Chapter 1: Introduction

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Chapter 1
Introduction

Welcome to the Spruce Technologies family of users, and thank you for purchasing one of
our award-winning DVD authoring solutions.
Were dedicated to providing you with the fastest, easiest, and most powerful DVD
authoring tools available. Were also committed to providing you with unparalleled
customer service. Hopefully youll find all the answers you need in this Users Guide; your
QuickStart Guide; the Support area of our Web site (www.spruce-tech.com); or your
Spruce authoring softwares built-in Help feature.
Should you encounter any questions or difficulties that are not resolved by one of the resources, please be sure to contact us directly and well do our best to get you back to
authoring as soon as possible. Youll find contact information for Spruce Technologies
Technical Support at the end of this chapter.

Please Read Your QuickStart Guide First

Before reading further and before you start using your Spruce Technologies authoring
software or DVDStation please review the QuickStart Guide that accompanies this
Users Guide, and was included with your Spruce Technologies authoring software or
DVDStation.
In your QuickStart Guide, youll find important basic information about:
DVDMaestro and DVDConductor authoring software;
DVDStationMX and DVDStationCX authoring systems;
our philosophy behind our products;
what youll need to know in order to use Spruce Technologies authoring tools;
how to set up your DVDStation;

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 what hardware youll need to provide;

how to start your system, Windows NT, and DVDMaestro or DVDConductor;
plus an overview of the authoring process, using DVDMaestro or DVDConductor (duplicated in Chapter 2 of this Users Guide).

About This Users Guide

We expect that youll be tempted to try your hand with Spruce authoring software before
you read much of this Users Guide and thats fair enough! However, we strongly recommend that you do take the time to read this Users Guide thoroughly before you begin
any authoring projects in earnest especially any projects for commercial release, or
which are facing deadline pressures. By doing so, youll probably end up saving yourself
considerable time.

What Applies to DVDMaestro & What Applies to DVDConductor?

As we described in the QuickStart Guide, DVDMaestro is our top-of-the-line authoring software, designed for creating no-compromise DVD titles of almost any kind. DVDConductor, on
the other hand, gives you the tools to do most DVD titles for an entry level price.
Importantly, as we also mentioned, DVDConductor is also designed to be a modular program. You can start with a basic version of the program, and, as you need them, you can
add any of two different enhancement Packs, including:
DVDPowerPack for authoring more complex titles, this enhancement to
DVDConductor gives you a full nine camera angles, dual-layer support, interactive
command scripts (GPRM support), playlists, closed-captioning support, and more.
DVDEncoderPack provides three professionally oriented encoder features beyond
those included with DVDConductor, including segment re-encoding, multipass variable bit-rate (VBR), inverse telecine, and forced I frames.

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Or, if you want all the features of Spruce authoring software, you may upgrade to
DVDMaestro, which has all the features of DVDConductor, including DVDPowerPack and
DVDEncoderPack. DVDMaestro also includes the following advanced features:

Parental lock, regional lock, CGMS support, APS copy protection, CSS Encryption,
karaoke support, publisher I.D. field support, DVD jacket picture support, and more.
Unless otherwise noted, everything we describe in this Users Guide applies to both
DVDMaestro and DVDConductor. Well highlight any of those features or specifications
that do not apply to DVDConductor, or which require one of the enhancement Packs
listed above, by making a note in the text and/or in the margin.

Note: So that we dont need to continually repeat DVDMaestro and DVDConductor

authoring software, well often just refer to either or both of them as authoring software.
Again, unless otherwise noted, all features and specs will apply to both programs.

How Weve Organized This Users Guide

This Users Guide combines both tutorial and reference material into one manual. As you
begin using Spruce authoring software, you might find that the best way to familiarize
yourself with its features is to sit at your computer with this manual at hand, and to go
through the following chapters sequentially. Thereafter, you may find it easiest to look up
specific information using the Index located at the back of this Users Guide.
If youre particularly experienced with authoring DVD-Video titles, the next chapter, Fundamentals, should give you much of what you need to get going with Spruce authoring
software.

Note: Please note that in a few cases, Spruce authoring software offers multiple ways of accessing certain functions; this is particularly true of certain Properties settings. Consequently, in a few areas of this manual, youll find information that duplicates (or nearly duplicates) information found elsewhere. Weve done this so that youll learn what you need
to know in context, with a minimum of jumping back and forth throughout the manual.

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Whats New in 2.0

(DVDMaestro Users Only)
Note: This section is intended for users already familiar with earlier versions of DVDMaestro
authoring software. If youre a user of DVDConductor, were happy to point out that many of
the features new to DVDMaestro 2.0 are also shared by the current version of DVDConductor.
When DVDMaestro 1.0 was introduced in early 1998, it was quickly hailed as an entirely
new approach to DVD authoring software, one which combined powerful technology with
an intuitive, easy-to-understand user interface. When it came time for us to create
DVDMaestro version 2.0, our primary goal was to enhance both the softwares underlying
technology, and its user interface, to make the program even more powerful and even
easier to use.
To achieve this goal, weve added over 40 new features to DVDMaestro. These features
span almost every operational area of DVDMaestro. In every case, however, weve worked
hard to incorporate these new features as seamlessly as possible. Consequently, if youre
already familiar with DVDMaestro versions 1.0 to 1.3, youll find the transition to 2.0 to be
straightforward and, we trust, as intuitive as the program itself.

Some of What Weve Come Up With

Among the many new features of 2.0, youll find:
Enhanced DVD Menus, with support for:
importing Adobe Photoshop files directly into DVD Menus, with smart
layer recognition of backgrounds and subpictures;
overlapping button highlight areas;
drag-and-drop linking of Chapter Start Markers and button highlight areas;
saving custom Color Map settings;
three Color Groups, so that different sets of buttons can have different highlight areas;
right-clicking in the Target window to change the target;
and more.

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 Enhanced DVD Movies, with support for:

mixed multi-angle video, with multi-angles available in specific sections of

video only;
incorporating still images in a DVD Movie;
16:9 dynamic DVD Menus (motion menus);
EDL-style views of DVD Movies, with start/end time information;
on-the-fly concatenation of multiple video files within a single track;
multiple options for Chapter Markers, including Chapter Start, End actions,
and Remote Key actions (without having to use the Connections window);
display of Video Bit Rate (VBR) in the video track;
the ability to add active buttons and button highlighting within the moving
video stream of a DVD Movie;
and more.
And many other enhancements, including:
support for DTS-encoded audio;
advanced encoding features, including forced I-frame insertion and smart
segment re-encode for film-mode (requires Spruce Technologies MPX-3000
hardware);
improved Subtitle Editor features;
improved Navigation Simulator features;
and much more.

Keep Those Suggestions Coming!

Many of these features are a direct response to suggestions from DVDMaestro 1.x users.
For all of you who offered your ideas for improvements, we thank you very much. And for
everyone, once youve become familiar with DVDMaestro (or DVDConductor, for that
matter), we encourage you to let us know what other new features youd like to see in future versions of your authoring software.

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If you have an idea for a new feature, or new product youd like to see, please email us at:
[email protected]
Wed love to hear from you.

Contacting Spruce Technologies

Technical Support
Should you run into any questions or problems for which you dont find answers in this
manual, Spruce Technologys technical support staff is ready to help you.
Heres how you can reach our Technical Support staff:
Spruce Technologies Technical Support
toll-free telephone (US & Canada): (877) 2-SPRUCE / (877) 277-7823
international telephone: +1 (408) 861-2299
fax: (408) 863-9701
email: [email protected]
Web: www.spruce-tech.com
Our technical support hours are Monday through Friday 9am to 5pm (North American Pacific time). Our main switchboard telephone number is (408) 863-9700.

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