Scene Selection--return to menu?

[AnnaM]

I am using the trial fo dvd ws and really like its ease of use. One thing I wonder and cannot firnd, is in a scene selectin menu, is there a way to set in and out points on the scene, so it only plays the 2 or 3 mins you choose, then returns to the scene selection menu? Insted of playing thru to the end of the movie? Thanks!

[GeorgeW]

Let's say you have one 10-minute video that is made up of 2 scenes (one 4 minutes, the other 6 minutes).

Add the 10-minute to the timeline, and set the in/out points (the 4 minutes). Then add the 10-minute video to the timeline again, and set the in/out points (the 6 minute scene).

Now go to your menu step and add the two different scenes to a menu. They should play and return to the menu. You could add an additional menu button, and change it's playlist to play both scenes (for a Playall).

Regards,
George

[AnnaM]

George thank you for the reply.It took a bit of looking, since I am brand new to this, but your answer seems to have solved my problem, and at the same time made me a little more aware of how the program works in general. I thank you. I think its all set now. WIll play a bit and post back if I have any further stuff. I quite like the ease of use of this program.
Anna

[fandj]

I believe I have done exactly as indicated, however, I have only succeeded with the second vídeo/chapter (i.e. it only plays the time I have selected and at the end of it, which coincides with the end of the entire clip, it returns to the begining of the chapter and starts playing again). As far as the first one is concerned it plays right to the end of the vídeo clip, and not the fraction of it I have marked in/out. I am sure I am doing something wrong. What? Any help, please. Thanks

[pauley]

Fandj,
you are running into this because your chapters are all in one title. In order for the DVD to end on a chapter, it must also be the end of a title. How to make a new title, you ask... It must be a separate video file. So, split you file up into the different chapters you want, then import them to DVDWS. Note, however, that if you choose to string titles together in a playlist, there will be a pause between the titles. This is a DVD spec issue, not DVDWS.

Pauley

[AnnaM]

If I am following your problem here, perhaps saying how I accomplished it will help.The key is to just put the same full length video on the time line for each chapter you want. Drag it from the library to time line so it occupies x amount of squares. So you drag it over 5 times eg, and have 5 of them down there. Double clcikc each one and set your in point and out point on each.

Then when you make a menu, Click below it the button on the left to bring back the timeline into view, then just click and drag each one of the clips to its own button on the menu above. Each button then will link to that short segement, and when its done, it will return to your menu. works perfectly for me and I thnk this is what GeorgeW was telling me. In any event, it works like a charm Hope I explained it well. Its easy once you get the idea of dragging the same full length clip several times into the time line.

[mxpxpxpx]

I have a 3 hour and 38 minute mpeg video made up of 54 music videos that I made into one video, so I could treat them as chapters instead of seperate titles. I am trying to follow what you guys have said but I do not understand the mark-in/mark-out thing. I have tryed it but all I get is this option may delete some chapters. I am trying to do what AnnaM is doing by getting the videos to return to the menu and not keep playing the rest of the video. Thank You.

[sjj1805]

I have a 3 hour and 38 minute mpeg video made up of 54 music videos that I made into one video, so I could treat them as chapters instead of seperate titles. I am trying to follow what you guys have said but I do not understand the mark-in/mark-out thing. I have tryed it but all I get is this option may delete some chapters. I am trying to do what AnnaM is doing by getting the videos to return to the menu and not keep playing the rest of the video. Thank You.

In your situation what you need is 54 seperate video clips, these will all become titles in the DVD Menu.

You can now create playlists where you could form groups of your 54 titles
then create buttons for each group. You then use the playlist function to add the titles for that group to that button. At the end of the playlist you can then stipulate where you should go next. This could be a return to the calling menu/sub menu or some other menu.

You could even create seperate buttons for each individual title.
Dependant upon how you want your DVD to appear this could be in addition to a menu of 'group' buttons or instead of.

Consider this: 54 is a lot of titles so perhaps you make 6 groups with 9 titles in each. You now create a Main Menu from where you can select 2 sub-menus.
Sub-menu 1 = individual titles. Sub menu 1 would be further sub-divided so that it spans 6 pages each page with 9 titles on each page.
Sub-Menu 2 = Grouped items. This could be a single page with 6 buttons, each of those buttons will play 9 items.

You have so much freedom with DVD Workshop that you just need to use your imagination.

Steve J

[mxpxpxpx]

I have already done it that way before, but I could not skip to the next video if I played them all because they were seperate titles and not chapters. I have 9 menus with 6 videos per page. I want my final outcome for me to be able to play all videos and be able to skip throught them and if I play the videos by them self they will return back to the menu instead of playing the rest of the video. Is that possible?

[Devil]

I believe it is not possible, because it is outside the scope of the DVD Standards. As mentioned by others, you have the choice of two possibilities:

1: separate titles
You can choose them either to play all in a given order or to play individual titles and return to menu. You cannot change the order or pick and choose, although you could do groups, as well, but programmed permanently in WS2.

2: one title with chapters
You can play through the complete project in order or you can choose a chapter, knowing that ALL the following chapters will play, in order, after that.

Of course, you could compromise by having groups of, say, 9 titles, each with 6 chapters.

[mxpxpxpx]

Thanks for your help

[GeorgeW]

I have already done it that way before, but I could not skip to the next video if I played them all because they were seperate titles and not chapters. I have 9 menus with 6 videos per page. I want my final outcome for me to be able to play all videos and be able to skip throught them and if I play the videos by them self they will return back to the menu instead of playing the rest of the video. Is that possible?

What you want to do is certainly within DVD Specifications -- just not easily handled in DWS 2.x.

Using the separate title approach -- add a dummy chapter to each title just before the end of the title. Then when you hit the next button, it will actually jump to the dummy chapter mark, and continue to play the next title (it's an illusion of you skipping to the next title).

Regards,
George

[Helge]

Its possible and totaly consistent with the dvd-spec. You can find many commercial dvds which do that. But you cannot do it with dws2 - at least not with one title.
But if you dont fear patching the dvd, it not so difficult. I have done it once - with only one title. If the title was selected, the whole tiitle was played, if a chapter was selected just this chapter was played. (Its also possible to return to the menu after playing more than one title.) This has an advantage above playlists: playing the whole title works without interruptions.
Do the following:
Create your dvd with one title and a menu to select the tilte or individual chapters. Dont burn the dvd but create a dvd folder. Use pgcedit ( http://www.videohelp.com/~r0lZ/pgcedit ) to patch the dvd. You need to locate the pgc for your title (if you have only one title this will be VTST1 TTN1) and add cell commands for every chapter where you wont to return to the menu. In my case I used: "if gprm7 == 3 jump tail pgc". (I had made a notice of this.) The exact gprm or the compare value might however vary. As far as I figured out ulead uses gprm10 for the title number and gprm11 for the chapter number. So probably "if gprm == ... jump tail pgc" would also work.
If you want to better understand how dvds work I would suggest reading the book dvddemystified ( http://www.dvddemystified.com ).
At moment I am very busy and dont have much time, but my intension is to write a tutorial of how to patch a dvd ( 16:9 menus, subtitles, reordering buttons, manipulating playlists, ...)

[Helge]

The tutorial I promised is here: http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic. ... 2486#62486

[sjj1805]

Thank you Helge That was a very comprehensive and informative article.