AVI subtitle projects often involve older capture hardware, surveillance exports, or migrated archives. Human review must separate speech uncertainty from container damage and verify that an apparently correct opening remains aligned near the end.
Where this workflow fits
- Archive video captions
- Capture-card recordings
- Legacy footage accessibility
Measure drift before editing cues
Place timing checkpoints at the start, middle, and end, plus both sides of visible glitches. If the error grows gradually, adjust affected cue ranges against the repaired viewing copy rather than applying one offset to the whole file.
Do not hide source damage
Keep archival uncertainty explicit. Correct spoken names and readable lines, but record inaudible gaps or missing frames instead of inventing dialogue that the surviving AVI no longer supports.
Before cue editing
- Play the file sequentially and seek to several late points before beginning detailed caption work.
- Document any remux, repair, or frame-rate interpretation used to make a stable review copy.
Limits worth knowing
- Damaged indexes can break random access even when sequential playback appears mostly successful.
- Legacy codecs and capture clocks can produce audio drift that a single global subtitle offset cannot repair.
Questions from the workflow
Why can AVI subtitle timing drift?
Broken indexes and irregular timestamps can make seeking unreliable. Check cue alignment at several points and create a documented repair copy if the source cannot play continuously.
Reviewed sources
- IANA Media Types registry · checked 2026-07-20
- Microsoft AVI RIFF file reference · checked 2026-07-20