Thankyou Allyn. One more question. Will the authoring software simply just add the chapters wherever the natural "breaks" occur, and in the places I have split the event?

i've never used any authoring software other than mydvd (yet) so i can't answer authoritatively. hopefully someone else can answer.

my guess is the answer to your question is no, the authoring software won't look at the content of your video at all. it will probably have options for chapter marks at fixed intervals but anything more complicated than that would have to be done manually.

I don't use MY DVD (Easy CD/DVD 6) but I think My DVD works pretty much the same way. In Screenblast take your original movie, break it up into "chapters", re-render the chapters. Then in MY DVD (I think this works) you can just chain the chapters together. It is a work around because MY DVD really doesn't support chapters, but it does look like chapters.

Been trying to learn DVD-LAB. Works pretty well, is pretty hard to understand at first, but has lots of power once you start figuring it out. It has a 30 day demo (9 days left and I might have to buy).

MyDVD will produce chapter markers IF you bring the video segments into the program in the order that you want on the final DVD. Just break the project into small .avi segments that represent the chapters. Once they are in the dvd project, you can NOT rearrange them unless you delete them and bring them back in. Not very graceful, but it does work. I prefer the Ulead Movie Factory 3 as it allows the segments to be rearranged. For most, the menu abilities are more than adequate. I agree with others that DVD-LAB is great but I don't require all the flexibility that comes with it's high price. The menus in UleadMF3 allow you to use your own photos in the menu backgrounds. It also contains a label printing feature. It also has a trial version and a fancy version called Creator for twice the money.
Kent

> Will the authoring software simply just add the chapters wherever the natural "breaks" occur, and in the places I have split the event?

DVDLab has an "auto-chapter" feature that uses scene detection to set chapter points. I've never used it because it's such a simple thing to do manualy and you get exactly what you want.

Ian G.

Just a note about labels:

It is usually recommended that you do NOT stick labels on your DVDs. The DVD players run much hotter than CD players. While a CD player can play a disc with a label on it without problems, a DVD player will, over time, likely break down the glue on the label and could possibly do some real damage.

"Just break the project into small .avi segments that represent the chapters."

merkelck,

Thankyou. I think what your saying is to render and send small pieces (chapters) to My DVD at a time. What I have been doing is sending about an hour and a half (of compressed video) from the timeline at a time....which gives you one chapter.....might as well leave the video on a tape in that case.

Dan

Another benefit of rendering small segments is that it makes it a little easier to go back into the
program and make changes. You are absolutely right about the benifits of chapters. That is what makes a dvd so attractive.
Kent

I have tried this “workaround” with MyDVD, to create “chapters”. (Answer ID 907 in the Knowledge base):

http://www.custcenter.com/cgi-bin/sonypictures.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_sid=CU48cP3h&p_lva=&p_faqid=907&p_created=1069776628&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9ncmlkc29ydD0mcF9yb3dfY250PTQmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1NeWR2ZCZwX3NlYXJjaF90eXBlPTMmcF9wcm9kX2x2bDE9fmFueX4mcF9wcm9kX2x2bDI9fmFueX4mcF9jYXRfbHZsMT1_YW55fiZwX3BhZ2U9MQ**&p_li=

Yes, you can split your video up into say 10 files, and import these into MyDVD in order, and set an option to play them one after another, which is sort of like chapters.

But – they are not chapters. They are separate videos (each without chapters).

What this means is:

- On your DVD player, it will always say chapter 0
- You can’t move to the next chapter by pressing the next chapter button on your remote control
- Most importantly – there is a delay when moving to the next file (a noticeable delay on my set top player).

In my opinion this workaround is not acceptable. To get “real” chapters you must use something other than MyDVD.

Mark

You are able to go to the individuals chapters by pressing the appropriate button but I did not stay with it long enough to find the other limitations. Uleads MF3 has plenty of capability for me especially the ability to rearrange the clips. I guess it is just a matter of how much time you want to spend on making the dvd.