Annoying problems with DVD Workshop

[andi71]

Hi,

I use Powertools 2 (the german product name for DVD-Workshop 2) since it has been released. I have sucessfully created several hundreds of DVDs, but one thing really annoys me. To explain what I mean I have to tell you which files I work with: First I record digitally broadcasted movies/shows (by cable) with my digital tv-card. The recording format is called PVA. The files are demuxed with a tool called Project X or as an alternative tool PVA-Strumento. I get two streams then, one video (mpeg) and one audio stream. As they are already DVD compatible, DVD-Workshop produces very quickly the DVD files - and without any quality-loss compared with the broadcasted file as no re-rendering is needed. What annoys me now is the time I have to wait when adding chapters. When I set chapters and scroll or type in the timecode it takes the software for example 10 - 30 seconds to "reach" this position (dependend on how far away from the last chapter/beginning) I go. DVD-Workshop 1 was much faster (although not perfect). If I use files which contain audio and video in one stream (muxed) it works much quicker, but Project X cannot produce that kind of file. PVA-Strumento is able to do so, but now and then problems occured (in some files audio/video weren't in sync) so I use only Project X now. To wait for example 10 seconds seems not very long if it would only be a matter of one chapter, but if you create a project of nine comedy shows and part every show into 12 chapters (and have to go back and forward to find a good place for a chapter) it really costs you a lot of time. And if I load a project and had stopped my work setting the chapter at the end of the file: I have to wait a long time until the software works again so I try not to forget jumping back to timecode 00:00:00 before leaving DVD-Workshop (on every movie). I have 1 GB memory, a 2,8 GHz Intel pentium IV processor and 160 GB of harddisk space (raid system). My OS is Windows XP. I cannot believe that my hardware is to slow (although bought 3 years ago, so not a hyperthreading processor). Has anybody encountered the same problems and has a solution? I hope I am not asking a question which has been already discussed.

Second problem: Is it possible to build a menu wich allows you to play only a single chapter? If for example in a show two songs can be heard and you marked the beginning of song one with chapter 2 and song two with chapter 5 you can of course choose them on a menu - but choosing chapter 2 means that not only chapter 2 but all following chapters will be played too, and only afterwards the menu appears again. Of course you could create additional mpeg-files containing the songs, but this costs to much DVD-space and wouldn't be necessary if there would be an option in the playlist to play only a certain chapter and ending that chapter jumping back to the menu - or is there a way I haven't found out yet?

Many thanks in forward
Andi

[DiscCoasterPro]

You can use the playlist to return to the main menu after chapter 2 is played

[Devil]

Can't answer your first question, but prior muxing of the video and audio may be an answer, if that is possible.

Second question is that WS2 will not permit interrupting a title at the end of a chapter. I believe there is a workaround but I haven't tried it. It involves inserting a 1 second black loop between the chapters, but I'm not sure of the details; perhaps someone else can guide you.

[GeorgeW]

Regarding the second question:

Is there a small fade to/from black between songs? If so, you could make all the songs separate mpegs. Then string them together in a playlist for when you need them to play consecutively. Or just play a single song and return to the menu.

Regards,
George

[andi71]

Thank you for your answers. Well, of course I could make seperate mpegs. But I want also be able to see the whole show without those unavoidable short pauses, which would be the result, if I would cut the show in seperate mpegs and put them together in in one playlist. I have discovered only two solutions yet: 1. DVD containing the full mpeg-file a n d additional mpegs for the songs. This would mean more space on DVD is used. 2. Full mpeg-file with chapters at the beginning of each song. The user selects the song from the menu and has to go back to the menu manually when the song has been finished. But this wouldn't look as professional as it is intended by me.

Greetings
Andi

[colin99]

You can use the playlist to return to the main menu after chapter 2 is played

Indeed you can. But it doesn't work, it just trundles on playing all the stuff you've not asked for. In my case I want one copy of the MPEGs but to have a "full" menu where you can play all of the chapters and a "restricted" menu which plays just requested segments.

The problems seem to come about when you use a menu which contains chapters from different MPEGs. If all the chapters in a single menu are from the same MPEG, it behaves properly. But if the chapters are from differing MPEGs then there seems to be a bug whereby it fails to return to the menu after playing the selected chapter.

Any solutions please?

I tried creating cut down MPEGs with just the required chapters, but this was cumbersome and the extra editing caused a loss of MPEG quality. I am trying to avoid having to run the tapes again to capture the shorter segments without editing, just to overcome this bug.