Scot Sheely
Forum Replies Created
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WOW! Barry, thanks for the response.
FYI, your book came with the DVX100BP I bought two years ago.
I have read and re-read that book many times. I love it! Best resource ever for that camera. Thanks for writing it, and thank you for your input here.
Did you also help produce the DVX DVD that came with the unit as well?
Scot Sheely
IMG Productions
Columbia, SC -
WOW!
GREAT responses, guys, thank you so very much!
This was exactly the info I was looking for. I finally found the info on Panny’s website on the HVX200’s specs, but your answer was what I was reallt fishing for, David.
GREAT info! Thanks again to the both of you, I appreciate your help.
Scot Sheely
IMG – Interactive Media Gurus
Columbia, SC -
Carlos,
The missing ingredient in this equation is the before now unmentioned ninth menu, which was executed so flawlessly that it was nearly transparent in its function – not in the connotation of layer / menu visibility, just its function.
Take a very close look at the beginning of the DVD menu playback, especially at 1:01. In this section, you will see the words “Sonali Gulati” in the lower right-hand corner.
Take notice of the fact that no menu item is selected; this is our first clue at unraveling this mystery. Since it fades in and out, it is part of an animated BG, not a subpicture highlight text object. Consider this to be the “First Play” menu. It is using a simple “Play Once” function, then is set in its “End Action” to automatically lead into the actual menu #1.
When the first menu actually appears at around 1:13 (“Sum Total”), notice that the first menu item is automatically selected and that the text beneath the “picture” disappears. This is our next clue as to the function of the menu navigation. This same function is maintained throughout the remaining menus.
Without examining the actual DVD, it is hard to tell if their are 9 or 10 menus. It may be that the First Play leads into a full menu, which we will call Menu 0 (“Menu Zero”), which, once a menu item is selected, leads into the subsequent menus. In my best estimation, I believe he is using 10 menus for the navigation and opening animation.
It is important to understand and fully comprehend the Autoplay function to make this effect work properly. From the “Menu 0”, you need to set the navigation to any other menu as autoplay to make the transition between menus as smooth and transparent as possible.
Once and item is selected and the DVD player’s remote “Enter”, “OK” or “Select” button is pushed, it is no longer desirable to use the autoplay function. Just set this as you normally would with any other DVD menu selection to play the actual video.
I have used this effect quite a few times in the last 2-3 years, but with a different twist than Sonali did here in the example you provided the link to. Just for perspective, take a look at a simpler, yet similar menu design I did in 2006:
https://www.digitaljuice.com/dj_showcase/detail.asp?page=1&portfolioid={789958A7-FF87-4A8C-8638-522B81765890}&sortby=&cid=0&tagid=0&display=&workid=2064
Notice that the heart, which is the menu pointer icon, never stops beating. This function is maintained through all of the menu navigation, and the heart moves up or down to the corresponding text. The background is also animated, which also continues throughout every menu selection.
Although I did not demonstrate the menu navigation, only the animation aspects, it works in the same way that Sonali’s menu design does.
The one caveat to all of this that has yet to be spoken is that all of this takes a tremendous amount of pre-production planning to execute properly. Also, note that burned DVD’s tend to lag just a bit longer than replicated DVD’s in the naviation between different menus. In most cases, your clients won’t really notice the jump, but to most of us in this industry, that small bump can seem like a mountain at times.
If you get stumped, or just need some help on any particular aspect of pulling this off, feel free to call me at my studio at 803-708-8043. I am in the EST / EDT on the East Coast (USA), and you are welcome to call anytime from 8:00 AM until midnight, 7 days a week.
Scot Sheely
IMG -Interactive Media Gurus
Columbia, SC -
Mark,
That is the most concise and appropriate information I have ever seen on this subject. Bravo!
Last year, we had a shoot for Cingular Wireless announcing their 3G rollout for their point of sales centers throughtout the Carolinas. This was a big deal, and involved multiple speakers, several Power Point presentations and multiple video clips (their broadcast commercials from that time period).
We handled it exactly as you mention, with the one added exception being that we were unable to do more than a 2 camera shoot due to extreme space limitations in an overly crowded mini-theater (a convex cascading forum type of venue).
The first camera was set directly dead-center at the top of the theater, and covered both the main speaker(s)and the entire overhead projection screen as well. The second camera was at the 4 o’clock position, if you view the speaker’s position as 12 o’clock. The other camera would be considered to be at the 6 o’clock position.
In post, a zoom-in transition was added between the projection screen and the source video clips or the PPT slides, which were exported from the PPT project as you described in your post above. This made it smoother and more natural to the viewer when watching the final video.
As you stated, this effect was not done willy-nilly, but as was necessary to help tell the story. When there was a lot of technical data involving numbers, that was a pretty good indicator that it was time to switch from the speaker’s camera (cam 2 at the 4 o’clock position) to the PPT slide or video clip.
At no time was the transition very long in its duration when using the zoom-in trick, it was only a way to bring the viewer up to the full screen. An alternate way to handle this would have been to use a simple cross-dissolve between the camera shots and the PPT slides. Either way works, but the way we did it was very smooth and natural, and drew the viewer’s attention to the screen a bit better than a simple cross-dissolve.
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The very best way to achieve this effect using the DVX100B is to use a program called “Scenalyzer”, which will actually capture the 60i or 24p footage you have shot previously in preset intervals, which will give you that ultra hyper-speed time lapse look. Scenalyzer also will capture from multiple sources at the same time, and capture footage in FF mode, so a full 1-hour tape takes only a few minutes to capture, with no apparent loss in quality. Great program, not too expensive, either.
Of course, you could also just speed up the footage 600% or something like that to give a more direct hyper speed look, if that will work for you.
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This is the durect link for their new “Reference” program, which appears to have supplanted the previous versions from just a few months ago.
In all cases, what you are supposed to do is download and install the free trial, then select the codec(s) you need, purchase that / those option(s), download and install any and all of the ones you buy.
I agree, their site has turned into a confusing and uttely bloody mess. It is hard to navigate and even harder to make sense of all of the changes they have made recently to their product lines.
If they intend to stay competitive in the marketplace, they need to do something to clarify their products and descriptions immediately.
Although I love their products and IMO think that they previously have been the very best of the encoders on the marketplace, this is ridiculous and will definitely run off many potential customers who cannot find what they are looking for.
I will call or e-mail them tomorrow to make sure all of this info is correct and to recommend to them to get the engineers and web masters together for a “lunch and learn” session to hopefully improve their website.
Scot
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I am not sure about the CS3 version of Encore, but the 2.0 version will not allow you to even import a .PDF file, let alone set up a local disc link to that type of asset. The Blu-ray specification is supposed to allow for many new ways to access multimedia content, but I am not sure if it is implemented into Encore CS3 yet. This certainly would be an excellent feature request for future iterations of Emcore.
Only a handful of the Sonic products offer the capability for web links etc. (like DVDit, eDVD, Scenarist) or some other upper-end authoring solutions (Spruce DVD etc.). This might apply to linking internal files as well, not sure.
Also, as I recall, I believe that Apple’s laster versions of DVD Studio Pro also allows for this type of action, due to its scripting (programming language) abilities. I may be wrong on this, but I vaguely remember seeing that somewhere in one of my manuals or online for that app.
For our level of authoring, one thing that can be done is to create (or have created for you) a Macromedia Shockwave file that has an autoplay / autorun feature embedded in the ROM portion of a DVD.
Then, web links, audio, video and even links to local or remote PDF files are possible.
Shockwave is the older cousin to Flash and has been around in various forms since the 1980’s. Almost all of the enhanced CD’s that have bonus content use Shockwave, with a few exceptions found here and there. Flash also has the ability to accomplish what you are asking.
If you are interested in this, send me an e-mail and I will provide a link to an .ISO disc image you can download and burn of a project I created about a month ago for another videographer. It contains embedded web links, as that is all they wanted at the time, but a link to a local (on disc) .PDF file is a very easy feat to accomplish.
FYI, I have been programming in Shockwave Director since 1995 and have created dozens of projects over the years.
E-mail: scot “at” imgvideos.com
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You could try one of the following conversion programs, but no assurances that they will work properly to convert the HDV .mov files you have:
https://www.radgametools.com/bnkdown.htm
(Rad Tools)https://tmpgenc.pegasys-inc.com/en/product/te4xp.html (TEMPGEnc Express)
https://www.smart-soft.net/video-converter/
(Smartsoft Video Converter Pro)https://mediacoder.sourceforge.net/
(Mediacoder)These all do work quite well for some people, and for others not at all. I have found great success with all of these software tools, so give them a try and see if they intergrate well within your workflow.
Scot
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Seems to me like you created a 16:9 (1.2 pixel aspect ratio) project.
Try closing that current project and create a new 4:3 project. That will give you the proper pixel aspect ratio (.9) for video shot in 4:3.
You shouldn’t have to stretch it at that point at all.
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Joe Bowden actually answered that question correctly. This is a dedicated function in the DVD spec, which all hardware players observe.
The only work-around I can think of at this time is to provide a link at the bottom of the menu with a “Main Menu” button or text listed there, and then link that back to your desired menu.
If you are already at the root level menu, as you mentioned in that post, then think of the Menu button as an “A/B” toggle button, which takes you back to the last place you viewed on your DVD.
This is a similar type of function as when you stop a DVD from playing by hitting the STOP button (usually the square) one time only, then, when you hit the PLAY button (usually the triangle) the DVD resumes from where you were last viewing.
Its all part of the DVD specification that the PTB (powers that be) decided upon many years ago.
Of course, with Blu-ray authoring, all bets are off, as you will be able to do some interesting navigation and layering tricks when the programming is fully implemented, which at this time, it is not that way yet. Close, but no cigar!
Scot