DVD video output, Author.xml, and audio sync issues

[slayer4567]

Hi,

Recently I started using GUI for dvdauthor, PVAStrumento, and Cutterman for my dvd authoring as they take far less time to author a dvd than my ulead movie factory 3. I must say that the 3 new (to me) programs work great, but I have run into some troubles, hence why I'm posting this message.

1) After I create a DVD, I find that it plays in my computer no problem. If I put this in some set top dvd players, it plays as it should, but the highlights on the menus might be off (not always), or that the video will squish to the left so that I will see most of the video from the dvd on 2/3 of the screen, and the right 1/3 will show whats supposed to be on the left of the screen (kinda like it wraps around). I have no idea why it does this.

2) I have been trying to mess around with GUI for dvdauthor's edit author.xml so to play 2 videos in a row, then go back to the main title after the second video. To do this, I first check the radio button which will continue to the next movie after the first is done. That gives me this in the author.xml:
<pre> {
if (g2 eq 1) jump titleset 1 menu;
if (g2 eq 2) jump titleset 2 menu;
if (g2 eq 3) jump titleset 3 menu;
if (g2 eq 4) jump titleset 4 menu;
if (g2 eq 5) jump titleset 5 menu;
if (g2 eq 6) jump titleset 6 menu;}
</pre>

And what I do to change it, is this:

<pre> {
if (g2 eq 1) jump vmgm menu;
if (g2 eq 2) jump titleset 2 menu;
if (g2 eq 3) jump vmgm menu;
if (g2 eq 4) jump titleset 4 menu;
if (g2 eq 5) jump vmgm menu;
if (g2 eq 6) jump titleset 6 menu;}
</pre>

When it goes to create the dvd, it will make it to the last step where it processes the MMMenu.mpg, gets to the end of it, and fails saying:
ERR: Cannot find PGC with entry
ERR: in VMGM pgc 1, <pre>

I only get this error when I put my changes into the xml file. What might be the reason for that?

3) I have notice that there is a slight un-sync of the sound on one of the movies I'm trying to create. Demuxing the sound from video is no problem, but how can I edit the audio to sync back up? is there a good program for that?

Any help on these topics would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance

[borax]

Q 1: ... I will see most of the video from the dvd on 2/3 of the screen...
This happens on some SA DVD Players, if they cannot properly display non dvd standard resolutions (like 480x480). The only way out is reencoding to a dvd standard resolution (like 352x480), or another SA DVD Player.

Q 2: ... That's the 'wrong' place to adjust.
Within each titlesetmenu you will find a < post > section like:

    <titles>
      <pgc>
       <pre> { g1=0; } </pre>
        <vob file="..."/>
        <post>{ g1=1;g2=2;call vmgm menu 2;}</post>
      </pgc>

If you want to 'break' the queue after this titleset, just replace the line:

       <post>{ g1=1;g2={NUMBER of NEXT TITLE]};call vmgm menu 2;}</post>

with just

       <post>call vmgm menu;</post>

Q 3: I prefer mpeg2schnitt, but cuttermaran is as good. Both programs can
only work with elementary streams (which you get from pvastrumento) and adjust audio delays (positive or negative).

[slayer4567]

Thanks for the quick reply Borax. I'll have to try these out when I get home tonight.

If the answer to question 1 is to reencode, thats kinda funny, becaue the dvd made from ulead movie factory works on this SA DVD player, but from GUI for DVDAuthor it doesn't. Would that be becasue Ulead re-encodes the movies?

For question 2, so if I want the first movie to continue into the second, but have the second return to the main menu, would I keep the intial <pre> {
if (g2 eq 1) jump titleset 1 menu;
if (g2 eq 2) jump titleset 2 menu; }
</pre>
or remove that and in the post for the titleset do...
(post for titleset 1)
<post>{g1=1; g2=2;call vmgm menu 2;}</post>
(post for titleset 2)
<post>{call vmgm menu;}</post>
?

Cutterman works for me, but can it change the sync up right in the middle of the video? I have used cutterman to change it for the beginning of the audio/video sync, but I haven't tried when the de-sync is in the middle of the video

[slayer4567]

Well for Q2 and Q3 I have found out the answer once I got home and tried things out. For Q2, I need to keep the <pre> tags that are there and just add the <post> when I want it to jump back to the main menu. As for Q3, I guess mpeg2schnitt can cut the audio in the middle of the video. It worked quite well too once I got the hang of it.

As for Q1, I would guess that Ulead does reencode the video to a certain size, so when I go to encode it for the first time, I will try 352x480, but what other sizes are SA DVD player ready?

[borax]

Q2 + Q3 : Well done!

For solving sync issues with mpeg2schnitt, Martin (the author of mpeg2schnitt) has a very good guide:
http://www.mdienert.de/mpeg2schnitt/homepage/M2S-Hilfe/Audioversatz_beseitigen.html
But it is only available in german. You can try to view it in a google translation:
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mdienert.de%2Fmpeg2schnitt%2F...language_tools
(the translation is hardly readable, but I think you can understand the procedure...)

The 'standard' sizes (and other properties) for DVDs are described here:
https://www.videohelp.com/dvd

I would use a resolution which is close to the original.

[slayer4567]

OK, I can set the resolution for when I record to either 352x480, or 720x480, but what about the videos that I already have that are 480x480? is there a way I can get them to 352x480?

[borax]

I don't know your recording source/software. DVB streams are usually saved as they come from the broadcaster. You should not change this (otherwise the recording software would need to reencode 'on the fly', but this often results in lost frames and therefore sync problems).
To reencode your 480x480 videos you can use any mpeg2 encoder.
The 'preferred' (commercial) ones are: CCE, MCE or TMPGEnc Plus
Freeware: FreeEnc, QuEnc, HC (usually in combination with avisynth and dgmpegdec )