DVD doesn't play from beginning to end. Help, please?

[J-E-T-S]

Hello everyone,

I have a dvd with several episodes on it. I would like to do as many of the following tasks to it as I possibly can. If anyone has a solution for any of these problems, please reply and show me how. Here are some info about it.

* The dvd has 4 episodes on it.

* It has a very pretty menu that I want to keep.

* The dvd has 3 different languages plus English subtitles.

* Each episode starts out with the same music video.

* The dvd does not play from beginning to end. I have to manually press play for each episode.

* The menu has 6 buttons: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Behind the Scenes, and Audio/Subtitles.


My questions are:

1) Is there a way to make the dvd play all the episodes from first to last without user interference, WHILE keeping the nice menu? Having to press play for each episode is a hassle.

2) Each episode starts out with the same music video. I would like to cut out this music video. Is there a tool that can cut with accuracy, sort of like TMPGenc Plus? I tried VOBBlanker and DVD Shrink but those 2 programs are not very accurate.

3) If I cut out the music video, will that affect the menu structure, and if so, is there a guide to help me rebuild the menu structure?

4) Will any of this cause the various languages to be inaccessible?

5) Is it possible to extract the background picture of the menu intact? The menu has the 6 buttons, plus a square in the center where a small video clip plays continuously. I can do without the buttons and the motion video clip, but I would like to extract the background picture so hopefully I can build another menu with the correct buttons. But I don't know if everything is "merged down" or if each part can be extracted individually.

Please help as I've been spending many hours and still hasn't gotten anywhere.

[guns1inger]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but at the moment you have

Menu

Item One -> Music Video -> Episode One -> Return to menu
Item Two -> Music Video -> Episode Two -> Return to menu
Item Three -> Music Video -> Episode Three -> Return to menu
Item Four -> Music Video -> Episode Four -> Return to menu

Where the music video may be part of each episode.

You want

Menu

Item One -> Ep One -> Ep Two -> Ep Three -> Ep Four -> Return to Menu
Item Two -> Ep Two -> Ep Three -> Ep Four -> Return to Menu
Item Three -> Ep Three -> Ep Four -> Return to Menu
Item Four -> Ep Four -> Return to Menu

Yes ?

If so, and if the music video is a separate title, then you may be able to do it by changing the links in PGCEdit.

If you need to edit the titles it becomes more difficult.

As to question 5 - no, you cannot. If there is a motion video clip then the whole background is one video, with the motion being just in the middle. It is not a background still with a small motion section running as an overlay. You could grab a still and try to repair it in photoshop by patching over the buttons and the motion area.

[J-E-T-S]

Guns1inger,

You are right about the menu structure, and the map you laid out is the one I want.

As for the music video, I think it is part of the vob files. I looked at the dvd structure in DVD Shrink and it has 4 titles with the music video at the beginning at each title. Here is a screen capture of the video_ts folder. The 4 > signs in the picture show the 4 episodes.


Can I use pgcedit to program the dvd playback to skip the music video on episodes 2, 3, and 4? Playing it once in the first episode is enough.

[guns1inger]

I haven't played around with PGCEdit enough to say if you can use it to skip into chapters or not. You may have to use something like VOBLanker to remove the cells first. If you can be patient I am sure others with more experience in re-authoring existing menus will be able to fill in the blanks.

[J-E-T-S]

Just giving this a bump.

Anyone can offer some help? Is there a "dummies guide to using pgcedit" out there? I can really use it.