What would the DVD Lab Pro VM Command be for this?

[stokefan]

Hi all,

i have posted a similar question but this question is different as it is more precise.

I would like to have 3 buttons on one menu in DVD Lab Pro which link to the same movie but with a different audio stream for each button.

I understand from the below part of the help guide for DVD Lab Pro that I need a VM command between the menu and the Film, but what VM command needs to be in this VM Object please?

Thanks, stokefan

[GeorgeW]

hmmmm, I'm not sure, but I've done this is the past.

1) create a new blank menu with an invisible auto-activate after 1 second button to your Title (make sure it's invisible for Normal, Select, and Activate).

2) for each of the buttons on your real menu, right-click, and
-set the audio stream
-make the bottom part where it says (restart menu, go to prev menu, go to next menu, go to first menu) -- I make that go to NEXT menu

[stokefan]

George W, I don't understand the purpose in stage 1) could you explain that please?

Also, I have uploaded below a screenshot of what I think you mean on your stage 2) is this correct?

[GeorgeW]

I thought you wanted to have a menu so that pressing a button would automatically set the audio and play the title with the correct audio stream.

You could do this with VM commands, and setting GPRM's and such. But if you didn't want to go through the VM commands, you could do it the way I described. Because there's no link command to set audio and play title (in the DLP Link options) -- it does allow you to set audio and go to a menu (the blank menu in this case). The blank menu is then used to auto-play the title after the audio stream is set.

If you didn't need a one-button solution (to set the audio and play your title), then I misunderstood.

[stokefan]

no George, sorry I didn't make myself clear, I meant to link from a menu which will have three different buttons on it, each I want to link to a different audio stream of the main film (although there are 8 audio streams I can choose from which is bewildering as I dont know which is which)

At the moment, it doesn't work anyway if i choose any audio stream then "+go to next menu", as it seems to choose one of my motion menus instead which confuses me greatly!

[GeorgeW]

There are up to 8 audio tracks in DLP, so you are just seeing the 8 different options in that menu. Just use 1-3 if your project only has 3 tracks (ignore 4-8).

Are you trying to setup an Audio Selection Menu?

If so, there's a tutorial on Mediachance's Site (which I'm sure you've already seen).
http://www.mediachance.com/dvdlab/tutorial/amanager.html

I setup an audio selection menu like this:

<<<
Audio 1
Audio 2

Main Menu
>>>

Based on the button pushed, I set the audio stream and Restart Menu. Then the user can go back to the main menu by hitting the Main Menu button.

A fancier method would be to display the current audio selection, but that would involve additional menus, and probably some VM Commands...

[stokefan]

Thanks for the responses GW, I'm not even after a selection menu which you're talking about, or as complicated as in the amanager tutorial to which you kindly linked me...

I simply would like each button in my menu which has 3 buttons total (as below)



to link to each audio stream in the film, as below



(there will be a steve.wav as a 4th audio stream there when I've converted it)

[GeorgeW]

So do you want to press the Steve button, and the movie starts playing with the Steve audio?

Press the James button, and the movie starts playing with the James audio.

Press the Dave button, and the movie starts playing with the Dave audio?

[stokefan]

yes that's what I want to do

[GeorgeW]

ok, try this:

Keep in mind that audio-1, audio-2, and audio-3 are really stream-0, stream-1, and stream-2


Add a BLANK menu, with an invisible auto-activate button after 1 second, that plays your Video Title.


For the STEVE Button, Link/Set GPRM and Link, then the popup window, let GPRM0=0, then in the bottom section link to the new blank menu with the auto-activate button.

For the James button, do the same thing, but in the popup, set GPRM0=1
For the Dave button, do the same thing, but in the popup, set GPRM0=2

Then go to the CONNECTIONS window, right-click on the Blank menu, and EDIT VM Commands.

Edit the PRE commands to have this line:
SetSTN (audio=GPRM0 )

Try that to see if it works...

[stokefan]

GW, thanks ever so much for that, it works...however...for each commentary, the playback of the movie is really jerky and not in any sort of sync with the audio, have you got any idea why this might be?

[GeorgeW]

Audio sync and "stuttering" can be caused by a number of different things:

-bitrates
-encoding process
-burner
-burn speed
-media (±R/RW -- different formats, and even different brands within a specific format)
-software to burn
-sticky labels on discs
-dvd player
-yada, yada, yada...


Given your project, I'm going to take a guess that it's your total bitrate (Video + ALL Audio tracks). If you have 4 .wav audio tracks, that's 6,144kbps just for the audio alone -- leaving very little for your video bitrate). For burned discs, I recommend staying around the 7000kbps total bitrate, so you have to add it all up to see where you stand. If you go with compressed audio like Dolby Digital or mpeg audio, then you have a better shot at getting your 4 audio tracks and a decent video bitrate onto disc. NOTE: mpeg audio is not an NTSC Standard, so some NTSC DVD players will not play back mpeg audio. I think I saw from one of your pictures that you are dealing with PAL, so mpeg audio should be fine... (btw, I can't see your pictures anymore, were they removed?).

[stokefan]

hmm so the maximum bit rate of a film and all the audio tracks for that film is about 7000? I didn't know that. Mine is totalling over 12,000 maybe I'll have to find a way to compress the audio commentarys...not as if they have to be great quality, its a right pain though as it took me ages to get all the commentarys to 48kHz and stereo!

I really appreciate these replies GW, my pictures are back (had some ....err...problems with my website) and i've listed some again below.

[GeorgeW]

The maximum bitrate according to DVD Specs is 10,080kbps. However, for BURNED DVD's, I believe you get better compatibility by lowering the ceiling down to about 7000kbps (just from my experience). You could go up to the max, as long as your DVD Player plays it fine; however, if you plan to distribute your DVD, then you should consider that not all DVD Players are created equal (there's a whole lot of reasons why some discs work in player-a, but not in player-b...).

If you are nearing 12,000kbps, I would say that the high bitrate is "choking" your dvd player -- it might play back fine on a computer, but the dvd player won't be able to handle it...

That said, switch over to Dolby Digital or mpeg audio at about 224kbps per track, if you have 4 tracks, that will allow you to encode your video at a decent rate of about 6000kbps (which should be fine for DV25 video footage). Of course, you also need to consider how long your video is, and if you are writing to DVD5 or DVD9 disc...