Spot is available to rent for periods of one, three, six or twelve months. See our home page
for pricing information
or visit our rental store at www.spotsoftware.eu to
place an order.
We also sell lifetime licences which require a hardware key to work. Please contact us for
further information.
Special discounts are available for:
Academic licences
Bulk purchases
SKTL, BZO, ATRAE and ATAV members
Residents of India and Brazil (rentals)
Residents of Spain and Portugal (lifetime licences)
Do your prices include tax?
All prices are subject to VAT unless you reside outside the European Union or can provide a VAT
number for an EU state other than the Netherlands
How much do you charge for technical support?
Nothing. Technical support is provided free of charge.
Support
What can I do if I'm having problems with Spot or think I've found a bug?
Still stuck? Feel free to email your
problem to us.
Installation
I get an "Out of memory" error message when trying to run Spot
Parts of Spot require version 4.8 of the .NET framework. Recent versions of Windows (10 and 11)
have native support for 4.8, but it may be disabled. To enable it, go to Control Panel, Programs
and Features, Turn Windows features on or off, and turn on .NET framework 4.8.
Spot won't open after the latest Windows update
Restart your computer to ensure that the Windows update has completed (you may need to do this several times) and then check that Windows has not disabled the .NET Framework (see above). Also make sure you run Spot as administrator (i.e. right-click the shortcut you use to open the program and select Run as Administrator - this is not the same as being admin on the machine). Some users have also reported that opening Spot as soon as Windows has loaded will do the trick. If the problem persists, you may need to reinstall the program.
Windows says Spot contains a virus
Microsoft mistakenly flagged spot.exe in a Defender update a few years ago. They confirmed it was safe
and removed it from their virus list. See our video
for details.
I get error message 1721 when trying to install the rental version
For older versions, right-click the installer file and choose "Run as administrator" to avoid
this issue.
I can't activate the dongle version of Spot. I get a "Product activation failed (code 11)"
message
We no longer use product keys. For Spot 5 only, download this updated
executable and copy it into the Spot folder, replacing the existing spot.exe file. If
you have Spot 6, simply install the program using the latest version 6 link at the top of the latest changes page.
Media
When I open a video, I get sound but no image (desktop computers)
First of all, ensure you have the latest K-Lite codec pack installed. Reinstall it if necessary.
If the problem continues, try converting the video file with Spot's video converter and/or
select Video Mixing Renderer 9 on the DirectShow Filters tab of the Media, Preferences window.
See also the first and second videos in our video
troubleshooting playlist
When I open a video, I get sound but no image (laptops with NVIDIA and Intel graphics)
This problem is usually solved by switching from dedicated to integrated graphics (or vice
versa). To do this, close Spot, open the NVIDIA Control Panel (right-click the desktop), and
then click 3D Settings, Manage 3D settings. On the Globla Settings tab, select Integrated
graphics (or High-performance NVIDIA processor if integrated graphics is already selected). Now
close the NVIDIA Control Panel, open Spot, remove any filters you may have added (optional - see
above), and open the video.
A video file won’t open, plays erratically or is out of sync with the audio
Although it’s possible that the video file you are trying to open may be corrupt, a more likely
explanation is that your system does not have suitable video splitters and decoders installed
and therefore cannot play the video correctly. The default decoders on a typical Windows machine
will not let you play back MOV or MPEG-2 files, for example, and may cause problems when
attempting to play other video formats. To work around this problem, install a codec pack such
as K-Lite and it will automatically configure itself to decode the most common video formats.
Spot contains various diagnostic tools that can help troubleshoot video issues, as well - see
the user guide for information on how to view the decoder and splitter being used to play the
video and how to choose your own. See also our video
troubleshooting
playlist.
MPEG-4 playback is jumpy
If running on Windows 10 or above, it may be best to disable audio stream switching and Spot's
own MPEG-4 decoder in the Media, Preferences window. Don't forget to reopen the video after
closing the window. See also the question above.
The video only fills a quarter of the video window
This issue may occur if you are running Windows 10 or above and have set your Display Settings,
Scale and Layout to greater than 100%. To work around the problem: 1) ensure you have the latest
K-Lite Codec Pack installed; 2) open the Media Preferences window; 3) click the DirectShow
Filters tab; 4) select Video Mixing Renderer 9 (put a tick next to it) and then click OK. Now
reopen your video - it should automatically resize to fit the window.
My 23.976 fps video is out of sync with the BITC
Because there is no such thing as 23.976 SMPTE timecode, the burnt-in timecode on a 23.976
frames per second video must be running at 24 frames per second. This means you should open the
video at 24 fps and ensure Spot is in 24 fps mode, not 23.976. Note that Netflix videos, for
example, contain two types of burnt-in timecode: one for SMPTE software (such as Spot) and one
for media time-based software. It's the SMPTE timecode (normally at the top left of the video)
that you need to sync to.
Our "Working with 23.976fps video"
explains this in more depth.
My 29.97 fps video does not run in sync with the BITC
Not all 29.97 fps video is drop frame. You can check whether yours is by jumping to e.g.
00:01:59:29 and moving one frame forward. Does the BITC now display 00:02:00:00? If it does, the
clock is running non-drop timing and the video should be opened in Spot as NTSC NDF (30 fps),
not NTSC DF (29.97 fps). If the BITC is showing 00:02:00:02, on the other hand, then the video
is using drop frame timing and you should open the video as NTSC DF (29.97 fps).
I added subtitles to a video using Spot's video converter, but the subtitles aren't visible
There are several reasons why this might happen:
1. Your Fonts folder has not been set (see pages 86 and 87 of the Spot 6 User Guide for more
information).
2. Your subtitles have been timed against the timecode on the source video. If the in cue for
the first subtitle in your file is 10:00:02:00, the subtitle may be in sync with the source
video when running in Spot but will not be encoded in the target video as it is only marked
for display after ten hours and two minutes. To stop this happening, either time your files
starting at 00:00:00:00 or offset the timing of your subtitles.
3. Make sure your subtitle file doesn't contain empty subtitles. All subtitles must have text
and valid in and out cues.
4. Check to see if your subtitle colour has been set to black. If it has, use a different
colour.
Spot stops responding when a video is playing
Not all video formats are created equal so make sure you have the very latest K-Lite Codec Pack
installed.
Audio waveform is not generated
There could be two reasons for this. Firstly, you may not have headphones or speakers plugged
into your computer, in which case Windows may think no audio hardware is installed and waveform
generation will fail. Secondly, there may be an .srt, .sub or .txt file with the same name as
the video in the video folder. If there is, move the file to a different location and then
reopen the video.
Spot renders portrait (vertical) videos in landscape (horizontal) mode
Go to Media, Preferences, DirectShow Filters, select the madVR filter (installed by K-Lite),
click OK and reopen the video.
Automatic transcription and translation
Why is automatic transcription and translation not included in the cost of the software?
Our automatic transcription and translation service involves third-party costs that we are charged for on a per-use basis. Since future usage is unknown, we can't include these costs in the base price of the software. By offering them as optional add-ons, you only pay for what you use, keeping Spot affordable for everyone.
I'm unhappy about my video being uploaded to a remote server
All videos are uploaded securely and deleted immediately after processing.
Editing
Assigning an out time with the F12 key causes the rental version to crash
This is due to a third-party protection issue. Reassign the shortcut (Tools > Keyboard
Shortcuts).
I can’t type characters in my language
For backwards compatibility, Spot takes a character set approach to dealing with certain
languages. If you find you cannot type e.g. Central European characters, click the Edit menu,
then select Edit Area, Input Method, Keyboard Mapping.
I can’t raise subtitles using Ctrl+Alt+Up/Down
Another program (most likely your graphics card software) may have hijacked the key combination.
Reassign it or
disable the conflicting shortcut.
How do I set a fixed number of characters per line?
Select "Set Characters Per Line Width" from the Subtitle menu. Setting a figure of 42, for
example, will ensure that only a maximum of 42 characters are allowed per line. As the only way
to set the maximum number of characters per line is by using a fixed width font (i.e. a font in
which each letter shares the same width), Spot will change the current editing font to Courier
New. This will not affect the target broadcast font.
There is a more elegant approach that lets you keep Arial 16 as the edit font. Change the edit
line width to a figure that sets the CPL value on the status bar to approximately 36 (e.g.
5000). Because Arial is a proportional font, this does not guarantee that you won’t be able to
type more than 36 characters in a line but it will prevent it from happening most of the time.
As you work, keep an eye on the two line length indicators above the current subtitle: if they
turn red, one of the lines in the subtitle is too long. When you’ve finished working on your
file, a "Too many characters in line check" (or switching to Report view) will pick up any
warnings you may have missed.
The spell checker doesn’t work
Spot uses Microsoft Word to spell check subtitles so if a version of Word is not installed on
your computer, you cannot use the spell checker or the thesaurus. If you do have Word installed
and the spell checker is still not working, make sure you have the correct language selected in
Spot’s language bar above the video window. If you are working with Spot 6, selecting the "Spell
check using the file save method" option (Tools, Options, General) forces spelling checks to
work as they should.
Files
When I import an SRT SubRip file, the accented characters are corrupted
The file is being opened with the wrong text encoding. In the Import SubRip File dialog box,
select files of type "SubRip UTF-8 file" (or, rarely, "SubRip UTF-16 file") and not plain old
"SubRip SRT file".
The masculine and feminine ordinals º and ª are lost when saving to an EBU STL file
This happens because the EBU STL format does not support these characters. Either write out the
ordinal in full ("A primeira pessoa a pisar a Lua"), use "o." or "a." or choose a different file
format.
