I have a 6-piece documentary series in avi format that i converted to mpeg to burn on one (maybe two) dvd's with a menu created with dvd lab.
now, i have some questions remaining:
1) my mpegs are 352X576 4:3 PAL (i believe..., can't check right now). for sure,its less width then height if you know what i mean. you can see it when previewing in windows media player. Does the final dvd show the movie in that way as well or will it change it to fullscreen / 4:3 aspect ratio by itself? I don't want to have a dvd playing on my TV with the movie takinp up only 1/3 or so of the available space...
2) How do i tell DVD lab to start a dvd by playing a short movie and show the first menu only after finishing the short clip?
3) Is there a way to tell DVD lab to play an audio clip when clicking a button and only then perfom the assigned action (go to a different menu)?
Thanks rebootjim! I have managed to get that done...
However, there are more problems...with demuxing. I have created my menu and have all the AVI files in Mpeg1 now and added them to it. however, when it asks me if i want to Demux right away and i say Yes, it generates weird video files of 8 to 150 MB from a 400-500 MB AVI. so that somehow doesn't work. as an alternative, I used TMPEnc to Demux myself but i get .m1v video files that DVD lab won't accept and 44 kHz audio that will need to be transcoded.
thus, i decided not to Demux them and to just add the mpeg1's as they are.
when compiling, i used test mode with movie dummies in it to check if eerything is cool and it turns out great. so i decided to let the real compiling start and Bang!, it quits after 1 or 2 minutes and says it's done! no error message, nothing. and my dvd output folder has size 0 bytes.
DVDLab is a DVD authoring tool, not an encoder.
It accepts mpeg-2, dvd compliant NTSC or PAL video streams, and 48000hz audio streams.
It assumes that you have properly prepared your assets before importing them.
Mpeg-1 is not dvd spec.
You CAN turn off the compliance, and let dvdlab author mpeg-1's, but the audio will still have to be 48000hz.
Your specific problem is probably due to mixed assets.
By that, I mean that one mpeg is a different aspect ratio, or contains different audio, than any other.
Unless ALL your assets are the same frame size (aspect ratio) and all audio is the same format (mp2, ac3), then it simply won't compile properly.
There is a way around this, but with no guarantee that it will play on your standalone player.
If you put each movie (with it's audio) into a separate VTS, then link the menu to the VTS, then each VTS to it's own movie.
DVDLab Pro is needed for this, as the regular dvdlab doesn't support multiple VTS.
I have checked non-compliance to work with mpeg1's and the only troubole i have is the message that it might not play. all the mpeg's are same bitrate and audio, it's mp2 with 44 kHz. I get the fact that it won't compile if i don't Demux and transcode, allright. but why won't it Demux properly? Should i extract audio with virtual dub or Demux with tmpegenc, convert the audio with beSweet to 48kHz and then mux the new audio with the old video in tmpegenc again. that way, i could add the mpeg1's with the new audio to dvd lab and choose don't Demux as option and compile. what do you think?
Personally, I hate dvdlab's demuxer, and always Demux everything externally (in TMPGEnc or whatever).
I also never use Besweet to do my audio. I use ffmpeggui and transcode everything to AC3.
Just import the elementary streams into dvdlab.
