Hello, I am working on an Episode DVD using DVDlabpro, and I was wondering if I can set up the DVD to play the episodes both with intro movies and without intro movies. By intro movies, I mean the 2 minute intro before each episode begins. I am doing this for my brother, and I am not sure if he wants to keep the intros or not, but if I watch it, I would like to do it without the intros. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
I think doubling the menus and adding a VMG would do the trick. I will have to encode a few more episodes, so I will not be able to post results until tomorrow or so.
Forget it, I just figured out that I would have to have the intro and main episode separated in order for it to work.
Or you can just place chapter points at the end of the intro. That way you can just hit the skip button and it would skip it. Or set the starting point at that chapter and then if you wish to watch the intro you can hit the back skip button. OR even still on your first menu have one link for playing with intros and one playing with out intros and just have the start points differant.
Your last suggestion is kind of what I was shooting for. I can attempt it now as I am strating another DVD today. I can't figure it out without having VTS1 be with intros and VTS2 without. Even though this works, I would have to place each file twice and thus taking up double the space. I remember Fantastic 4 the animated series can let you choose whether or not you want to have the Stan Lee intro before the Show starts. This is what inspired me, but I cannot figure it out. When I replied to myself, I thought it would be simple, but no, since I would have to add each media in the DVD 2 times. If you can think of a way to do it without having to add each movie two times please let me know. Just adding a second menu with different start points will only work on the first episode, unless if I have it go back to the menu after each episode is finished. If you can figure out a way to do this I would be happy. I have access to DVDlabpro, DVD Maestro, DVD Architect, & Sonic Scenarist. Making it work with any program would be great. Right now it is only in the back of my head. I am being pretty lazy about this. I am even too lazy to convert subtitles from .srt into the proper format since it usually takes more than one step. Now, I am taking the space saver approach and am going to put all 45 episodes on 4 DVD's instead of 5 to 6. I will add an extra VTS with the intro and Ending only and have it as Special Features.
Do you episodes have the into already on them? I'm assuming they do. If you place the chapter points like I suggested with DVD-Lab you should be able to create two menus and have one point to whatever chapter point you wish. In DVD-Lab there is a hierarchy window which will shows arrows of how the work flow is. Lets say you have icon "1" you right click on it and select link and then select "episode one "00:02:45" for instants to have it start without the into dealy. Just make sure to create you chapter points before hand. If you can't figure it. Just let me know and perhaps I can post a few screen shots. Good luck.
I know how to make it skip the intro all together, but I would like to have the option to pick whether I want the intro to play or not. Basically a menu before the main menu that will say somethig like "Play Episodes with Intros?" then be able to select "yes" or "no". Also, I separated the intro and ending from the main episode. I did this to save space (and encoding time). For each episode both were 5 minutes long, so I can fit an extra 3 or so episodes per disc like this. I did my first disc of the series with the intro and ending as part of each episode (without splitting). Now, I am doing the third disc and I have split the intro and ending like I did in the Second Disc. I will only include them as special features once again.
Use the hiearchy window. Have the "yes" and "no" point to two differant menus that look the same but actually have the links point to differant sections. A flow diagram of this might look like this if yes -> menuwithintros -> episodes 1 select -> goto intro -> goto episode one if no -> menuNOinto -> episode 1 select -> goto epsisode one You are more than likely going to have to use VM programming which is in DVD-Lab. Here is a link. http://www.mediachance.com/dvdlab/Helppro/vmcommands.htm You will need to use this to place variables....so like if $into = true then goto intro; play intro; if $episode = 1 goto episode 1 I'm not familiar with that language but thats generally how languages go
Yes, this is exactly what I was looking for. I will give it a try when I do disc 4 which will have enough room for intros. Thanks for all your help.
No problem man! Keep this topic updated. I would like to see how it goes and even your code. I've never tried it but I already have all kinds of good ideas running through my head.
Well, I have not tried it yet as I have been busy copying and re-authoring movies, but I have a theory. I guess I can have a VMG menu with "Play Intros?" and "yes" & "no" options. I can then have yes point to Dummy Menu 1 and No Point to Dummy menu 2. Dummy menu 1 can have something like 1.GPRM1 = 1. 2.JumpSS VTSM (vts 1, tt 1, menu ROOT) Dummy Menu 2 can have: 1.GPRM1 = 0 2.JumpSS VTSM (vts 1, tt 1, menu ROOT) Then I would have to create a Dummy Menu 3 for the Play button so it knows to resume, but that has nothing to do with this. I would have to create a Dummy Menu 4 with the following commands: 1.If (GPRM1 = 0) Goto 3 2.If (GPRM1 = 1) Goto 4 3.JumpVTS_PTT (tt 1, ptt 2) 4.JumpTT 1 Then, I would have to add the following post commands to each movie; 1.If (GPRM1 = 0) Goto 3 2.If (GPRM1 = 1) Goto 4 3.JumpVTS_PTT (tt X, ptt 2) 4.JumpVTS_PTT (tt X, ptt 1) Where X is the movie number. I have not tested this out, so if you are doing a Episode based movie, do not use it and assume it is correct (I just figured them out in my head as I was writing the Post). Test it out first. I already got ideas of how to do this by having the Intro be say Movie14 and the ending being movie15 and still having the opssibility of including them or not. I would need to add a GPRM counter to the end of each movie. I would then have to have each episode ask for the GPRM value and decicde where to go from there. I would also need a ton of Post Commands for the Intro and Ending movies. The second way will be more coplicated, but it will save tons of space on the DVD.
