DVD slideshow GUI - development thread.

[Gavino]

I wonder if this comment in the KenBurnsEffect code has anything to do with the zoom problems:

(from http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=135776)

#  float startZoomFactor: 100 = 100%, ect... 
#                      Negative values is the zoom of the pixels, positive values is the zoom of the frame. 
#                      When converting AR, this isn't perfect.

[Frovingslosh]

I wonder if this comment in the KenBurnsEffect code has anything to do with the zoom problems:...

I'm inclined to think not. The reason is that some DSG settings work much better than others. And some settings that I would expect to have less of a problem, like 1:1 pixel ratios, have more problems instead. So I'm inclined to think that tin2tin is on target saying that it is a calibration issue and that if the proper calibration can be worked out for all various video settings and pixel ratios, things will be a lot better.

[hoinar]

2 questions, please:

1. Using avs script as a slide (mixed with normal jpg images as ordinary slides) lead to absence of sound for that particular slide(s) regardless its position in the show: in the beginning, at the end or mixed somewhere in between... is there a way to make the sound appear continuous in the final avi file or the solution is only to separately mix an audio file with the video file generated by DSG ?

2. Using for example 640x480 px images in a PAL show (720x576) lead to the upscale of the images to fit the PAL resolution. My intention is to use such smaller resolution images in order to have the background as "border" for some effects there. Is there a way to prevent this automated fit of the images ?

Thanks for your time and work with DSG.

[tin2tin]

@hoinar
1. Try right click in the music list and select 'Use Video Audio'.
2. Not possible within DSG unless you do the scaling in ex Paint.Net on a full screen transparent background and save as png.

[hoinar]

Thanks for quick reply...

1. Try right click in the music list and select 'Use Video Audio'.

'Use Video Audio' is selected even I didn't notice this... but I tried to deselect it and, surprise, it works this way, i.e. the sound is stretched aver avs slides too in this way.

2. Not possible within DSG unless you do the scaling in ex Paint.Net on a full screen transparent background and save as png.

OK, I understand.

[hoinar]

2. Not possible within DSG unless you do the scaling in ex Paint.Net on a full screen transparent background and save as png.

I figured out a solution for this i.e. changing the TVsafeX and TVsafeY for 40px and 48px for a PAL resolution (720x576px) movie using 640x480px images. In this way the picture is centered with the background (with any effect applied) visible all around which look quite nice. NB: the numbers are not "safe" for DSG which prefers the 72px and 57px (in this example) but that's valid for TV resolution and DVD-style display; for a PC-display any numbers can be used according to one's own needs.

2 extra question, please:

1. the generated *.ebmp files used by the avs script are in any way modified/altered (compared with the original slide images) because I suppose these files are actually used to encode the final movie ?

2. after setting up the project settings and add pictures to the show, some parameters modified later on in "Project Settings" for example slide duration or transition duration can no longer be set from here but only from actual slides only... instead, movie resolution, background, border, etc can be set from here... Is this the way the program works or there is something wrong ? I use v 0.9.4.1

Thanks for your time.

[tin2tin]

1: Each image is scaled, overlayed the background image according to the project resolution and saved to harddisk. The scaled images (lossless) are then used in the final avisynth script. The reason for this process is that Avisynth keeps the original images in memory, so if you are making a slideshow out of 10mb images you'll soon run out of memory unless they are downscaled and imported in a new instance of Avisynth. Animated slides are imported in their original size, which will result in you'll run out of memory faster that without animated slides.

2: The import settings will only have an effect when you import - the other settings will affect the entire slideshow.


Get a copy of the free eBook here!

[Frovingslosh]

Glad that I decided to check-in today, apparently something went wrong and I didn't receive the e-mail notification on the last two most recent posts.

.... Avisynth keeps the original images in memory, so if you are making a slideshow out of 10mb images you'll soon run out of memory unless they are downscaled and imported in a new instance of Avisynth. Animated slides are imported in their original size, which will result in you'll run out of memory faster that without animated slides.....

Is there some known reason to do this that I'm not understanding? It would seem to me that keeping the image in memory once Avisynth is done with it is just asking for trouble. And clearly the reason that I run into problems with any software that uses Avisynth and attempts to process lots of images. Since the source should be available we might even be able to "fix" this ourselves, but i hate to fork off something when it really seems like it should just be fixed. But I get the feeling that there must be some reason for this behavior that I'm missing.

Also, relating to memory problems, I've started seeing memory problems even with relatively short runs (Out of memory in DevIL library"). The thing is that I've confirmed that I have memory problems even with project files that I built successfully on the same computer in the past! So I'm thinking that the problem is that some recently installed software must have brought in a .dll that is causing problems with Avisynth (or perhaps ffmpeg as some erors have referenced it). Only thing that I can think to do at this point is a reinstall of Windows. Really just mentioning this in case others here see it also.

Still hoping that there will be a "recalibration" of the offset and zoom for NTSC 16x9 1:1 pixel animations. Again, if there is any form of grunt work in testing or calibration that I can help with I would be glad to contribute my time.

[tin2tin]

It's the way Avisynth deals with images atm, but since it's opensource anyone could have a go at it, and eventually have it accepted in the official Avisynth. Personally I'm only coding in wxBasic, so that stuff is out of my limits.

If you got Avisynth problems, it may be caused by the plugins in the Avisynth plugin folder - these are automatically loaded when an Avisynth instance is opened. So you could try to clear that folder - and maybe try to reinstall Avisynth - but grab the 2.6 beta, because it is know to be handling memory much better.

On development of DSG, atm. I'm pretty tied up job wise in my working days, and my weekends are spend on working on the old house I'm living in. I will try to corret those things, but right now I don't have the time.

If you want to tinker with the recalibration, it's a matter of finding the factor the position values should be multiplied with. Export a avs script in 16:9 NTSC 1:1 and run it in AvsP and tinker with the values in the animation part of the script.

[Frovingslosh]

Grabbed the 2.6 beta after the problem started, but that didn't resolve it. I'm pretty sure that I'm looking at a Windows reinstall. Did some preliminary work on that tonight but more to do before I can even start the reinstall.

I'm interested in trying to work on the recalibration, but have no experience working directly with Avisynth or AvsP. Your description came across as technobable to me, but I'll see if I can try to get up to speed and make some sense out of it. Even if I pull that off I'm not sure how you provide the calibration info for each setting to DSG, but if there were some data file or ini file or some other way to provide the calibration settings to DSG for the different video and pixel settings I would love to know where I could change them.

I completely understand that life comes before creating free software. Please be patient if I show up here occasionally just to be sure this isn't forgotten.

And the one little piece of good news is that I seem to be getting the email notifications of forum activity again.

[Gavino]

Is there some known reason to do this that I'm not understanding? It would seem to me that keeping the image in memory once Avisynth is done with it is just asking for trouble.

The problem is that Avisynth never really knows when it is done with the image.
Because it works off a user-written script that could basically do anything, it would take a very sophisticated analysis for it to work out when the image was no longer needed.

The only practical solution if you are importing a lot of large images is to downsize before using them in Avisynth.

[tin2tin]

The only practical solution if you are importing a lot of large images is to downsize before using them in Avisynth.

...and this is the reason for DSG to make downscaled temp. ebmp files.

[Frovingslosh]

Is there some known reason to do this that I'm not understanding? It would seem to me that keeping the image in memory once Avisynth is done with it is just asking for trouble.

The problem is that Avisynth never really knows when it is done with the image.
Because it works off a user-written script that could basically do anything, it would take a very sophisticated analysis for it to work out when the image was no longer needed.

The only practical solution if you are importing a lot of large images is to downsize before using them in Avisynth.

Downsizing may not always be a desirable option, and if working with animations one may want the ability to zoom into a small part of the image without showing excessive degrading. Also, even downsized images would still have a limit that I can see easily reaching in some cases.

So if the issue is that things are kept in memory because of the unknowns of a user written script, maybe the best fix would be to let the script tell Avisynth when the image is no longer needed. (Or, since I'm pretty ignorant about the scripting language, maybe that's already there and just not used by the applications that run out of memory.) Alternatively, I doubt that a "very sophisticated analysis" is called for or even desired. Avisynth should know what is in memory, when each was last used, and how much memory is in use. A simple common "least recently used" algorithm would seem to be what is called for, freeing the least recently used files first before the undesirable "out of memory" messages start showing up. This may require keeping a table of what images were used and where to reload them from if need later and no longer in memory, but that should be less memory intensive than keeping all images in memory, and I expect that at least part of that table is already there.

I do thank you for your response. I gives me additional insight into why the problem exists and what to look for as I start to study the scripting language.

[Gavino]

Avisynth should know what is in memory, when each was last used, and how much memory is in use. A simple common "least recently used" algorithm would seem to be what is called for, freeing the least recently used files first before the undesirable "out of memory" messages start showing up.

Avisynth does use this strategy for its internal frame memory cache, but the individual filters (some of which might be from external plugins) can allocate memory of their own and this is not under central control.

As I understand it, each instance of the ImageSource filter allocates memory to load its image(s) into and this is what can add up with many large images.
The filter is really designed for loading image sequences, not individual images, but the way it is used by DSG requires a separate instance for each image.

I do thank you for your response. I gives me additional insight into why the problem exists and what to look for as I start to study the scripting language.

As you study more about the language, you will learn how powerful it is and perhaps understand better my explanation.

[minifig]

Hi,

I ran into a problem with DSG today. After an AVI-movie, the slideshow (exported as AVI) stops.

- version=0.9.4.1
- Winsdows 7 (DSG runs as administrator)
- only 4 images in slideshow and 1 avi-movie
- Wherever I put the AVI, the slideshow (also in AVI-format) stops right after my movie, the slides after it are not shown.

I've uploaded all the slides and avi-movie to http://www.minifig.be/dvd.zip
In the zip you'll also find the cali-test.dsg that generates the fault.

I hope you can reproduce the problem with my zip file so you can shed some light on this problem.

Greetings and keep up the good work.

Roger

[tin2tin]

@ minifig I've just teste those files and it seems that Avisynth (ffmpegsource plugin) is choking on the audio. That' s what it is saying, when double left clicking the video clip in the listcontrol.

[Attachment 7742 - Click to enlarge]

To avoid loading the audio into DSG - you can do this:

If you select the videoclip and click Slideshow > Edit Avisynth script


[Attachment 7740 - Click to enlarge]

Find the path of AvsP.exe in c:\AvsP\Avsp.exe.


[Attachment 7745 - Click to enlarge]
Say Yes to convert - nothing will happen to your original file. DSG is just creating a script wrapper.
In AvsP add one line:

Killaudio()


[Attachment 7744 - Click to enlarge]

Save under the same name and close AvsP.


[Attachment 7741 - Click to enlarge]

Now the audio isn't used from the clip any more. Notice that the extension of the video file has changed to .avs (avisynth script).


[Attachment 7743 - Click to enlarge]

Now you slideshow runs/exports without any problems (here on my computer).

[BTW all the PAR 1:1 seems to come out wrong - so better not use it until I'll get the time to fix that]

[tin2tin]

During the weekend I've spend several hours on the PAL+NTSC 16:9 with PAR 1:1 bugs. It seems pretty broken all together(not just animation) so don't use that funtion until it's fixed.

Noticed a new slideshow done in Impress(Open Office's Power Point alternative) and exported as a slideshow from DSG(great to see that functionality beeing used):

[Frovingslosh]

During the weekend I've spend several hours on the PAL+NTSC 16:9 with PAR 1:1 bugs. It seems pretty broken all together(not just animation) so don't use that funtion until it's fixed.

I appreciate the update. I didn't realize that PAL 16x9 was also affected, but you saved me some time in stumbling over that, as I was going to make a PAL video and then deal with some other software to convert it to NTSC. Guess I shouldn't plan on taking that approach now. Not sure what you are refering to on the "not just animation" problem, i didn't spot that. Can you provide any more details?

Thanks again.

[minifig]

@ minifig I've just teste those files and it seems that Avisynth (ffmpegsource plugin) is choking on the audio. That' s what it is saying, when double left clicking the video clip in the listcontrol.

[Attachment 7742 - Click to enlarge]
If you select the videoclip and click Slideshow > Edit Avisynth script
Killaudio()

Now the audio isn't used from the clip any more. Notice that the extension of the video file has changed to .avs (avisynth script).

This works, but now I don't have the audio of course.
Any idea why avisynth chokes on the audio? The file plays well in all sorts of other players.

[tin2tin]

Did a search on that error message - and it might be related to a bug in the ffmpegsource plugin for Avisynth. You could try to update ffmpegsource by downloading this file here and copy the included files into the 'C:/Program Files/DVD slideshow GUI/FFmpegSource'(or where you've installed DSG) and overwriting the old files.

It seems to me that the newer version of ffmpegsource accepts your videofile including the audio - is exports without the error here.

Actually you clip could use a bit of deblocking. It can be done by making an Avisynth wrapper - as descriped above and follow the instructions on this page using the MSU deblocking filter in the avisynth script. However an extra line of code must be added in the end of the script: 'converttoyv12()'

import("C:\Program Files\DVD slideshow GUI\FFmpegSource\ffms2.avs")
FFmpegSource2("C:\Users\Peter\.DVDslideshowGUI\dvd\dvd\MOV07271_MPG.AVI")
LoadVirtualDubPlugin("C:\Program Files\DVD slideshow GUI\MSU_SmartDeblock_0.8.vdf","MSU_Smart_Deblocking", 0)
ConvertToRGB32.MSU_Smart_Deblocking(1, 1, 1, 1)
converttoyv12()

... so the script looks like above and correct the path to where you unzip the MSU_SmartDeblock_0.8.vdf file. Save under the same name and close AvsP.



On the 16:9 vs. PAR 1:1 issues am I thinking about dropping the 1:1 option - the result looks the same anyway.

[Gavino]

import("C:\Program Files\DVD slideshow GUI\FFmpegSource\ffms2.avs")
FFmpegSource2("C:\Users\Peter\.DVDslideshowGUI\dvd\dvd\MOV07271_MPG.AVI")

Unless the file has been renamed, it should be ffms2.avsi.
Also, FFmpegSource2 does not produce audio unless you add atrack=-1.

[Frovingslosh]

....

On the 16:9 vs. PAR 1:1 issues am I thinking about dropping the 1:1 option - the result looks the same anyway.

Unfortunately, they absolutely do NOT. I was first using 16x9 NTSC at the default pixel ratio, but noticed that people were shorter and fatter than they should be. It was really obvious when I did an animation into a flower and chose to rotate the camera as I zoomed in. The result was the center of the flower was an ellipse rather than a circle, and it stayed horizontal even as the flower rotated. That was what made me create the circle and squares test image that I passed along in my failing 1 to 1 example, it is pretty obviously distorted at the default ratio (and I expect at other ratios, although I don't know why there would be more than the native DVD ratio (for DVD authorizing when not doing any additional processing) and 1 to 1, which should be used for web videos or any other video use.) If anything I would say 1 to 1 is the format that absolutely has to work, as many other tools can produce a DVD from it if needed, and I suspect more people use 1 to 1 than the native DVD authoring setting. Otherwise all of 16x9 is broken, and in light of the direction where consumer video has moved, that is pretty unfortunate.

I'll be glad to do a quick demo of the same image at the default aspect ratio and 1 to 1 if you want to see it. Or again, if there is any drudge work in adjusting setting to find the proper calibration that I can help with, I'll volunteer my time.

[minifig]

Did a search on that error message - and it might be related to a bug in the ffmpegsource plugin for Avisynth. You could try to update ffmpegsource by downloading this file here and copy the included files into the 'C:/Program Files/DVD slideshow GUI/FFmpegSource'(or where you've installed DSG) and overwriting the old files.

It seems to me that the newer version of ffmpegsource accepts your videofile including the audio - is exports without the error here.

Jep, that works great.
Thanks for the tip on deblocking also.

Thanks

[tin2tin]

@ Frovingslosh - try this one:
http://download.videohelp.com/tin2tin/DVDslideshowGUI_calibration_test.exe
(Place it in the DVD slideshow GUI folder and run it by doubleclicking it...)

NB. you may have to change det resolution setting in Media Player Classic by right click > Video Frame > Override Aspect Ratio > Default/4:3/16:9

[Frovingslosh]

@ Frovingslosh - try this one:
http://download.videohelp.com/tin2tin/DVDslideshowGUI_calibration_test.exe
(Place it in the DVD slideshow GUI folder and run it by doubleclicking it...)

NB. you may have to change det resolution setting in Media Player Classic by right click > Video Frame > Override Aspect Ratio > Default/4:3/16:9

Thank you. This is a huge improvement. I don't believe it is perfect yet, but it is greatly improved.

First of all, the animations seem to be properly positioned, not offset to the right as they were in the past.

As to the images themselves, I believe that they now are a bit taller and narrower than should be. In the past the error was greater and in the other direction, that is people looked short and fat. Now they look thiner and taller, which may get fewer complaints but still isn't what you want. Notably, the test image of circles and squares that I passed to you previously now looks like a slightly vertically elongated oval rather than an oval compressed in the other direction.

I've only done my testing at 16x9 NTSC 1:1 pixel aspect ratio. I'm not clear about the media player classic settings, my copy of MPC doesn't quite match what you describe. I have a "Keep aspect ratio" setting when I follow the options you gave, which was checked. Below that is a "correct monitor/desktop AR difference" option was was not checked. But I have played with checking and unchecking all 4 permutations of these options and it doesn't seem to change the visual effect. Maybe I need to get a newer copy of MPC. But MPC isn't really the issue. I played back the resulting AVI file in VLC and saw the same thing that I saw in MPC. The image was slightly elongated in the vertical direction. I confirmed that the PAR of the produced AVI file is indeed 1:1 (using gspot). And it really doesn't matter what my media players are set to, I (and I expect other users) want my resulting video to play back on other systems and on non-PC devices, not just my own specially tweaked system.

I also considered that my monitor might not be adjusted perfectly, since the monitor does have both horizontal and vertical width adjustments. If either were off it could certainly cause what I am seeing. But I've satisfied myself that this is not happening, as the original source image of the circle and squares image looks fine on the same monitor. So it is getting slightly compressed in the horizontal direction while being converted to video. I wanted to send you a screen shot of the two side by side, but unfortunately a PC screen shot fails to capture the image from Media Player Classic or VLC and that part of the screen is just black. So I've resorted to a crude digital camera screen shoot of the screen with the images side by side, the original JPG is on your left while the MPC result is on your right. Also in this example is it evident that the video creation process has dulled down our colors somewhat. I'm not concerned about that yet, and I expect that one way or another I'll be able to compensate for that. But I'll mention it now so that you can start to think about it. Perhaps I need to start trying to learn how to use those project pre-processing and post processing effects to compensate for what I'm seeing here;.

So I hope that my feedback is not leaving you thinking "these users are a pain and are never satisfied", but rather see this as feedback that a lot of progress has been made but a bit more is needed before the next version of this part of the tool is ready for release. If, as it seems, it is just a matter of calibration and getting a few parameters zeroed in so that the output looks right, I'm very willing to do what I can to help finalize the calibration. If the parameters could be passed in through a file, or by in-line switched, or even by hex editing the file, I would be very happy to play with the settings until I get an image that looks correct.

[tin2tin]

Okay, now I force Pal + Ntsc 16:9 PAR 1:1 to 720x432:
http://download.videohelp.com/tin2tin/DVDslideshowGUI_calibration_test2.exe

I've only done my testing at 16x9 NTSC 1:1 pixel aspect ratio. I'm not clear about the media player classic settings, my copy of MPC doesn't quite match what you describe. I have a "Keep aspect ratio" setting when I follow the options you gave, which was checked. Below that is a "correct monitor/desktop AR difference" option was was not checked.

If you check "Keep aspect ratio" then the override aspect values will have an effect. These are to be used if you need to force a different AR on material. If you want a 1:1 AR you'll need to uncheck "Keep aspect ratio".

"Correct monitor/desktop AR difference" - my guess is that checking this, will ajust ex. a DVD made for tv Display Aspect Ratio to a computer monitor DAR. So when playing DVDs in MPC this should be checked.

BTW. AVI is just a container, and it isn't capable of storing either Pixel Aspect Ratio (PAR) or Display Aspect Ratio (DAR). Same thing with Avisynth scripts, which means previews in DSG will not be automatically corrected, however exported MPG files does store 16:9 and 4:3 info.

If you want to tinker with how videos are generated - export as .avs and open that file in AvsP/Notepad.

[Frovingslosh]

Okay, now I force Pal + Ntsc 16:9 PAR 1:1 to 720x432:
http://download.videohelp.com/tin2tin/DVDslideshowGUI_calibration_test2.exe

I'm confused as to why you would do this, as my experience tells me that NTSC video (at least that later put on a DVD) should be 720x480, not 720x432.

If you check "Keep aspect ratio" then the override aspect values will have an effect. These are to be used if you need to force a different AR on material. If you want a 1:1 AR you'll need to uncheck "Keep aspect ratio".

I did try the various settings, but in each case the video was narrower than the original image. And as I guess I failed to explain, I want the videos to be proportioned correctly when I give the files to someone else who plays them on some standardly configured media player, or when I play them on my media player built into my Blu-Ray player, or when I pass them to a DVD creation program such as DVDflick or DVDstyler. The media player settings is not the place to address this. But this is no longer an issue, see below!

"Correct monitor/desktop AR difference" - my guess is that checking this, will ajust ex. a DVD made for tv Display Aspect Ratio to a computer monitor DAR. So when playing DVDs in MPC this should be checked.

OK, that makes sense, but as I'm just trying to play back 1:1 PAR video here should not apply to this.

BTW. AVI is just a container, and it isn't capable of storing either Pixel Aspect Ratio (PAR) or Display Aspect Ratio (DAR). Same thing with Avisynth scripts, which means previews in DSG will not be automatically corrected, however exported MPG files does store 16:9 and 4:3 info.

Actually, my experience is a bit different. I do make a lot of XVID AVI files in VirtualDub and I use PAR and DAR settings inside of XVID to get my aspect ratios correct. Prior to doing this I had some display problems when playing back these AVI files in my BluRay player, but with the correct settings (and a few other tweaks and filters) the files look fantastic. There is indeed a warning that states that IF AN AVI CONTAINER is used the PAR/DAR is LIKELY to be ignored in some players, but my experience has been good. XVID Codec screen shot attached.

However, I'm certainly not comitted to using AVI, it just seemed like a good compact choice both for testing and posting to the web. If you would recommend that I use mpg files or any other format when I select the EXPORT option in DVD Slideshow GUI, then just say so and I'll go that route and make it a non-issue.

And the best news is that I ran another test with an MPG file as the output. and it indeed does look much much better with the mpg file rather than the AVI file. So while I'm still a fan of XVID AVI files, not so much with these AVI files. I'll go ahead and use MPG files as my DSG output.

By the way, the MPG file does still have the same issue as the AVI file of the colors not appearing as saturated and the whites no spearing as white as they do in the original image.

You may be wondering just what is different between the AVI and the MPG files such that the MPG file would look right and the AVI file would look wrong, I certainly was. So I looked at both files with gspot. It reports that the AVI file does indeed have a 1:1 PAR, but that the MPG file actually has a 1.185 PAR. And, of course, that makes all the difference. A shot of gspot examining both files is attached, with the MPG file on the left. So it looks like I may be using a file without the expected 1:1 PAR to make my DVD, but I'm much more concerned with what looks right than what the intermediate file settings are. I'll make a test DVD with both the AVI file and the MPG file to confirm that the MPG file is the one that needs to be used for final DVD production, it is certainly the file that is needed if you are distributing the widescreen output of DSG directly to others.

If you want to tinker with how videos are generated - export as .avs and open that file in AvsP/Notepad.

I'll be glad to go that route (if there is still any reason to play with the parameters). However, I'm not clear on how I manage to export this file. I can find the control to export a slide to a script, but how do I get DSG to export the scprit of the entire animated slide show in a way that I can grab a copy? Or am I even so confused that this question doesn't make sense?


So at this point the first of the two EXE files looks like it is going to do what I want, as long as I export to MPG and not AVI. I have not worked with the second exe file, the 720x432 one. I'll go ahead and at least try that and see what it does, but as I said 720x432 doesn't seem right. It is very late here and I want to be alert when I do any testing so I'm not going to do that now.

I should also mention that I did a bit more testing prior to getting your last post. While I previously reported that the animation does not have the large offset to the right that it did in previous versions of the software when doing NTSC 16x9, I found that it does have a slight offset. This offset is minimal, and I was only able to notice it by putting two duplicate images back to back in the slide show, displaying the first unanimated and the second animated (but with a few seconds of still image at the start of the animation). In that case you can see a slight but obvious shift in the image to the right as it transitions to the second image (use a cut or dissolve rather than a fancy transition). You might not find this worth fixing, but I expect that you now know this part of the code quite well and as a tester I would be at fault if I didn't mention it.

[tin2tin]

Just to make a few things clear computer monitors show PAR 1:1. SD televisions doesn't not. So if you want something to look correct on a TV the DSG suggested PAR settings should be used, that goes for both DVDs and mediafiles, as far as I know. In other words the PAR 1:1 setting should only be used for computer playback and you'll have to make sure that the media player is set to a PAR/DAR of 1:1. On the same note 720x432 is not for DVDs.

[Frovingslosh]

Just to make a few things clear computer monitors show PAR 1:1. SD televisions doesn't not. So if you want something to look correct on a TV the DSG suggested PAR settings should be used, that goes for both DVDs and mediafiles, as far as I know. In other words the PAR 1:1 setting should only be used for computer playback only and you'll have to make sure that the media player is set to a PAR/DAR of 1:1. On the same note 720x432 is not for DVDs.

What I found when making 4x3 (SD) NTSC DVDs was that I got the proper result when producing a 1:1 video with DSG and then importing it into DVDflick. The project had already been started in DVDflick and I stayed with that, but I got some fantastic effects on still images with DSG. Got some things to work with videos in DSG too, but still can't do some things like put frames around videos and use most animated transistions. Trying on a different system with DSG installed on the C drive didn't help. But I got great results mixing videos that I shot with slideshows that I created in DSG. At that time I did all of the output as AVI files, other than the first few tests I quickly saw that the quality seemed comparable and the AVI files were significantly smaller (although that size wouldn't affect the final DVD).

I didn't use the DSV DVD maker component, both because I had already started with DVDflick and because I'm still rather intimidated by the "GUI for DVD author".

Since that project, I came across DVDstyler, and would like to experiment some with both DVDstyler and GUI for DVD author. But there is a learning curve there, and my focus so far has been to try to get some example files ready for the next project.

That project will be a DVD of a large set (800+) of 35mm slides. I've already decided that 800+ slides just isn't going to work in one file, we are going to make multiple smaller files and then combine them. No source video is involved, but I plan on using the Ken Burns effect a lot. The 35mm format has wide landscapes and better matches widescreen 16x9 format than the older 4x3 format. So we decided to target for a widescreen DVD. This would still be, like a commercial DVD, playable on an older SD set in widescreen format (with loss of some horizontal resolution), or could be played on a more modern digital set in widescreen format. We anticipate most viewers would be playing it on a newer 16x9 digital set and likely with the aid of an upscaling DVD or Bluray player. Commercial DVDs do this just fine, and I have every expectation that with the right tools I can do it too. I have mentioned to the photographer that after we get the DVD made we could consider making a HD BluRay disc. But that's not anything I'm concerned about yet, he's overwhelmed enough with the DVD project.

Of course, while 4x3 NTSC output worked well for me, I ran into the animation offset and aspect ratio problems with the widescreen videos that DSG produced. Looks like you're getting a handle on that now, so I need to make another test DVD with both the AVI and MPG files to confirm that the MPG file is the way to go in spite of its 1.185 pixel aspect ratio. Then I'll make a sample with some of the actual photographs to send to the photographer.

Still confused about the 720x432 thing, but need to play with that exe also. Plan on also looking at other settings in one of the exes, such as widescreen PAL, NTSC with the DVD WS pixel ratio aspect ratio (even though I don't intend to go directly to DVD ready VOB files yet), and even revisit the old 4x3 settings now that I know there can be a significant difference in the files depending on if AVI or MPG or something else is selected. Way to many combinations to do exhaustive testing, but I want to get a good grasp on as much as I can.

Thanks for everything.

[tin2tin]

I would recommend you to stick with mpg or (m2v +mpa) and not changing the DSG PAR, when working with dvd's in order to avoid avi PAR/DAR problems.

Here's a tutorial on how to render several slideshows and add them to a GUI for DVDauthor dvd:
http://www.digital-digest.com/articles/Photo_Slideshow_Using_DVD_slideshow_GUI_page3.html

The latter part of this tutorial covers the process of making a slideshow dvd from DSG with GUI for DVDauthor -it's fairly simple. All you have to do is to select File > Export DVD Menus and if GFD is installed, it will open automatically and you just click Create DVD and Burn DVD.
http://blip.tv/dvdslideshowgui/dvd-slideshow-gui-tutorial-external-applications-3957794