DVD Authoring Software for Interactive DVD

[MoreRockin]

I am creating ready to start a DVD project where the DVD is completely interactive. You use your remote control to navigate throughout the DVD to select video clips to watch.

I have ripped these vids from Youtube and google.

I have had NO luck using Adobe Encore 2.0. I can't even get off the ground with it. After I changed my videos to 720X480, it says Invalid file type or something similar. So I'm giving up on Encore.

What are your suggestions?

I want software where I can lots of menus, background music and the ability to integrate a lot of video clips.

Please Help!

[machf]

If you want all that, I'd suggest DVD Lab pro for the authoring process. You'll need something else for the pre-processing, though (converting your original videos into .m2v video streams and .ac3 audio streams). Possibly TMPGEnc Xpress would be good enough for that...

[MoreRockin]

Pre-processing? Thats all I need is another step . . . . can you please explain cnverting the videos to .m2v and .ac3 is needed?

I've never heard of this . . . although, I am a rookie!

Thanks for your quick response . . . I'm looking for DVD Lab right now . . . hopefully its not too expensive!

[machf]

Well, for all that it will allow you to do, DVD Lab is relatively cheap. You can download it for free and try it for 30 days.
I think TMPGenc Xpress has become more expensive than it used to be, so maybe you would like to use some other program to encode your videos to a DVD-compatible format. Take a look here for alternative programs that can do the job.

[MoreRockin]

Is there not software that will convert the entire project over to DVD compatible format? I have dozens of short videos i'm trying to compile into this compilation.

What is the difference in DVD Lab and like Encore or Roxio Easy Media Creator?

[machf]

Hmmm... you could try WinAVI Video Converter to turn all those videos into a ready-to-burn DVD, but I think it won't allow you to have any menus at all, just play all the videos one after another.

I haven't used Adobe Encore, so I can't coment on that, but if Roxio Easy Media Creator is anything like the old Roxio VideoPack, you could certainly use it too... the main difference with DVD Lab Pro possibly being the amount of available options (the "Pro" in DVD Lab Pro's name does it justice).

[guns1inger]

ConvertXtoDVD will do it, but you only get simple text menus. Basically, if you want complex menus, you need to learn how to convert the video yourself. If you want something that does it all, you have to accept that the output will be simple, at best.