Bill Stephan
Forum Replies Created
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DVD uses MPEG-2 assets, not MPEG-4.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
What yo need to create in your authoring software is a still show, not a slide show.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
I’m doing HD 1080P (and some 1080i) finishing on Symphony Nitris 1.7 on Windows XP (32-bit), and my system might show some strain but does not bog down with effects-heavy sequences. Expert render is your best friend when dealing with multiple layers of effects. That function renders only what is necessary to play back the sequence correctly. In most cases, rendering every layer is unnecessary and a waste of time and system resources.
I believe most, if not all, of the BCC effects do need to be rendered, where the Avid effects have much more real-time capability. Of course, that depends on how many and what type you have stacked together in one place.
FWIW, I am upgrading my system to Symphony Nitris DX 5.5 when it is installed in our new facility. We always want to go faster and that new 12-core CPU with Windows 7 64-bit will help.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
I don’t use Vegas or DVD Architect, so I can’t advise you on specific settings within the software. But any DVD-compliant software encoder (Apple Compressor, for example) will take an HD or NTSC 24P file and encode it to an interlaced NTSC 29.97 file with flags to indicate the pulldown. The DVD player can read the flags, causing it to display 24-frame video if the attached monitor is capable of displaying that format. Otherwise, the DVD player outputs normal NTSC to the display.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
DVD is either 29.97 or 25fps interlaced. A 24P encode is done as 29.97 interlaced with flags for the 3:2 pulldown.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
NTSC is always lower/bottom/even field first (except in some MPEG-2 workflows for broadcast use). PAL and all HD standards are upper/top/odd field first.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
This is very complicated but possible. What you can do is set your menu buttons to “Auto Activate”. When you navigate the selection to the button, it takes you to another menu entirely, which would play the graphic effects you desire. Each menu needs to be a motion menu if there are any animated effects you wish to display. If there are more than a few buttons, you will be creating a large number of animated menus to handle all the navigation possibilities.
Menus such as I’ve described work in DVD players only. The auto activation function is disabled in software DVD players to prevent unintended activation from mouseovers.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
[Siu Kei Ip] “And what is the minimum requirement of the PC for DVD encoding?”
The manufacturer of the encoder board will have specific requirements for the PC for its products. In general, you want a workstation PC (not an “office” PC) for its segmented PCI bus. You need a faster (and big) second hard drive to store the media. DVD encoding does not require a RAID.
[Siu Kei Ip] “IS the quality Okay for retailed DVD?”
You should demo the encoder you are considering using familiar footage to see whether you like the results.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
Canopus might have an encoder board similar to Zapex. There is also the Sonic Solutions encoders. Using a Black Magic or Aja capture card requires software encoding after capture.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City -
See if you can find someone selling a used Zapex encoder board. Be aware that the company went out of business years ago, so you want at least the board and the software. Better would be a working PC with the board already set-up.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City