Single MPEG2 file or several of them?

GTakacs wrote on 9/27/2004, 11:38 AM
I am working on a DVD and the DVD will have a main feature, about 35 minutes long, it has an intro screen (about 20 seconds) it will have a slideshow (about 50 or so pictures) and it will have an interactive menu with animated menu transitions (about 10 pages of menus with 20 or so transitional videos).

Right now I have the intro rendered as a separate mpeg2, I also have every transition rendered separately, I have the photo slide show as a separate video file and the main feature is my last mpeg2 stream so I have about two dozen separate mpeg2 files that I am putting on this disc.

My question is: Should I have just rendered everything into a single mpeg2 file, generate multiple instances of the same file and use in/out markers to point to the proper areas for each of these instances?

Which would give me the most compatible and workable result?

Comments

ScottW wrote on 9/28/2004, 6:25 AM
The major drawback with rendering everything as a single MPEG would be that if any one thing changed, then you have to re-render the entire project.

For example, when I do a menu transition, I usually start with a snapshot of the menu taken from DVDA - suppose something on the menu changes, like I resize one of the fonts - now I have to rerender everything when I could have just done a re-render of the transition (which takes, what, 10 seconds?)

Also I find it easier to render the seperate objects in terms of organization. I name my files such that they are easy to find and then I rename various things in DVDA - for example, a transition which might have been named "menu 1" gets renamed to "transition to xxx"

Just my 2 cents.
--Scott
GTakacs wrote on 9/28/2004, 6:44 AM
Scott, this is exactly how I am doing it right now, I was just wondering if there was a drawback to having 20+ separate files on my DVD. I do have my menu transitions named just like yours. However you do know that when you duplicate a video asset you can rename it to whatever you want.

I have just read some threads here about different title sets and end actions not playing right on some DVD players, that is why I was wondering about which way to go.

As for the re-rendering of menu transitions, my buttons are rather small and my menu transitions only transfer from one menu background to another, I don't have the buttons on them, so I can keep changing the buttons and it will not matter much. My menu is basically an interactive map where the user can go up and down and zoom in and out and can click on little camera icons to get to a slide show or little camcorder icons to play a relevant video clip.
johnmeyer wrote on 9/28/2004, 9:12 AM
I was just wondering if there was a drawback to having 20+ separate files on my DVD.

Yes, the way DVDA 2.0 is currently structured, there are still significant disadvantages to using separate files, event though -- as you both have already pointed out -- the natural way to create a large project is to render it in small chunks, to separate MPEG-2 files.

The problem is that DVDA does NOT combine the MPEG-2 files into one big chunk prior to preparing the VOB files. As a result, each MPEG-2 file (and its associated audio and subtitles) are prepared into separate "titlesets," each with its own, separate VOB numbering. When you play these DVDs, some set-top players will not let you use the chapter advance/reverse button to navigate between these titlesets (there have been lots of posts here recently about this). No player will let you use the fast forward/reverse to move backwards through titlesets. Some players apparently (according to posts here in this forum) won't even play from one titleset to the next, even with end actions set correctly.

One "solution" is to insert a Music Compilation and then put your MPEG-2 and AC-3 files into that compilation. I've documented the steps here:

Music Compilation

The only way to make everything work perfectly is to combine all the MPEG-2 files and AC-3 files into one file and then do the prepare. DVDA COULD do this, but it doesn't. Therefore, if you want to have all the obvious advantages of preparing your project in separate pieces, yet have it all play seemlessly, you must use an external product, like Womble's MPEG-VCR, or TMPGEnc's file joiner to join the files before you import them (the Womble products will handle the AC-3, but I don't think TMPGEnc will do this).
bStro wrote on 9/28/2004, 11:22 AM
The problem is that DVDA does NOT combine the MPEG-2 files into one big chunk prior to preparing the VOB files. As a result, each MPEG-2 file (and its associated audio and subtitles) are prepared into separate "titlesets," each with its own, separate VOB numbering.

Looking at the situation of the original post, where most of the MPEG2 files are transitions between menus, isn't DVDA going to make them separate titlesets anyhow? Whether he drags in separate files or one big one?

Rob
GTakacs wrote on 9/28/2004, 12:51 PM
As a result, each MPEG-2 file (and its associated audio and subtitles) are prepared into separate "titlesets," each with its own, separate VOB numbering. When you play these DVDs, some set-top players will not let you use the chapter advance/reverse button to navigate between these titlesets

I don't care if I can navigate between these movies, as they are only transitions between menus, and one menu button brings the movie up and another menu screen is the end action of these files. I never want these short clips to play back to back, let alone the user navigate between them. My main feature is a 35 minute movie, and that one is rendered as one file with all 13 or so chapter points within. So the viewer can naviage that one just fine (I assume).

I also don't care about ac-3 and merging them externally, they are all elementary streams so there is no audio in them to start with.

johnmeyer wrote on 9/28/2004, 1:24 PM
GTakacs,

Sorry, I guess I didn't read your post closely enough.
GTakacs wrote on 9/28/2004, 1:39 PM
No problem.... So having read my post more closely, what do yuo think? Is it OK to have 20 or so separate movie clips in their own little title sets, given that I don't want to be able to navigate between them?
johnmeyer wrote on 9/28/2004, 3:35 PM
Is it OK to have 20 or so separate movie clips in their own little title sets, given that I don't want to be able to navigate between them?

If you have a DVD-RW and a set-top player that can play it, try burning a test to the DVD-RW and see how it goes on at least one player. If you can navigate there and you don't have any hiccups, then you'll probably be OK.