Extracting and editing an existing DVD menu

[sambat]

Trying to edit a PAL DVD menu.
The menu is displayed with 16:9 AR (a snapshot from VLC is 1024x576)
Saving a .bmp from the menu using PgcEdit is 720x576

After editing the image and saving as a .bmp, I use MuxMan to create a small DVD - but I always end up with a 4:3 video instead of the original 16:9

I can't figure out how I should be resizing the image from the editing program to end up with a 16:9 video.

[usually_quiet]

720x576 are the right dimensions for the background bitmap in a PAL DVD, regardless of the aspect ratio, so you can't get the desired result by resizing the bitmap with an image editing program. Instead, the authoring program has to be set up to to use 16:9 as the aspect ratio for the menu. Unfortunately, I have never used muxman directly, only as the authoring engine for GUIfordvdauthor. It can definitely produce 16:9 menus, but I don't know the function or parameter settings to specify a menu's aspect ratio in a muxman script.

[manono]

When loading a BMP in Muxman, it always assumes it to be 4:3 for some reason. First, open the BMP and then save the MXP project file. Open it in Notepad and edit it like so:

Scroll down a little ways from the top to the "Section=Content" part. Where you see "Display Mode=4:3", change it to either "Display Mode=Only Letterbox" or "Display Mode=Only PanScan", depending on whether you want your 16:9 pic displayed as Wide/LB or Wide/PS. You probably want "Display Mode=Only Letterbox", not what's shown in my old picture. Then resave the project. Reopen Muxman, and rather than loading the BMP, load the .mxp project file and take it from there.

[manono]

And, if I understand correctly what you're doing (not guaranteed) you can avoid the problem entirely by using VobBlanker for the job:

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/254043-Guide-for-extracting-menus-for-editing-and-r...00#post1514500

If you just want to get the edited BMP back into the DVD, scroll down to The Easy Way section at the bottom of the guide

[sambat]

Thank you for responding.
I tried editing the MuxMan script - the results were the same (BTW 'Only Letterbox' is also selectable from the GUI)




I have a problem with the Easy Way.

Open the DVD in VobBlanker. In Tools->Configure Tools at the top, point the way to the Muxman.exe, and to a work folder where VobBlanker itself will do the Muxman step for you.

Tools menu in VobBlanker ? - or should I be opening it in PgcEdit?

[manono]

(BTW 'Only Letterbox' is also selectable from the GUI)

Only now I noticed the drop-down box offering those choices. I wrote that a long time ago for a never published PAL2NTSC guide and don't know if earlier versions of Muxman were different and that drop-down box didn't exist then, or if I just never noticed it. Anyway, thanks for pointing it out to me. Then I don't understand why you don't get a 16:9 menu out of it. Did you check the menu video attributes in PGCEdit afterwards to make sure it's not 16:9? If it's not, you might try just changing the menu attributes to 16:9 and Letterbox to see if that fixes it.

As for replacing a BMP in VobBlanker, you go Settings->Configure Paths and point to the Muxman.exe and a place where VobBlanker (or Muxman) can create some temporary files. And that's different from Tools->Configure Tools which was the way to do it when I wrote that guide. Thanks for pointing it out and I'll update the guide now.

After doing that, you go to the Menu Cell, highlight it, hit "Still" to the right, and then you drag and drop your edited BMP.

[sambat]

I started over by changing the motion menus to stills - no other changes.

Burned a PAL disk and verified that the menus worked on a standalone player.

Saved a .bmp file (720x576) and edited it by adding a circle.
(a snapshot from VLC is 1024x576?)

Setup VobBlanker to run MuxMan and replaced the still with the edited bmp.

While the original menu is 16:9 the new one is 4:3 and the circle is an ellipse.

The images are screen caps of the original and edited menus in PgcEdit.

If I edit in a new image it gets squashed down.

I'm going to create a new DVD with a 4:3 menu and see what the result is when edited - I assume it will be ok.

[usually_quiet]

You need to add an ellipse to the original bitmap instead of a circle. Remember the bitmap is compressed from side-to-side until stretched out to 16:9. You could also try resizing the bitmap to 1024x576, adding the circle, and then resizing again to 720x576. The resulting bitmap could loose some detail, but may still be acceptable.

[Edit] I had another thought. Since the background is plain, after adding the circle and resizing the bitmap from 1024x576 back to 720x576, you could cut and paste your now skinnier circle back into the original bitmap to get correct proportions when it is displayed in the menu.

[sambat]

I'm not sure that the particular .bmp that was saved can be stretched out to 16:9
I can see creating a new image that is 1024x576 then resizing would work - but the intention is to use the original - edited except for the buttons.
The circle is just for reference - it's easier to see on the PC when the AR is wrong.

I will try using a snapshot (which is 1024x576) to see if it changes anything,

[usually_quiet]

In the examples you posted, everything but the circle looks to have the correct proportions. Given how it was added, your circle is always going to appear stretched horizontally when displayed in the menu. The video's actual resolution is always 720x576, regardless of the aspect ratio. Because DVD uses anamorphic widescreen to display at 16:9 aspect ratio, the picture must be stretched horizontally to match the aspect ratio specified and your original circle is transformed into an ellipse.

[sambat]

Why would only part of the new menu be squished down?

Both are now part of the same .bmp image before being converted to video.

[usually_quiet]

The circle is not squashed down. It is stretched out from side to side, and so is the video.

[usually_quiet]

I decided to use some images to show what I mean. These are NTSC, but hopefully you can see what is happening.

Image #1 is a 720x480 still to which I added a circle and a square.

Image #2 is the same image resized to 16:9. The circle is now an ellipse and the square is now a rectangle.

Image #3 is a 720x480 still to which I added an ellipse and a rectangle. I actually cut and pasted them as per my other thought in post #8.

Image #4 the still to which I added an ellipse and a rectangle resized to 16:9. The ellipse is now a circle and the rectangle is now a square.

[sambat]

Can't see the images - but my two 'Extras' images are the same (given that they were different parts of the motion menu).
The top (before)image overlays the bottom (after)exactly in the original parts of the images- only the circle gets stretched.

[manono]

I can't see the pics either, but agree with you that this is pretty much a non-issue - that sambat is creating these circles on the unresized 720x576 BMPs and then's wondering why they're not still circles at the resized final playback resolution.

Why would only part of the new menu be squished down?

The answer is, of course, that the rest of the picture - the picture when you made the circle - wasn't that shape at all, but was more compressed horizontally. Can you tell?

[sambat]

The image that I used was a 720x576 .bmp that was exported by PgcEdit- it was not the image that PgcEdit displayed (the same as would be seen on playback when the stretch was applied to the video to make it 1024x756 and correct in aspect).

How can a .bmp contain PAR(?) information to tell it to display it at 16:9 - I thought that applied to mpeg video.

[usually_quiet]

Can you see my pics now? If not I give up!

[manono]

How can a .bmp contain PAR(?) information to tell it to display it at 16:9 - I thought that applied to mpeg video.

The menu doesn't contain a BMP. That BMP is reencoded to M2V in the process of making a menu. Just extract it using PGCDemux or DGIndex. You won't get back a BMP.

Yes, usually_quiet, the pics are quite visible now. Good job.

[sambat]

I gave up on the .bmp (DgIndex was the same as PgcEdit).
Instead I used a 1024X576 snapshot of the Menu from VLC.
Edited it and sized down to 720x576 - that worked OK.
Burned the DVD and tested the menu OK.