There are a lot of really nicely packaged software suites out there in the affordable range ($59.00-$120.00) that promise to make it easy to take your home movies from your camera to a nice dvd that you can share with your friends.
However, all of the software programs that I have tried over the past few years have always assumed that you already understand a lot that maybe you don't.
I spent literally weeks one summer learning how to convert my own old camcorder vhs tapes to DVR dvd's. They worked just great in the DVR player that I had used to make the conversion from analog tapes to digital. Then, the real frustration began. I could not get the dvd's to work in any of my players at home. I tried every dvd player and kept getting error messages. Obviously, I did not get it.
What was the problem? I started madly searching for products that would solve the mystery of being able to make a simple, readable DVD that I could send to friends. I bought a VSO product http://www.vso-software.fr/ called Copy to DVD and discovered there are Audio_TS and Video_TS (Title Set) elements (files that are VOB/IFO type files). I saw these files when I put the DVR dvd into the computer but it still didn't make any sense. I finally figured out that the video_TS files are the big deal and they need to be double clicked over to the other side so the dvd can be created. Take a look at Copy to DVD for a trial copy. I had looked all over the internet to try to find how this works with no luck.
Then, I started to get bolder. I had a new Everio digital camcorder and I wanted to make copies of my videos for friends. The directions from JVC made absolutely no sense to me--you had to make little files on your desktop and blah blah blah. The tech people helped me but I lost everything the first time I had to restore my computer.
I figured out that if you right click on the start button on the lower left of Explorer (Microsoft) go to "explore" and then find the hard drive of your camera (make sure it is on). It is the one that says HDD. The Camera comes with a basic editor from Cyberlink called PowerDirector Express. http://cyberlink.com.tw/ It took me a very long time to edit each video because this program crashed constantly until I learned that you edit each clip and then add it to the timeline. I was putting all the clips on the timeline and then editing into the middle of the timeline. They don't tell you that, but I finally discovered it. I also learned the value of constantly saving a project.
So now, I thought I was pretty darned smart. I had learned about the files that make up a dvd and that you could edit on a timeline and create a .wmv file. It will play on the Windows Media Player (http://mediaplayer.d0wnloadz.net/) and it could be made into a cd or vcd that promises to confuse the heck out of your friends--trust me on this. That still wasn't giving me what I wanted. Then I figured out that you need to convert (render) the .wmv file into an .mpg or aka mpeg. You do this in the software. But you aren't through yet! You have a nice mpeg file but now you need to get it on a dvd in a format that your friends will appreciate. Believe me, they get really tired of you saying, well, how old is your dvd player?...or are you playing it in your computer and does your computer have a dvd player software installed in it? Uh...that leaves most people thinking that maybe they are really too busy to play your lousy cd of your cats and vacation to Lake Mead to feed the carp.
Now, this step separates the men from the boys....you have learned how to edit a dvd in Microsoft's movie making software http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/moviemaker2.mspx that comes with your computer or with the movie making software that comes with your digital camcorder. You have a nice movie now and what comes next?
Enter Roxio's My DVD Creative Suite--you can find it on the internet or at Costco. Be advised that they are not available to help and they won't even respond to emails if you have a problem with your disk so caveat emptor. However, they have a program that allows you to take your .wmv file and convert it to something a dvd player can read along with a nice set of menus. (A menu is that part that shows when you first put it in the player--it allows you to move up and down to select a movie or chapter.) Gotta make sure everyone is following along with me...
One really helpful thing to know that took me a while to find out is that you can make a dvd without a starting menu. The friend puts it into their player and it starts right up. This is perfect for your parents or people in a hurry like my husband and I.
I have spent a fair amount of time with Roxio's Easy Media Creator 8, 9 and now 10 version and they PROMISED all kinds of things that the new version would do that the old version wouldn't....but as soon as you fall for the upgrade scheme, you learn that you need to upgrade again for that little part of the software that is just critical for that cool thing you wanted to do all along...you know what I mean if you have ever bought anything from them. Every time you load up the program, a little box in the middle tells you the latest upgrade and how if you bought this one more thing, you would be so cool. Don't fall for it like I did. They tease you into thinking that you can make BluRay discs...then you find out that you didn't understand and now you need to buy something else.
Now, I have begun to work with the upgraded Cyberlink Power Director (from the Express version mentioned above). http://cyberlink.com.tw/ You still need to know about converting .wmv files to other formats....however, they explain each of the types of formats such as avi, mpeg1 and mpeg 2 and so on. You can edit a video or slideshow, render it to a dvd friendly format, and then create a menu or not.
After spending a summer popping DVD's in 6 different dvd players to see if they worked in all of them, I learned that all the work of editing the scenes, adding music, adding transitions and titles is useless if the silly thing won't play at your friend's house. The most important thing is that the DVD's must work in all brands and types of players--especially all the types that your friends have.
Hopefully, this will help someone just getting into the idea of taking a movie off their camcorder and making a dvd for posterity. The camera manufacturers have been working on hardware that puts all the video on a disk in one simple step. This is good if you don't care about the 30 minutes that you carried the camcorder around your neck shooting your feet. However, jump in there and give it a try.
If I can figure it out, you surely can.
PS...the URL for VSO is: http://www.vso-software.fr/
and the URL for Roxio is: http://www.roxio.com/
Thanks for reading my blog. Please visit my site at
http://www.rltphotoartist.com/ and check out the things that I do in my work.
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