Basic Questions About DVD Architect

[Ken Jarstad]

Got Steve's book and it's very good, but - some basic questions remain. Please pardon my sometimes "cranky" tone. It is the way I seem to learn.

First - I see the explanations of what Playlists and Compilations are but I can't figure out what on earth I would ever want them for. Right now I cannot think of a reason to use either of them. I want to make a home movie that runs exactly like a commercial movie - Main Menu, sub menus with scene markers - what more could a guy want?

[Bob]

what more could a guy want?

Extras, bonus material, featurettes, etc.

Playlists can be pretty useful when you want to control or provide alternate ways for how the clips are accessed. Here's one example. Know how commercial dvds have deleted scenes and alternate endings. Usually you can play them individually or play them all. Playing individually can be easily done with a button linking to a clip with a return to the bonus menu after the clip is done. To play them all, create a playlist to play them consecutively and link the play all button to that.

Compilations provide a rudimentary way to create a basic slideshow or play a group of video and/or music clips. Some people will undoubtedly use a compilation since it's easy to do and they just want to quickly get their photos and/or videos on a DVD. But, you can create a much better presentation given the tools we have access to. I won't say I'll never use them, but it's not something I see myself using often. I've seen autostart dvds playing in waiting rooms that have a bunch of promotional videos and testimonials that repeat over and over. It might be good for that.

[Steve Grisetti]

I couldn't have said it better, Bob! Thank you!

[Ken Jarstad]

Thanks for the timely reply! I sometimes have to struggle to understand things.

Since I am making home videos and not theatrical releases I am not interested in deleted scenes and alternate endings so a playlist seems to be of no interest to me. However, opening my recent wedding video in DVDAS 5.0 shows the Timeline Panel, the Playlists Panel and Compilations Panel. Not knowing any better I kept looking at the Playlists and Compilation panels thinking that DVDAS would automatically put "something" in there! I am looking for this quality of being "intuitive" and all the panels did was cause me to scratch my head. Why can't we hide those features that we seldom or never use? They just confuse me.

When I open a new project in DVDAS, in addition to Menu Based and Single Movie I get Music/video Compilation and Picture Compilation. These also are not intuitive to me. It looks to me like a Picture Compilation is simply a slideshow. If so, why not say "Slideshow" Music/Video Compilation seems like just a regular video. What is to delineate that and a Menu Based video or a Single Movie video? It doesn't make sense to me.

An option in the Music/Video Compilation is a music sequence and I already found out that VMS is the best "audio" editor I own! (Haven't tried Sound Forge yet). But why would anyone want to put together a music/video compilation in DVDA when it is so much easier to use Vegas and it takes no greater time

Your description of a compilation implies the idea of throwing together a quick DVD. I suppose you could do minor editing on the DVDA timeline but why? It doesn't strike me as being any quicker and I would want to simply "do it right" anyway. BTW, I added a slideshow to the end of my wedding video simply by highlighting all the photos I wanted and imported them in a single operation. I was delighted to see VMS place them on the timeline in the original sequence with an automatic crossfade between them. Very nice - saved a lot of time. It was no Ken Burns deal but that isn't very important to me. But here's the deal - by adding a slideshow on the end of my video I think I created a "compilation" - even though I set up the project as Menu Based. So, I don't see the distinction. I'm just a simple guy and I swear this terminology is only confusing me

More grumpiness to follow - if you don't mind.

[Steve Grisetti]

I think you're making it too complicated, Ken.

Indeed, compilations are pretty much mini-movies -- a slideshow or a set of video clips you pull together in DVD Architect. The tools are pretty limited. They're nothing compared to what you get in a full-scale video editor. In fact, I see little use at all for them. But, if you need to throw together a quick slideshow or video assembly, you can do it as a compilation.

Aside from when you're creating a compilation, the timeline in DVD Architect is not really an editing space. You can trim from the beginning or end of a clip. You can add Scene/Chapter markers. But it's really not designed for inserting or assembling clips. It's pretty much for add chapter markers to finished video projects.

I assume you've been through my Basic Training tutorials for DVD Architect. They cover the basics of authoring a DVD. Everything else is just gravy (creating custom scene thumbnails, adding transitional segments between menus, adding an introductory segment before the first menu). And I cover them in my book (and, to some extent, in our tutorials.)

[Ken Jarstad]

Thanks Steve - curmudgeon here. Took a couple of days to beat the heat.

My curmudgeonly take on this is ...... I can just ignore compilations and playlists because I will never use them. I wish I could hide the tabs or make these superfluous functions go away.

Second issue - and here I may whine a bit. I started out with a command line interface, even administrated a unix minicomputer for a while, and ever since graphical user interfaces took over I have been chiding programmers that they promised us that these programs with graphical interfaces were "intuitive" to use. Well, they are, if an actual user with no programming background is used to approve the interface.

Because I have been using Elements for over five years I was able to transfer those skills to DVDAS5 and make Blu-ray and DVD disks for my granddaughter's wedding. But I must say that the reason I avoided using DVD Architect until now was what I consider to be its unintuitive, even counter-intuitive interface. I am referring specifically to the project overview panel. It makes no sense. If fact, it is so bad that after this discussion I may write to SCS and tell them how to fix the crumby job they did!

Looking at page 22 of Steve's book there are "folder" icons in there. What the h-e-double-toothpicks are FOLDER icons doing in there? When I look on my finished disk I find either BDMV or VIDEO_TS. What's up with that?? Confusion, confusion, confusion!! Folder icons don't belong there - period! Yeah, I'm ranting now but this really torques me off. What were they thinking?

Looking at page 22 of Steve's book there is an entry named "Menu (Page 1)". Why? I have never, ever seen a main menu on a DVD that had more than one "main" menu or top-level menu. If there is someone who wants to add a second main-menu it would have to be a one in a million (OK, thousand) option that could easily be hidden in an option menu rather than placed in every new project which confuses the heck out of me. You see, if there is a page 1 then there MUST be a page 2! Or more! Seems "intuitive" to me. So, I'm worrying about stuff that I shouldn't have to worry about. Just leave the stupid "page 1" out of the interface because most people for most projects will never use it. And reduce the confusion factor of this application.

OK, I guess that's enough ranting for one session. I don't mean to berate anyone - and I appreciate all your help. I do want to see application interfaces get better though. I especially like the "Insert" button with the plus icon. That is a great idea and it is where some of these hideous options should be hidden away from new users.

[Bob]

I can just ignore compilations and playlists because I will never use them. I wish I could hide the tabs

You can. Select the view menu option and uncheck the compilations and playlist checkboxes. No more tabs for them.

I am referring specifically to the project overview panel. It makes no sense....Looking at page 22 of Steve's book there are "folder" icons in there. What the h-e-double-toothpicks are FOLDER icons doing in there? When I look on my finished disk I find either BDMV or VIDEO_TS. What's up with that??

The project overview panel is a representation of the logical structure of the project, and is definitely not the physical layout on the disc. The actual physical layout on the disc is defined by the DVD (video_ts etc.) and Blu-Ray (bdmv etc.) specifications and would make even less sense to the typical person creating a dvd project.

I don't have an issue with the folder icon. It's being used in the generic sense of a container which is understandable. I suppose they could have used that twirl down arrow thingy that seems to be showing up in more applications lately.

Looking at page 22 of Steve's book there is an entry named "Menu (Page 1)".

You can always press "F2" and rename it to whatever you like. It's just a placeholder.

[Ken Jarstad]

I can just ignore compilations and playlists because I will never use them. I wish I could hide the tabs

You can. Select the view menu option and uncheck the compilations and playlist checkboxes. No more tabs for them.

Excellent, Bob! Just what I needed. I should have stumbled across that myself by now.

The project overview panel is a representation of the logical structure of the project

Yes, but it's not very logical. Before I decided to get VMS/DVDAS I tried a number of other applications. Most of them actually had worse interfaces (IMHO) but one was outstanding - the AVS (AVS4YOU) authoring application. Intuitive, logical, layed out much like DVDA but only DVDs, no Blu-ray yet. So, the programmers really can do wonderful application design and when other designers do a great job I want to bug the designers of the applications I use to do better. Check out the screen shots on this page to see a navigation panel done right:

http://www.avs4you.com/AVS-DVD-Authoring.aspx

[sdp1278]

SIMPLE QUESTION:

I am under a time crunch...
I have chapter markers set, but when I preview my main menu, click on the video, it plays through all my linked videos. How do I get each link to go BACK to the Main Menu screen after it plays?

Please help soon!

Shaun

[Steve Grisetti]

Hi, Shaun. Welcome to Muvipix -- the best place in the world to get a question answered quickly!

DVD Architect doesn't emply Stop Markers. In other words, you can't set up spots in your video so that the viewer jumps back to the menu. This only happens at the end of the video -- after it has played completely through.

If you've got a longer video and you want it to play like a bunch of short videos, returning to the menu page after each, there are two ways to do it:

1) Use your video editing program to break your longer video into a bunch of shorter ones, or

2) Add your video to a menu so that a button in created, then trim it in the timeline so that only one scene is included. Then add your video again to your menu and trim it again, this time so that the next scene is displayed, and so on. In other words, produce several buttons using the same footage several times -- but trim each media clip so that only one portion of it plays when each button is selected. Make sense?

If you'd like your audience to have the option of playing all of these segments through, you can do that too by creating a Playlist of the whole set.

Have you checked out my book, by the way? It could be very helpful.

[Ken Jarstad]

Wow Shaun, you got TWO replies to same question! How do you rate?

[Bob]

I don't know, Ken. Some aspects of that interface are certainly reasonable and intuitive. It's hard to judge from just screenshots. But, if I can be curmudgeonly for a moment, the apparent use of the IFO files as surrogates for the video content bugs me. IFO files do not contain video, the VOB files do. The video_TS.ifo is a configuration file that describes the overall structure of the dvd while there are additional IFO files that link the menus, start points, chapter points, etc. to the locations in the VOBs. It's not a simple one video to one ifo correspondence. In my opinion, it makes a lot more sense and is less confusing for the user to have the interface link to the actual video resource rather than to a information file that a machine uses to obtain its navigational references.

But, that's why there's room for multiple authoring programs. What doesn't appeal to one person may be perfect for another.

[Ken Jarstad]

Hey Bob - and Steve. I appreciate your working with me on these issues. Sometimes I just have to blather for a while before I can accept what is.

Yeah, I agree that the appearance of the IFO file there seems out of place in an "intuitive" interface! Maybe I should go yell at them.

As an aside, accommodating the peculiarities of a particular applications leads me to the issue that I call "this means that." This should mean "this" - but instead really means "that." I guess as long as we understand what is (I guess) intuitive for someone else means - then we will get by. I consider the Project Overview Panel of DVDA to be just that - and my usage will be tempered by "Oh yeah, this means that."

It's kind of like Chevrolet is pronounced shev-row-lay instead of shev-row-let, which is just like it is spelled. I'm not French, I'm Norwegian (which may explain a lot!) and Chevrolet is (unfortunately) the only example I can think of right now, where this (Chevrolet) means that (shev-row-lay). I think it ought to be Americanized to Chevrolay. But I guess that's just me.

Thanks again!

-=Ken=-