DVD Creation for the Rest of Us
Until this year, the only element missing from Steve Jobs’ dream of a "digital hub" was distribution. Transferring high-resolution digital video to VHS required additional hardware such as a video card, a digital video camera with a Firewire input and an analog out, or an outboard device like a Formac Studio Converter. Publishing to DVD in high- resolution digital could easily require a $5000 investment, not counting the computer. In addition, the professional DVD authoring software carried with it a very steep learning curve for the non-professional.
That scenario changed drastically with Apple’s introduction last January of its SuperDrive — a Pioneer CD-RW/DVD-R drive (see review of the DVR-A03 as a stand-alone unit) built into its top-line G4 computer — and an extremely simplified DVD authoring program, iDVD, for a total cost of $3500 (including the 733MHz Apple G4 computer). Note that the iDVD software is available only with the purchase of an Apple computer with a built-in SuperDrive, and Apple has no other plans for it.
Streaming Media will be reviewing PC/Windows-based DVD creation software in coming months – due to sheer market share PCs will be a more popular platform for DVD authoring. So PC users may find this interesting from the point of view of "what are the basic features of DVD software and how should I evaluate them?"
We tested the iDVD software package on the new G4/867 "Quicksilver" with a SuperDrive, 128MB of RAM, and a 60GB Ultra ATA/66 hard disk. The tests were run under Mac OS 9.2.
Simplify, Simplify
Using professional DVD authoring software can be a daunting proposition for the non-pro, but Apple keeps its ease of use crown with iDVD. After taking the 15-minute multimedia tutorial, anyone with the ability to use a mouse should be able to create a DVD containing a video up to one hour long or thousands of still images. There is no manual, but the online help is a worthy guide if you need assistance.
Although iDVD allows only six items per menu, creating menus was easy and fun. And the items-per-menu limit has its reasons — it makes it possible for the program to automatically arrange the large, easy-to-read buttons. Items can be DV, QuickTime or MPEG movies, folders of still images (slideshows), or a button leading to another menu. Through nested menus, any number of total assets can be arranged on the disc up to the total available space on the disc. A fish-eye graph keeps track of how much space is available on a DVD as it is authored.
Movies are automatically stretched so that they will fill a TV screen while maintaining the original aspect ratio. For very small movies, this upsampling can result in pretty severe pixelization. Of course, this is not an issue for movies that are created and edited from standard DV, NTSC or PAL formatted sources.
A finished disc can be previewed in software prior to encoding. If you are low on memory or have virtual memory enabled, video playback can be a bit choppy, but this does not affect the final burned disc.
While iDVD contains a number of built-in "themes" for what Apple conceives as standard uses for the program (with names like "Road Trip," "Summer Fun," etc.), the look of each menu is fully customizable. Dragging a still image (JPEG, TIFF, BMP, PNG, GIF and others) to the background of a menu instantly places that image as the background.
Dragging an image to a button sets the button to that image. If a button is for a movie or slideshow, any keyframe of the movie or any still image in the slideshow can be selected as the button image. Button shapes are customizable, as are fonts, font sizes and colors, and any customized theme can be saved as a" Favorite." With the upcoming iDVD 2, the background and button graphics will be motion-capable, and the slideshows will have the ability to be accompanied by music.
One painful restriction is the program’s inability to separate a long-form video into sections using chapter marks. I found this limitation disappointing when I wanted to author a disc containing a continuous musical performance by my band. It left me with the choice of authoring a simple, contiguous one-hour DVD of a performance with the 12 songs individually inaccessible, or editing the performance (in iMovie or Final Cut Pro) into 12 individual videos spread across three nested menus, and not supporting playing of all 12 videos automatically. Clearly, this is a case where Apple’s DVD-Pro authoring software should be considered.