intro's to your svcd's and vcd's????????????????????????????

[theprinceofallsaiyans]

is it posible to make a intro ( like your own root directory intro movie or something ) 4 your svcd or vcds?
you know like on real dvd intro's????????????

[Maverlck32]

do you mean a menu...?

[theprinceofallsaiyans]

thanks 4 the reply......
ok... u'v seen like harry potter or something else that has an intro to the dvd? i mean all the flying through the fog and the clouds... then the camera fades innto the menu... so that you can choose like play or extra's....
thats what i mean...

[Maverlck32]

ya that is pretty cool but i have no idea how to do it sorry. if you find out i'd like to hear from you.

[Thorn]

If you have the video already, you can always put a video clip before the main one.

However, VCDs and SVCDs cannot have menus like DVDs where you can choose what to play. They can only have a (static) main menu screen where you press the number of the selection (chapter/file) you want to skip to. DVDs have to be authored to animate buttons and put video in the background (and that is an entirely different game).

If you want to make your own intro clip you're in for a bit of a learning curve and a big time sink... I've looked into making some motion backgrounds for the DVDs I'm making of home movies and it has become obvious that animated content creation isn't so much an amateur's game. Probably not worth the effort if it's an idle curiosity. If you think about it the folks who put together some of these DVDs are pros and the cool animations you see weren't made in idle time.

[sterno]

However, VCDs and SVCDs cannot have menus like DVDs where you can choose what to play. They can only have a (static) main menu screen where you press the number of the selection (chapter/file) you want to skip to.

One minor correction - VCD/SVCD menus don't have to be static, they can be movies themselves. For my own amusement I've made one or two "thumbnail" menus with looping clips of each segment and background music. The menu numbers are just set up with PBC, so it doesn't matter if it's an MPEG still or an actual movie.

I suppose that if you really wanted to go to the effort you could have a fancy intro clip, a 0-second delay (there will still be a brief pause on most players), and then a menu movie set to loop indefinitely.

[hp_lovecraft]

You can make animated intros, and animated menus using VCD-Imager (from the 'tools' menu).
Its looks complicated, but start with some pre-made templates, and work backwords.

There is also some GUIs for VCD-imager if you don't want to program XML like TSCV (sp?).

nick

[vitualis]

Yes, you can use both still and "motion" menus on VCDs if you author with VCDImager: http://www.vcdimager.org/guides

BTW, the best way to learn how seamless "intro" animations work is to have a look at some well authored DVDs.

You CAN make a VCD with an intro menu that seamlessly enters the main menu and then subsequently ONLY loops the main menu.

The trick is to use an entrypoint at where the main menu starts and encode the intro + main menu as a single MPEG.

The first time it plays, it plays from beginning to end.

Subsequently, it loops indefinitely but with the play-item starting at the entrypoint of the main menu rather than the beginning of the intro anim + main menu video clip.



Regards.

[hp_lovecraft]

Michael-
Thats a great way of doing it-

I've been using a seperate intro and main-menu mpg.
The last frame of the intro matches the first frame of the menu. There is pause for a second, so it is 'almost' seamless.

I have the main-menu mpg only play once. That way, I can have the last frame of the Main-Menu be the first frame of an "exit-mpeg" that leads to sub menus, or whatever.

The animated menus become very DVD-like, though its a pain getting all the frames to match up. I never thought of using extrypoints in the menu like you did... I might try that next time, as it seems an easier way to do roughly the same thing.

Nick

[vitualis]

I used to do it the same way as you described...

I got my idea from having a look at some DVD menus that do the same thing (i.e., intro video clip seamless goes to main menu clip that then loops). They generally do it the same way.

This makes it easy to make if you are making a DVD rip of such a menu (e.g., Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, Shrek, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Charlie's Angels all do the same thing from memory).

It does depend on how much animation is actually in the main menu though... Usually, if there is very little animation (e.g., the LOTR:FOTR menu) I don't bother and just settle for a high res still screen for the main menu.

Also, for the looping mainmenu, I usually find it a good idea to actually have the video clip to physically contain TWO loops of the clip. Many DVDs do this as well. Basically, at the end of the loop and the restarting the loop, there will be a little pause (though if the video + audio is authored well, it won't be noticeable). However, since most people will have made their menu choice by the 2nd time the menu animations start again, by physically encoding two loops of the menu video clip, you can generally avoid the little pause completely...

Regards.

[kitty]

Yes authoring good intros is an art in itself. Many people asked for & located logos and other art and I've collected them onto the web site below. A sample VCD intro is on there made from elements on the site and authored in Studio 7.

[adam]

I also use an entrypoint to have my main menu loop after the intro but I think an important thing to realize is that your entrypoint will only be accurate if there is an I-Frame at the specific frame you want to jump to.

You can set the I-Frame in both CCE or TMPGenc. If you don't manually insert an I-Frame then your chapter point can be up to 1 sec off, which will often ruin the continuity of the loop.

Also in regards to the functionality of menu's on SVCDs and VCDs, no they cannot function like DVDs but you can simulate much of what can be done on a DVD with some creativity. For instance you can draw a "button" over your selection and then create a series of stills for each "button." You can then use the next and previous keys like directional buttons to navigate and then use the enter button to select that "button." This gives the impression of hotspot buttons like dvds use and it makes it much more user friendly than having to use the # keys to select everything.

If your interested in figuring out how to do this check out my guide I'm working on, though I have to warn you that its not finished and is still very rough around the edges so please no nitpicking.

http://home.att.net/~adam.poole/Introduction.htm

[hp_lovecraft]

Your comment about I-Frames brings up a good point-

I get in the bad habit of encoding everything using KWAG templates, which basically uses almost no I-frames, making it difficult to create entrypoints, unless I add the I-frame manually..... (which I never remember until -after- I burn the VCD...)

Doh!

Nick

[vitualis]

Absolutely with the I-frame thing!

This is usually critical for the intro anim + menu anim as a few frames off will make a difference.

BTW, I wonder if anyone else has noticed, but the Panasonic 2.51 encoder (stand-alone and plugin versions) only seems to force new intra frames if you set it to the default GOP structure (top of the pulldown list). This is irritating as for PAL, the optimised GOP is the third from the top --> can't force intra frames (you can set it but it doesn't make a difference).

Regards.

[kwag]

Your comment about I-Frames brings up a good point-

I get in the bad habit of encoding everything using KWAG templates, which basically uses almost no I-frames, making it difficult to create entrypoints, unless I add the I-frame manually..... (which I never remember until -after- I burn the VCD...)

Doh!

Nick

Hi Nick,

You have an I frame at least every second with the KVCD PLUS templates. Unless you're using the old pre-historic original templates
The MAX frames per GOP is now set to 18, and that's a good balance for quality vs. compression.
And yes I agree that the old 48 frames was toooooo looooooong

-kwag

[hp_lovecraft]

Kwag-
1 second is too long when trying to match up menus!!

Anyway, your CVDx2 template is the best I've ever used for 'time-shifting' my favorite TV shows.... and just about everything on xVCD (except the menus).

For the menus, I'll usually do NO B frames, and very few P frames when trying to arrange a super-complex menu with seamless transitions.

I've tried all I-frames, but my max KBPS was 6,000 and it wasnt enough to prevent macroblocks.

nick

[theprinceofallsaiyans]

wow guys!!!!!!!!
thanks. im going to try now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!