abridged

Technical Specifications:
32 characters per Line

Target Reading Speed:

• 15 CPS for features
• 17 CPS is the maximum (used for talky features, television episodes and added value)
• 12-14 CPS should be used for children’s programming

Three Line Maximum

Style of Closed Caption Events

• English US spelling
• Files should follow normal sentence casing and current spelling/grammar rules
• Speaker IDs should be written in ALL CAPS with a colon.
o JOHN: These are closed captions.
• Dialogue Dashes: Two speakers in a caption event should use a hyphen without a space
• Timing should generally match the dialogue, but can start slightly early or late to accommodate read
speed. No more than half a second.
• Sound effects should be in ALL CAPS and enclosed in brackets
o [SOUND EFFECT]
• If foreign dialogue is spoken and there is no burn-in translation, use a sound effect event
o [SPEAKING SPANISH]

Placement of Subtitles
Normal subtitle position is in the bottom third of the screen. Subtitles should not be placed in the middle of the screen
unless it is absolutely necessary and an explanation is provided, or if it is specifically requested by the Home Entertainment
office or WPF NEW RELEASE (HEBO) . Subtitles should not be placed over embedded English text. Whenever the normal
placement of a subtitle would cover embedded text, the subtitle must appear in the upper third of the screen instead.

Subtitles should not cover a character’s face. This rule is strictly enforced for big actors like Julia Roberts.

Text in the picture due to principal photography such as newspaper headlines, letters, notes, or signs may be covered by a
subtitle facilitating its translation.

Use of Italics
As a general rule, italics are used for dialogue that is off-screen (not in the same room as the person they are
speaking to), over a speaker, over the telephone, narrated, on television, in an untranslated foreign language, or in
songs. However, there is some variance from language to language concerning the use of italics.
Songs or foreign language are sometimes noted in quotation marks. This is an acceptable alternative to the use of
italics. Use of italics is language-specific. For example, Arabic and Hebrew subs will never use italics in their files.

Songs
The Identification of Song Titles and artists should only be taken from files supplied by Theatrical or official Sony Cue sheets
or CDSL. The GMS New Release subtitle or CC vendor should not identify Song Titles or Artists on their own. Soundtrack
music that the vendor is not supplied the title and artist credit should be indicated with a caption containing three music
notes surrounded by brackets: [♪♪♪]
Subtitles – plot pertinent songs only

CC – All songs, soundtrack and those performed onscreen – keep in all song lyrics from the provided file, including those in
the end credits; add all song lyrics if not present, including those in the end credits.

If song lyrics are not present in the provided file, flag this to the project coordinator.

Dedications and Disclaimers

Sony does not subtitle dedications at the head and end of movies (e.g. “This movie is dedicated to….”).

As a general rule, Sony does not subtitle disclaimers. However, disclaimers that contain any sort of creative intent
(e.g. they contain a joke, or something specific to the film) may need to be titled. Any questionable disclaimers
should be flagged out to Sony with a recommendation for review.