My friend Capriuni passed along to me this awesome YouTube video of “Your Brains” (original song by Jonathon Coulton). In and of itself, that’s not really note worthy – Capriuni is my source for many cool things in YouTube’s Deaf communities. The video itself is subtitled for the ASL-impaired.

That’s where things got interesting, because my friend particle_person passed along to me how to get the captions off a YouTube video so one can make a transcript without duplicating work!

This is awesome to me because, of course, transcripts are necessary even for subtitled or captioned work, for a variety of reasons.

I wanted to pass along particle_person’s instructions, and the video itself because it made me laugh.

Here’s how:

1. Go to youtube, find video with captions.

2. Go here: YouTube Subs

3. Paste the URL of the video into that tool and follow directions. When you hit the download button, a .srt caption file will be saved to your desktop.

4. Change the file extension from .srt to .txt, open in Notepad or whatever and you’re done.

So easy! (I should note that the .txt file comes with the timing marks in it.)

Thus, I share the following with you (although had I been paying any attention I would also have noted that the video has the captions in the description, but then I wouldn’t have learned of this nifty tool):

The video is of a white-looking dude dressed up as a Zombie – blood! torn clothing! The video is presented in Sign, but for the Sign-Impaired there is singing. The song by John Coulton. In creating the video, CaptainValor has also included a direct translation of the Sign he’s used (as Sign has different grammar than English), which is indicated in ALL CAPS in the transcript below. I’m told by people who know these things that he’s Hearing, but is very good at Sign and translating between Sign and English. (The ASL substitutes CRAZY for Unreasonable, unfortunately.)

Heya Tom, it’s Bob from the office down the hall
HI I BOB, OFFICE HALL [location-mid] FROM-[there]

It’s good to see you buddy, how’ve you been?
GOOD SEE-[you] FRIEND, HOW ARE YOU?

Things have been OK for me except that I’m a zombie now
I GET-THROUGH OK, BUT I BECOME [ZOMBIE]

I really wish you’d let us in
PAST I WISH YOU INVITE-[us]

I think I speak for all of us when I say I understand
I THINK WE AGREE WE UNDERSTAND

Why you folks might hesitate to submit to our demand
WHY YOU NOT WANT OBEY US

But here’s an FYI: you’re all gonna die screaming
BUT I SEND [F-Y-I] FUTURE YOU-[all] DIE, SCREAM

All we want to do is eat your brains
WE WANT DO-WHAT? YOUR BRAIN EAT

We’re not unreasonable, I mean,
WE NOT CRAZY,

No one’s gonna eat your eyes
NOT EYES EAT

All we want to do is eat your brains
WE WANT DO-WHAT? YOUR BRAIN EAT

We’re at an impasse here,
TWO-OF-US NOT GET-ALONG,

Maybe we should compromise:
MAYBE TWO-OF-US NEGOTIATE

If you open up the doors
IF YOU OPEN

We’ll all come inside and eat your brains
WE ENTER, YOUR BRAIN EAT

I don’t want to nitpick, Tom, but is this really your plan?
I KNOW I PICK-ON-[you] BUT YOUR PLAN WHAT?

To spend your whole life locked inside a mall?
LIVE ALONE INSIDE MALL?

Maybe that’s OK for now but someday
MAYBE OK NOW, BUT FUTURE

You’ll be out of food and guns
GUN, FOOD FINISH

Then you’ll have to make the call
YOU MUST DECIDE

I’m not surprised to see
I NOT SURPRISE

You haven’t thought it through enough
YOU NOT PONDER ENOUGH

You never had the head for all that bigger picture stuff
PAST YOU NOT UNDERSTAND-ALL

But Tom, that’s what I do,
BUT I UNDERSTAND,

And I plan on eating you slowly
PLAN EAT-[you] SLOW

All we want to do is eat your brains
WE WANT DO-WHAT? YOUR BRAIN EAT

We’re not unreasonable, I mean,
WE NOT CRAZY,

No one’s gonna eat your eyes
NOT EYES EAT

All we want to do is eat your brains
WE WANT DO-WHAT? YOUR BRAIN EAT

We’re at an impasse here,
TWO-OF-US NOT GET-ALONG,

Maybe we should compromise:
MAYBE TWO-OF-US NEGOTIATE

If you open up the doors
IF YOU OPEN

We’ll all come inside and eat your brains
WE ENTER, YOUR BRAIN EAT

I’d like to help you Tom, in any way I can
TOM, I WANT HELP-[you]

I sure appreciate the way you’re working with me
TWO-OF-US COOPERATE I APPRECIATE

I’m not a monster Tom, well, technically I am
I NOT MONSTER (pause) TRUE

I guess I am
YES

I’ve got another meeting Tom,
HAVE MEETING,

Maybe we could wrap it up
MAYBE TWO-OF-US END

I know we’ll get to common ground somehow
FUTURE TWO-OF-US AGREE

Meanwhile I’ll report back to my colleagues
NOW I GO-TO FRIENDS,

Who were chewing on the doors
THEY DO-WHAT? DOOR CHEW

I guess we’ll table this for now
TWO-OF-US POSTPONE THIS

I’m glad to see you take constructive criticism well
MY CRITICIZE YOU ACCEPT

Thank you for your time I know we’re all busy as hell
YOUR ATTENTION THANK-YOU, WE BUSY

And we’ll put this thing to bed
FUTURE THIS MELT-AWAY

When I bash your head open
WHEN I SMASH-[you]

All we want to do is eat your brains
WE WANT DO-WHAT? YOUR BRAIN EAT

We’re not unreasonable, I mean,
WE NOT CRAZY,

No one’s gonna eat your eyes
NOT EYES EAT

All we want to do is eat your brains
WE WANT DO-WHAT? YOUR BRAIN EAT

We’re at an impasse here,
TWO-OF-US NOT GET-ALONG,

Maybe we should compromise:
MAYBE TWO-OF-US NEGOTIATE

If you open up the doors
IF YOU OPEN

We’ll all come inside and eat your brains
WE ENTER, YOUR BRAIN EAT