Chapter markers in video output

[gwtomic]

I have created several chapter markers in the video timeline and when I go to share and create a DVD or blu ray disk I see the chapter markers are reflected in the the create chapter menu which is what I would expect. I don't want to create a whole disk but I want to create a video file like mp4 that includes the chapter markers as part of the video file. I believe that the mp4 format supports chapter markers based on this page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_Part_14

I can't seem to create a video output file that also includes the chapter markers. Is this possible in video studio x4 or am I forced to create a DVD or blu ray disk with a menu structure in order to preserve the chapters in the resultant output?

[DVDDoug]

I think you have to make a disc. And, if you can create an MP4 file with chapters, you'd still need player software that supports chapters in a "raw" A/V file.

am I forced to create a DVD or blu ray disk with a menu structure in order to preserve the chapters in the resultant output?

You don't need to burn a physical disc. You can created the file structure on your hard drive and play the DVD-files with your DVD-player software. (I've not tried this with Blu-Ray, but I assume it works also.)

And, you don't actually need a menu link for chapters on a DVD. ( If you don't have a menu button, the >>| and |<< buttons on your remote will skip between chapters.) I usually have a menu, but I sometimes have "extra" chapter points with no direct menu button/link. For example, I often put an extra chapter point at the very end (and sometimes at the end-credits) so the viewer can skip-ahead to the end of the title (and on to the next title, if there is one).

[gwtomic]

Yes I usually create the DVD or blu ray on the hard disk rather than burning it to a physical disk. I'm finding that not many networked players play DVD/bluray folders over the network. The only one I've found thus far is the boxee box. My blu ray player nor my T.V. will play DVD/blu-ray images over the network (either ISO or folder) but they happily play mp4 files. I recently tried creating a blu ray disk because I want to use h.264 encoding rather than MPEG-2 and my cyberlink powerdvd 8 which plays blu rays from my blu ray drive doesn't play it from a hard disk folder! Yes I could probably find a software player that does or buy a different living room device but that costs extra $$$. These devices all play mp4 files for example so that is why I want to use that format.