DVD Menu Problem

[1videoguy]

I am trying to burn a DVD on my Kron with a menu but after following the written instructions for Arabesk 3 the menu does not appear on the DVD? I successfully created my chapter menu as I want it to be, but after burning the DVD all I get on the screen is what was selected in the edit menu section, no menu appears just my background selection with a stamp that says P2 (project 2). Dont know what I am doing wrong?

Mark Ghezzi

[jimmeeker]

Hello Mark,

I'll try to remember how Arabesk 3 works as I've been using Arabesk 4 for some time now....but it sounds like you have gone half way through what is needed to get the menu to appear on your DVD. For the first thing I must say is that you MUST get some re-writable DVDs and test everything first before you waste any DVD-Rs. Never burn a non-re-writable DVD without testing it first on a DVD-RW. that way you can do dozens of test burns without spending any more money or wasting any regular DVDs. This is really needed as you can'ttell in any of the Arabesk systems if you have everything the way you want it without actually burning it. There is NO REAL preview of a DVD without burning it.

Now, under "Control" select whether you want the trailer ( the first film) to play first and then go to the menu or if you don't have a trailer if you want the menu to come up always first.

Then after selecting any "Text" that you want on the menu screen, you select "Background" and this will be either a color or a pattern or a moving video scene. If you want it to a moving video scene you select that scene and then you must check the box for "Animation" which in this case means a moving image of any kind. Then if you have audio with that moving scene, be sure to check the box marked "Audio" otherwise you will not get any sound with your menu background.

This scene that you select for the background should be from 30 to 50 seconds long as this becomes the menu and will repeat itself until you select which film you want to watch by clicking on it during playback of the DVD. Naturally all of the scenes that you select must be fully rendered (Created) in the scene bin and placed in the storyboard area. Also, even if you have a still background for your menu and have audio with it, you need to check the "Animated" box and the "Audio" box or you won't have any audio played back during the menu's time on the screen.

Next you may put in the buttons or Icons or Stamps for each "Film" that you add. What ever the name is that you typed in for each film....and is listed in the "Films, Chapter Menus" button under the heading of Info/Edit/play section of Arabesks main page....will automatically be transferred to the name of each film on your menu page. It's a good idea to leave these there as they are until you make sure that each button actually takes you to the correct film as you can mess up the order of the films and buttons or stamps easily. You can change the names (text) later, after you know they are in the right order.

By the way you can alter the playing order of the films in the "Films, Chapter Menu" page by clicking on the up and down arrows located just to the right of the "Remove Film" button. That way if you add another film you can move it's playback location further up or down the order of playback. For instance if you add three films and make up the menu and decide that you want to add a fourth film and it automatically goes in the number four slot but you want it to play first, just highlight that film and click the up arrow until it is in the first or top position in that list. Without having this ability....the films would aways play back in the order they were captured....and that probably won't always be what you want.

Now you have the films in the correct order and you can select what size or type of icon or STAMP you wish to represent each of the films. You can have three different sized picture frames for each film and you can add the title that you want for each at this time and position the letters on either side or top or bottom of the Icon. Now select your frames size and color of them, and the Activation and Selection color for the frame.

Or you can select to have no icon show up and have just letters. When you have all of this figured out and tested, then you can render all of the films or encode them from Digital video signals into MPG-2, then I believe in Arabesk 3 you can test preview your main menu and playback, but you will not be able to preview the Chapter menus. We still can't do that in Arabesk 4. This is even more reason to test burn on re-writable DVD-RWs. Then you can see what you actually are going to get in the final product.

When you have your background menu, your icon for each film and a title for each one, and the audio check box checked, then you must render it all. Go to the Info/Edit/Play section and click on "ALL".... this starts the render process and must not only render each of the films it also renders the Menu so that it works.

It is possible to render the films first and then do several re-dos on your menu design and render just the menu again and again until you get it the way you want it. Just hit the "All" button again and then the "Create" button. Then burn the DVD-RW and check out the entire production before you actually burn a regular DVD.

I hope this fills in some of the missing steps that you need to complete your DVD and make it work properly.

[1videoguy]

Jim,
You were right! I was leaving out some of the final steps to be able to complete this DVD process successfully. I appreciate your very through instructions as they provided the answers I needed to get the job done. You really put some time and thought into your post and it made the diffrence here.
Regards',
Mark

[jimmeeker]

Hey, we've all been there....trying out something new and not having any success. It really does help to have someone who has done it before point out the correct steps to make it work.

That's why this forum is so valuable, and when we all are able to learn from each other....it makes it a friendly place to visit, and we hope you'll keep coming back with more questions, and then you'll be able to help others in the future.

This is the friendliest place on the web.