Introduction to DVD Studio Pro

http://www.cla.purdue.edu/vpa/etb/ Fabian Winkler

Required software for this workshop: Description Apple DVD Studio Pro http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/dvdstudiopro/

Apple DVD Studio Pro 4 Workshop

When you open DVD Studio Pro for the first time a window appears which prompts you to set your initial project settings, for now choose: configuration - advanced mode and SD DVD. As with the other pieces of software, for all question related to DVD Studio Pro that we cannot address in class please consult the excellent DVD Studio Pro User Manual, go to:

Help > DVD Studio Pro User Manual

DVD Studio Pro User Interface For beginners, chapter 4 - The DVD Studio Pro Interface, might be helpful to explain all the functions of the softwares user interface. Here is a short glance (please also see screenshot on page 2): 1. Toolbar 2. DVD Graphical Outline (Graphical/Outline) 3. Canvas (Menu/Viewer/Connections) 4. Browser (Assets/Log) 5. Timeline (track/slideshow/story/script) 6. Property inspector 7. Palette

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If you have lost a window you can always go the Window menu section and specify which window you would like to open back up (For example Window > Assets in order to open up the assets window). Even before you have started to work on anything it is a good idea to save your DVD project File > Save As Again, save your project in the same location as your other animation project files. DVD Studio Pro will give your DVD the same name that you just gave to your project, you can later on change the name if you like in the property inspector.

Importing Quicktime Videos Before you import any Quicktime video files we will need to double-check the compression settings in DVD Studio Pro. DVD Studio Pro does not work directly with the DV compressed Quicktime video files that Final Cut Pro exports but with MPEG2 compressed video files. DVD Studio Pro has a built-in compressor that will compress all video files for you.

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This is a slow encoding process that you will need to sit through. Fortunately only once when you author your DVD. The result is for a very fast (real time) decoding process whenever you watch the DVD). Go to:

DVD Studio Pro > Preferences (go to the Encoding tab at the far right)

The important settings are: Mode (set to Two Pass VBR) Bit Rate: can be set to around 5.0 Mbps Max Bit Rate: set at around 7.0 Mbps Motion Estimation: set to best Method indicates how the encoding process is executed background encoding starts with the encoding immediately after you have imported a video file as asset and work on the encoding in the background while you work with the DVD authoring in the foreground. Encode on build only starts the encoding process when you have finished working on your DVD and are ready to build and burn it, this is sometimes the more reliable way to encode your files even though effectively it costs you more time. Now you are ready to import your video file. All media files that you are going to use in your DVD are called assets.

File > Import > Asset

Working with Video Assets Create an empty container for your first video track: Project > Track or simply click on Add Track in the toolbar.

> Add to Project

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Drag the video and audio file from your imported asset to the track container (see step 1 in the screenshot above) Double clicking on the track now opens the video in the viewer and you will see a timeline representation of your video in the track tab at the bottom of your user interface (see step 2). Next, create a second video track for your second Quicktime movie.

Creating Menus Create an empty Menu by using the Add Menu button in the toolbar. Double click on the menu in the Graphical Editor so that the property inspector displays the menus properties. For example, the background property allows you to select a background image for your menu (create it at 720x540 pixels in Photoshop, then in the last step before saving the file scale it un-proportionally to 720x480 it will look squished and save it as .psd file, import this file as an asset like you imported your movies). For the sake of simplicity I will skip over this step though (we come back to it later when we look at improved menus in DVD Studio Pro). Now I would like to create a first text-based button, which we will link to the first video track. Just click and drag anywhere you would like the button to begin:
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Next click on the buttons outline and type in the text that you would like to have displayed in the Text property in the property inspector (which changes its appearance based on the focus of your last click). Make sure the inspector displays the Style tab. After you typed in the text for the button, check Center from the Text Position property and finally check the Include Text in Highlights box, so that the text changes colors based on mouse over or remote control selection.

In the next step, select the colors for the buttons highlights there is one color for the buttons Normal state (i.e. it just sits in your menu), one for the selected state (somebody selected the button or moved the mouse over it) and one for the activated state (somebody pressed the button or activated it with the OK button on the remote
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control). Go to the Colors tab and set the colors accordingly. You can mix your own colors by clicking on the Edit Palette button on the bottom of the inspector window:

Finally, we need to link the button to the video track it should trigger. Go to the Target property in the property inspector (still with the button selected in the Menu Viewer) and choose Tracks and Stories > YourVideoTitle > [Track] from the pulldown menu.

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This should create an arrow that points from the menu to the video track in the Graphical view:

You can repeat the above steps for button number 2, linking it to video track 2. We still need to think about what to do when the video is done playing. Fortunately, DVD Studio Pro has an End Jump property, which was created for this situation. We can use it in order to jump back to the menu once a video has finished playing back, allowing the viewer to choose another video. Click on a video track in the Graphical viewer and then choose: Menus > Menu 1 > [Menu] in the property inspectors End Jump property.

As you can see, this property even allows you to specify individual buttons that can be preselected for viewers after jumping back to the menu from a video track. The arrows in the Graphical view should now point in both directions between the menu and individual video tracks

Setting First Play and naming the DVD In order for DVD players to be able to read your DVD correctly, you will need to set the First Play action. It is a little hint for the DVD player what to play first after the DVD has been inserted. It makes the most sense in our case to choose the menu for this purpose but in other cases other media elements might make more sense (e.g. you can choose menus, tracks, scripts or slideshows to be played first). Click anywhere in the gray area
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of the Graphical view window, then select: property inspectors First Play property.

Menus > Menu 1 > [Menu] in the

If you like you can change the name of your DVD in the same window of the property inspector, typing it into the Name field.

Finishing Up and Previewing Your DVD Your DVD Studio Pro desktop should look somewhat like this:

You are now ready to simulate the DVD. Click on the Simulate button in the toolbar or go to File > Simulate Disc

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If your video plays well in the simulator and all the menu buttons work as expected (check the highlights, where they are linking to and if viewers return to the menu after watching a video) you can go ahead and build and format (i.e. burn) your final DVD. Go to File > Advanced Burn > Build and Format or simply click the Build and Format icon in the toolbar. In the Build & Format menu under Current Build choose a new folder that you create in your project folder. This is where all the compiled files of the build process will go.

Finally, click Build and Format in the menu window and insert a DVD-R disc into the combo drive. From there DVD Studio Pro handles the burning process and will report to when your disc is ready. In the next DVD workshop we will look at improved menus with text that is rendered smoother and the inclusion of Photoshop graphics that you can turn into customly designed buttons.

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