Appatic

There are now more and more ways to watch TV shows, Movies or even Music Videos Online. But as the overall video content variety and stream quality gets better. The same cannot be said about Subtitles (or Captions) support.

In my case, i usually watch shows and movies from all over the world in their original language. And if there is a official and legal chance of watching them online. I am more than happy to watch them online. But then the hassle is that most of these movies and shows now online are in sites that don’t count with any kind of subtitles support. 

JustSubsPlayer is a open source portable subtitles player from codeplex that allows you to put subtitles in any online content, as you can drop it on top of any online video player.

The player makes itself semi-transparent as you position it over any online video player. And the subtitles can be easily synchronized thanks to the subtitles player being independent to the video you are watching. 

In the first screenshot i added Spanish subtitles to YouTube as i was re-watching George Romero’s The Night Of The Living Death in its original 1968 version. While i choose YouTube as a example, you can do the same in Hulu, Netflix, TV.com, Epix, Vimeo, etc, etc. It don’t really matters as the app can be dragged and dropped and then adjusted to wherever you need it.

The controls are very simple and they don’t divert from the ones of any simple video player. Play, Pause, Forward, Rewind, Close. But it got some extra controls for the specific benefit of this app, that let you resize the font size of the subtitles and resize the width of the player so you can use it in any online video player you may find. Also as a plus is that it got a option to let you search within the subtitles track. As a way to instantly fast forward to a dialogue line, in case you rewind or forward to a favorite scene in whatever you happen to be watching. Very useful.

Some Notes

JustSubsPlayer is still in a beta state. but i found it stable enough to post about it. The only limitations or trade-offs in this app are that you have to experience the subtitles in a black background (like in close captioning). Something that is only a bother in content that is only in Standard TV format. And that since it is not integrated to any video player, you cannot use it in Full Screen mode. 

The only things i can quickly think of, that i know could make it a even better app, besides somehow finding a way to resolve the issues i described above. Is if it had a integrated Subtitles search engine from where you could quickly find, download and then play the subtitles you need for the content you want to watch. But it would be totally understandable if the developer don’t wants to take this app that far. So, at this moment you will need to go and find subtitles (.SRT file format only) on your own.

But even with the mentioned requirements and trade-offs , JustSubsPlayer is a great app that deserves a try, as it can improve your international online video viewing in a snap.

Works in XP, Vista and 7. While the app is portable, it does need to reside in its own folder.

Linkage

JustSubsPlayer Info

JustSubsPlayer                                    <— Direct Download Link

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