Creating real subtitles is as much a combination of art and skill and judgement and balance as editing the video itself.
A good subtitle allows you to quickly read ahead, and then move your eyes back to the video, back to the people speaking, so that you can watch them act out the line.
A good subtitle doesn't transcribe everything said word for word, but reduces spoken language to written language, and focuses on the gist of what's said.
A good subtitle for hearing-impaired viewers describe important sounds that happen off-screen, such as doors opening or closing, but skips non-important sounds, and sounds of things happening on-screen.
While they are technically different, they are very similar and much of the "art" is the same between them.
Good subtitles and CCs both have to be structured carefully so that they do not negatively impact the delivery of lines in the content. The biggest offender of this is comedy series as an improperly structured and timed CC or subtitle will ruin many jokes.
Another aspect of this is how they handle making it easy to digest multiple lines of dialogue. Good CCs and subtitles will either structure the dialogue such that a certain voice is always on top or bottom or alternatively will match colours to voices.
Similarly, in content that is visually busy or rapidly changing, good subtitles and CCs will stay out of the "busy" section of the screen and avoid using a colour or outline that would interfere with the readability based on the background of the scene.
They are different but with regards to what makes them good, they are basically the same.
And to add on to this, on just about everything but live feeds, they are produced and added to video more or less the same way.
One difference is that captions shouldn't differ too much from the original audio. If they do, it's confusing if you're reading and listening at the same time. Translated subtitles don't have this problem.
> They are different but with regards to what makes them good, they are basically the same.
Yes. The rules for how long to show a subtitle, and when to pop them in and out are the same, regardless of the actual text shown. Everyone can decide what characters-per-second limit works for them, but whatever you choose, it fundamentally alters everything else and restricts what text can actually go in the subtitle. Translated or not translated, sound cues or no sound cues.
Creating real subtitles is as much a combination of art and skill and judgement and balance as editing the video itself.
A good subtitle allows you to quickly read ahead, and then move your eyes back to the video, back to the people speaking, so that you can watch them act out the line.
A good subtitle doesn't transcribe everything said word for word, but reduces spoken language to written language, and focuses on the gist of what's said.
A good subtitle for hearing-impaired viewers describe important sounds that happen off-screen, such as doors opening or closing, but skips non-important sounds, and sounds of things happening on-screen.