Add a menu to a DVD without re-authoring, using DVD-Lab Pro

http://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=220758

VideoHelp.com
User guides - Add a menu to a DVD without re-authoring, using DVD-Lab
Pro

petar - May 10, 2004 10:32

OK, I thought I make my contribution to videohelp.com so here's one guide from me. It's my
first one (on this site or any) so bear with me on this one.
This guide is if you've made a movie only DVD (like when re-authoring with DVD Shrink) and
would like to add a menu without complete re-authoring. TMPGEnc DVD Author, for example,
makes the re-authoring very simple but it doesn't support multiple audio/subtitles and if you
have a movie with such, this guide can help. It's also useful if you want to do the muxing
with a reliable tool which doesn't support menus or is limited on the menu creation side for
your taste and you want to create the menus with DVD-Lab Pro but you don't trust it to
create the VTSs because is still Beta (for example you follow many of the guides on this site
how to author with IfoEdit or ReJig but you want to have a menu too). This guide gives you a
safe way to add a menu because you won't be touching the movie VOBs so it has few
advantages over the tools that support re-authoring by importing the VOBs.
Just a note before we begin. Adding a VTS menu is very complicated and involves a lot of
time/effort so instead we'll add VMG menus. That way we only need to do minor
modifications to the VTS files.

Tools required:
IfoEdit
DVD-Lab Pro (or any other authoring tool that can create VMG menus and gives access to vm
commands but this guide is specific to DVD-Lab Pro (it's the only one I can afford); however
the principle is the same with any other tool that supports these features, like Scenarist for
example)

EDIT: I added a third simpler example at the end if you find Examples 1 and 2 too
complicated

Example 1. Only one movie (VTS)

Open DVD-Lab Pro and create the menus required. For this guide we'll create a main menu,
audio/subtitle selection menu and one chapter selection menu. Remember all three must be
VMG menus, not VTS menus. Also all objects we add must be VMG objects.
Create the three menus as you like, create 3 command objects, then make transitions,
motion effects or whatever. Once done let's see what we do with the buttons.

Main menu
This one should probably only have one button that leads outside the VMG - the play movie
button. The other buttons lead to other menus. Here's a simple example:
Link the "play movie button" to the first command object. Then open it and add the following
two commands:
GPRM0 = 0
JumpTT 1
Should look like this:

Audio/Subtitle selection menu

Link all buttons that select audio/subtitle to the second command object. We'll create the
buttons in a way that the streams are on the disc, just to make this guide simplier. Say your
disc has 1. Spanish audio, 2. English Audio, then 1. Spanish subtitle, 2. English subtitles. So
create the buttons where button 1 is Spanish audio, 2 is English Audio, 3 is Spanish
subtitles, 4 is English subtitles, 5 is sub off and then add any other buttons you want (for
example, 6 - start movie, 7 - go back to main menu).

Example:
Then open the command object and put
GPRM1 = SPRM8
GPRM1 /= 1024

(the following two commands are for the example above, i.e. if you have two audio streams;
if you have three then continue with "If (GPRM1==3) GPRM2 = 2" and so on)
If (GPRM1==1) GPRM2 = 0
If (GPRM1==2) GPRM2 = 1

(the following two commands also relate to the example above, i.e. two subtitle streams; if
you have more, continue with if (GPRM1==5) GPRM3=66 and so on; also the condition - If
GPRM1==X, should continue from above, i.e. if the last condition above was "If GPRM1==3",
then the first one below should be "If GPRM1==4")
If (GPRM1==3) GPRM3 = 64
If (GPRM1==4) GPRM3 = 65

Last condition, for the sub off

If (GPRM1==5) GPRM3 = 62 (if the sub off button is number 5, otherwise put the number as
applicable)

As you can see, the condition on the left is the button number, on the right is the audio
(from 0 for stream 1) and the subpicture stream (from 64 for stream 1 plus 62 for sub off).
So if you understand this, you don't need to make the buttons in any particular order, just
make sure the condition is connected to the right stream.

Last command:
LinkPGCN3 (this is assuming the audio is the second menu; if it's the third, then put
LinkPGCN4 instead; DVD-Lab makes a generic PGC1, then PGC2 is your first menu and so
on).
This last command loops back to the audio/subtitle selection menu. I'm assuming you want to
have one other button that links to the main menu. However, if you prefer after selecting an
audio/subtitle stream to go back to the main menu directly, put Link PGCN2 instead.
Also if you include a button for start movie in the audio/subtitle selection menu, link it to the
first command object we created at the beginning.
The command object should look like this in this case (DVD-Lab converts all numbers to hex-
decimal, though you can type them in decimal):
(Optional) If you know a bit about the DVD commands, you can include some button
highlighting commands before the LinkPGCN command. As most commercial movies are
made, when you click on a particular audio selection button, next it highlights the start
movie button or the first subtitle selection button.
For example, lets say after the user selects the audio, we want to highlight the first subtitle
selection button and once the user selects the subtitle we want to highlight the start movie
button. Assuming we have 2 audio selection buttons and 3 subtitle selection buttons in that
order and "start movie" is button no 6, we'd put before the LinkPGCN command:
If (GPRM1 <= 5) GPRM4 = 6144 (means if the user activated any audio/subtitle selection
button to highlight button 6 - the start movie button; the value needs to be multiplied by
1024)
If (GPRM1 <= 2) GPRM4 = 3072 (means if the user activated any audio selection button to
highlight button 3 - the first subtitle selection button)
SetHL_BTN GPRM4
Don't forget to make the default selected button to 0 for this menu. You'll also need to NOP
the default button highlight command that DVD-Lab puts in the pre command section of the
menu PGC.

Chapter selection menu

Similar to above link all buttons that select a chapter to the third command object. Make
button 1 for chapter 1, button 2 for chapter 2 and so on.
Example:
In the command object put:
GPRM0 = SPRM8
GPRM0 /= 1024
JumpTT 1
Should look like this

That's it from DVD-Lab. Compile with one dummy movie (or tick test compile) and exit.

----------------------------

Then put together in one new VIDEO_TS subfolder: the VIDEO_TS.* files that DVD-Lab
compiled with the VTS*.* files from the original movie.

Open IfoEdit and open the VTS_01_0.IFO file

Click on the VTS_PGCITI table, then on the +, then on the PGC. Scroll down to the PGC
command table. If there isn't one right-click on it and add one pre-command. That will create
it and add one NOP command. If there are any commands already NOP them all. Then add as
precommands:
41 00 00 82 83 00 00 00 (this sets the audio and the subtitle to what we selected in the
menu)
20 a5 00 00 00 01 00 01 (this links to chapter number 1 if the user selected chapter 1 in the
menu above)
20 a5 00 00 00 02 00 02 (this links to chapter number 2...)
20 a5 00 00 00 03 00 03 (to chapter number 3...)
and so on until you get to the last chapter

Then add as a post command

30 08 00 00 01 42 00 00 (this calls the title menu after the movie has done playing)

If you have any NOP commands left, you can delete them though it makes no difference.
Here's how it should look:

Finally open the VIDEO_TS.IFO file

Click on VMGM_PGCI_UT table, then on the +, then on the first PGC
Modify the second command to 20 04 00 00 00 00 00 02 (DVD-Lab makes by default the Title
key on the remote to jump to the root menu but we don't have one).
Then click on the VMG_PTT_SRPT table and modify the number of chapters to the correct
one.
Finally click on the VMG_VTS_ATRT table and modify the number of audio and subtitle
streams to the correct one, then modify the attributes by double-clicking on each in the top
view (the VMG overview).

That should be it.

-------------------------------

Example 2 (more than one VTS)

If you have a disc with more than one VTS (like putting together a disc with more than one
movie with Re-author of DVD Shrink) it gets a bit more complex though not much more
complicated.

The main menu

Same as example 1 but add a second (or third, one for each VTS) button that links to a
separate command object. The same commands as in example 1 should go in each, except
the second command should be JumpTT 2 for the second movie, JumpTT 3 for the third and
so on, i.e. GPRM0=0, JumpTT 2 for movie 2, for example. If you have many VTSs rather than
creating loads of command objects, you can make just one and do all the jumping from there
(see Example 3).

The audio/subtitle selection menu

If you have the same number of audio/subtitle streams in each VTS and in the same order,
you can leave this as it is.

Otherwise if one movie has more streams than another (for example movie 1 also has
director's comments whereas movie 2 doesn't), the easiest solution is to put a note in the
menu which streams are not applicable to which movie so that the user doesn't select them
(nothing wrong will happen if he does).

If the order of the streams is different (for example movie 1 has first english, second spanish
and movie 2 the other way around) then you'll need to modify with IfoEdit the values of
GPRM2 (for audio) and GPRM3 (for subtitles) in the precommand section of the VTS where
they are swapped. So before the SetSTN command you'll need to put, for example for the
subtitle stream:
1. if (GPRM3==65) Go to Line 4 (00 A1 00 03 00 41 00 04)
2. mov GPRM3, 65 (71 00 00 03 00 41 00 00)
3. Go to Line 5 (00 01 00 00 00 00 00 05)
4. mov GPRM3, 64 (71 00 00 03 00 40 00 00)
5. the SetSTN command and so on
effectively it means if GPRM3 is 65 to make it 64 and otherway around. To swap the audio
streams, replace GPRM3 with GPRM2 (in hex-decimal where it's 03 with 02) and 65 and 64
with 01 and 00 (in hex-decimal 41 and 40 with 01 and 00). If you need to swap both the
audio and the subtitle put both sets of commands (8 commands in total) and adjust the Go to
Line values to match (add 4 for the second set), i.e. line 5 would have Go to Line 9, line 7
would have Go to Line 10 and the SetSTN command would be in line 10.

If you have a combination of both, for example, movie 1 has subtitles in english, english
commentary and spanish, whereas movie 2 has spanish and english in that order, you'll need
to work out the swapping for movie 2. If you created the subtitles to correspond to movie 1,
then for movie 2 you need to swap 66 for 64 and 64 for 65. If you find this too complicated
(or for some reason you have two movies which have completely different languages) then
just create two audio/subtitle menus selectable from the main menu - one for movie 1 and
one for movie 2.

The chapter selection menu

Create one for each movie and link to a separate command object for each movie. Same
commands as in example 1 but the last one should be JumpTT 2 for the second movie,
JumpTT 3 for the third and so on.

Create as many VTSs with one dummy movie each as you have on the original. That way you
won't need to modify too many things in the VIDEO_TS.IFO file. Compile and exit.

Make the same modifications as in example 1 to the VTS_0x_0.IFO files. Similar for the
VIDEO_TS.IFO file but you need to modify the attributes and the number of chapters for each
title as opposed to just title 1.

Optional, if you want to make a Play All button

In each command object that the start movie 1 (2, 3 or whatever) button is linked to, put an
additional command at the beginning GPRM5=0. Then create an additional object and link the
play all button to it. Put there three commands GPRM5=1, GPRM6=1, JumpTT 1. Create an
additional command object and count how many VMG objects you have, including the VMG
menus. Add one to this number and write it down. Put in the command object the following
commands:
GPRM5 += 1
GPRM7 == 2
If (GPRM5==GPRM7) JumpTT 2
GPRM7 == 3
If (GPRM5==GPRM7) JumpTT 3
and so on, depending how many movies you have (if you have only two movies there's no
need to put any of these commands, only JumpTT 2).

Then in the post command section of each VTS, except the last one, before the CallSS
command put with IfoEdit "If (GPRM5=>GPRM6) Call VMG PGC X Resume Cell 1", where X is
the number from before. In hex-decimal that's 30 48 00 XX 01 c0 05 06, where XX is the
number in hex-decimal. If you're not sure about the PGC number you can always open with
IfoEdit the VIDEO_TS.IFO file after compiling, click on all PGCs and find the one with the
command table as above. DVD-Lab doesn't follow the same syntax as Ifoedit though so look
for something that looks like that.

tranfenec - May 11, 2004 02:52

Hey man you saved the day (and TIME!)

Thanks!!!
DereX888 - Jun 17, 2004 20:04

Im surprised there isnt many comments here.

Perhaps more people will use multiple VTS on one disc when dual layer DVDRs become
mainstream...
And yes, TMPGEnc DVD Author not only doesnt support more than 2 audio streams and is
unable to add any subtitle, but it also *removes* any subtitles from your existing VOBs. So
at this moment I dont know any easier way than this to create multiple title VOBs on a single
disc and preserving subts, otherwise we need to demultiplex VOBs to elementary streams and
start brand new disc authoring...

THIS IS VERY GOOD GUIDE.

THANK YOU.

petar - Jun 26, 2004 07:25

Thanks for the feedback guys. It may be the complexity of the guide that's putting people
off. Any comments on how I can make it simplier would be welcomed.

I thought I may add another simplier example on how to put just a main menu to a multi VTS
disc. For example, if you've made a disc with re-author in DVD Shrink of many movies,
episodes or whatever and want to put a simple menu to be able to jump to each one
separately plus maybe a play all button and a random play one. This example will still allow
you to have multiple audio/subtitles but to keep it simple there's no menu to select them
(you can change them with the remote while the movie is playing). As I mentioned before
nothing of what we are going to do modifies the VOB files so your movies will remain exactly
the same.

EDIT: I added some comments on which parts of the guide can be skipped if you don't need a
Continuous Play button or Random Play one

Example 3. Multi-VTS with just a main menu for navigation

Create the menu. As before it has to be a VMG one. Here's one example, for a DVD with 6
movies:

What this example will do is create a Play All (or Continuous Play, as I call it) button which
can be On or Off. When Off, after a movie is done playing, the main menu is called. When
On, the next movie plays. The difference, from what normally is a Play All button, is that
here you can jump to any movie you want from the main menu and if Continuous Play is On,
the next movie will play. With a normal Play All button you always start from movie 1. Think
Continuous Play is more flexible.
The Following paragraph is only needed if you want a Continuous Play button
Now we'll create a second VMG menu, exactly the same as the first but it will say "Off" for
Continuous Play instead of "On". You can do this in a simple way if you export the menu as
"menu" (under Menu/Export Menu/As Menu), then create a new VMG menu and then load it
(under Menu/Load Menu...). Then modify the button to "Off" instead of "On".

If you want to put any transitions or additional menus or whatever, do this at the end, before
compiling, otherwise the link commands in this example won't be valid.

Next create 4 VMG Command Objects (or 3 if you don't need either Continuous Play or
Random Play; or 2 if you don't need both one and the other). Link all the buttons from both
menus like this:
- All (6 in this example) buttons for each movie to Command 2
- Continuous Play to Command 3 not required if you don't need this functionality
- Random Play to Command 4 not required if you don't need this functionality, link to
Command 3 if Continuous Play is not required

To keep the Command objects simple, create the buttons in the same order as this example -
first all movie buttons in the order they are on the disc, then the Continuous Play button and
then the Random Play button. This is not compulsory but it would make the command objects
more complicated if we don't put the buttons in this order.

Now open Command Object 1 and put:

GPRM0=1
if(GPRM1==GPRM0) JumpTT 1
GPRM0=2
if(GPRM1==GPRM0) JumpTT 2
...
GPRM0=X
if(GPRM1==GPRM0) JumpTT X (where X is the last movie number).
This command object will do all the "jumping"

For 6 VTSs in this example it would look like this (as mentioned before DVD-Lab converts all
numbers to hex-decimal but you can type them in decimal, though I think in the last Beta it
doesn't do this anymore).

Now open Command object 2 and put:

GPRM3 = 0
GPRM1 = SPRM8
GPRM1 /= 1024
LinkPGCN 4 (LinkPGCN 3, if Continuous Play functionality is not used)
This command object links to the previous one with an instruction of which movie to jump to

Then open Command object 3 and put:

if (GPRM2 == 0) Goto 4
GPRM2 = 0
LinkPGCN 3
GPRM2 = 1
LinkPGCN 2
This command object toggles Continuous play On/Off; the entire command object is not
required if you don't need this functionality

Last open Command object 4 and put:

GPRM3 = 1
GPRM1 rnd X (where X is the number of movies, 6 in our example)
if (GPRM1 == 0) Goto 2
LinkPGCN 4 (LinkPGCN 3, if Continuous Play functionality is not used)
This command object links to the first one but the instruction of which movie to play is
random; the entire command object is not required if you don't need this functionality;
however if you need this but not Continuous Play, this command object would be number 3,
not 4

The third command in Command object 4 may not be necessary but include it anyway. It
doesn't allow 0 as a random number. When I tested this with WinDVD it never generated 0 as
a random number out of 30 or more tries (maybe bad luck). However my standalone did.

Finally double-click on the Connections to open them, then right-click on the first menu and
select "edit VM commands". Click on edit pre-commands and put:
if (GPRM2 == 0) LinkPGCN 3 only required if you are making a Continuous Play button

That's it from DVD-Lab. Not to have to make too many modifications in the VIDEO_TS.IFO
file, create as many dummy VTSs as in the original and put one dummy movie in each (can
be the same one in each). Then compile (you can select test compile too which is faster).

--------------

As in the previous examples, put in a new VIDEO_TS folder all VIDEO_TS.* files from DVD-
Lab and all VTS*.* files from the original disc.

Now with IfoEdit we need to modify all VTS_XX_0.IFO files, one by one.

Click on the VTS_PGCITI table, then on the PGC and then scroll down to the PGC command
table. If there isn't one create it by right-clicking and adding a command. If there is one,
delete or NOP any pre and cell commands and add/delete post commands to make 6 of them.
Then modify them to:
71 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 only required if you want Random Play functionality
30 28 00 07 01 c0 03 00 same as above; however, if you want this functionality but not the
Continuous Play one, change the fourth pair of digits to 05 instead of 07
71 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
30 28 00 02 01 c0 02 00
71 00 00 01 00 XX 00 00 (XX is the next movie of the one you're modifying; for example if
you're modifying VTS_02_0.IFO, XX would be 03; it's in hex-decimal so 10 is 0A, 11 is 0B
and so on)
30 08 00 04 01 c0 00 00

if you don't need Continuous Play functionality, the last four commands can be replaced with
a single one - 30 08 00 02 01 c0 00 00; hence if you neither want this nor Random Play
(which is made by the first two commands) this single command is the only one you need to
put in all IFO files

For the VTS_01_0.IFO it will look like this:

For the last IFO file make XX - 01. This will play movie 1 after the last movie if Continuous
Play is On (i.e. loop from the beginning). If you prefer to go back to the main menu, only put
the first 2 commands in the last IFO file and a third and final one - 30 08 00 02 01 c0 00 00.

Finally you need to modify the attributes for the audio/subtitle/chapters in the VIDEO_TS.IFO
file as in Example 1 and 2 above.

That's it. In the previous examples I mentioned to do this too:

Quote:
Click on VMGM_PGCI_UT table, then on the +, then on the first PGC
Modify the second command to 20 04 00 00 00 00 00 02 (DVD-Lab makes by default the
Title key on the remote to jump to the root menu but we don't have one).

However, in the latest Beta I noticed that DVD-Lab doesn't do this anymore. Won't hurt to
include this command anyway just in case (make it the first one instead of the second one).

petar - Jun 26, 2004 07:53

And one other thing. As I mentioned at the very beginning, in order not to touch the VTSs at
all, we're creating VMG menus. This however has one slight disadvantage - you won't have a
Root Menu (or you'll have one which is not working, leftover from the original disc) so the
Menu button on the remote won't take you to the Main Menu (but the Title one will).

However, if you like to have the Menu button operational, it can be done. Open the
VTS_01_0.IFO file (if you've done a DVD with multi-VTS, you'll need to repeat all I'm going
to mention now for all VTS_XX_0.IFO files).

Click on the VTSM_PGCI_UT table. If there isn't one we need to create it with PgcEdit
(explained below). Click on the root menu and scroll down to the command table. Put as a
first pre command 30 06 00 00 00 42 00 00 (this is a JumpSS to Title Menu command so
pressing the Menu button will have the same effect as pressing Title). That's it.

To create the table open the DVD with PgcEdit. Click on VTS1 (again if you have more than
one VTS, you need to repeat this for each), right-click and select "New Menu" and yes to
continue. It will create the table and put one PGC (which is the root) in it, with one pre
command. Modify the command as above.

FallenAngel10 - Jun 27, 2004 01:02

Or as an alternative to all the above: Consider Titlewriter1.6, Still In beta but much easier.
Doesn't support Subtitling or language menus at this point - perhaps I'll add it to
proggie/templates.Watching feedback on threads such as this

http://forum.digital-digest.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=37608

FAllenAngel
petar - Jun 27, 2004 05:00

I edited the third example with comments on which parts can be skipped if you don't need
Continuous Play or Random Play.

FallenAngel, thanks for that. Yeah it'a simple way to add a navigation menu but I wouldn't
call it "an alternative to all the above". It's just a generic menu plus it only works for DVDs
re-authored with DVD Shrink. My idea of this guide was to help people add their own custom
menus to a DVD which was originally authored by whatever application, not just DVD Shrink.

DereX888 - Jun 28, 2004 15:19

@ petar
I was 'experimenting' with your way in past few days, and just wanted to post now about
some changes but Ive noticed youva already did it (the 'skip' parts when no cont. play is
needed).

@ FallenAngel10
Lack of subtitles or language menus makes it not much more useful than TDA is.
Im not discouraging you from further development, but please consider my advice: don't
scope on 'easiness' of your software.
Those potential users who don't need any extra options will most likely go with super-simple
soft like TDA, and those who need some extra bells'n'whistles usually have enough
knowledge to understand i.e. petar's guide.
IMO the most common 'sin' of many software writers is dumbing down their software, trading
software's abilities for ease of use suitable for average Joe.

mnkyboy - Jun 28, 2004 17:28

How do I create commands? I created a button, then right-clicked->Link->VM Command,

then typed in the command, then OK. Nothing showed up in the command folder.

petar - Jun 29, 2004 05:22

mnkyboy wrote:
How do I create commands? I created a button, then right-clicked->Link->VM
Command, then typed in the command, then OK. Nothing showed up in the command
folder.

Double-click on the Connections, then right-click anywhere in the Connections window, select
Add / Add Command Object / In the VMG Domain. Then you can add commands by double-
clicking on it (DVD-Lab automatically opens its pre command section when you double-click
it).

mnkyboy - Jun 29, 2004 17:04

petar wrote:

mnkyboy wrote:
How do I create commands? I created a button, then right-clicked->Link->VM
Command, then typed in the command, then OK. Nothing showed up in the
command folder.

Double-click on the Connections, then right-click anywhere in the Connections window,

select Add / Add Command Object / In the VMG Domain. Then you can add commands
by double-clicking on it (DVD-Lab automatically opens its pre command section when
you double-click it).

Thanks. Worked great. I used your guide, but heres what I did differently. I a bunch of video
and audio files for several episodes. When I use DVD lab to generate a DVD with these files,
I get pixalation in several parts of the dvd. I found your guide, and figured I would try this.

1st, I create a menu to "dummy" video files in DVD Lab. I compile, then delete the
VTS_01..VTS_02... files. I then use IFOEDIT to generate a dvd with each movie. For second
movie, I rename the files VTS_02... Then I copy these files into the folder of the VIDEO_TS...
files that DVD Lab created. I didnt have to edit any of the ifos, everything seems to work
fine.

Should I have to edit any of the ifos to do what I want to do? I have a basic menu where you
just choose what episode you want to play.

One thing I wanted to find out, where in the IFO file the default subtitles and audio are set?
Currently, my video file has subs on as default. Thanks.

petar - Jun 30, 2004 04:05

Quote:
1st, I create a menu to "dummy" video files in DVD Lab. I compile, then delete the
VTS_01..VTS_02... files. I then use IFOEDIT to generate a dvd with each movie. For
second movie, I rename the files VTS_02... Then I copy these files into the folder of the
VIDEO_TS... files that DVD Lab created.

Yeah, that's fine. Remember, all we are doing with this guide is creating VMG menus (which
are in the VIDEO_TS.* files) and these are independant of the VTSs. You can create the VTSs
with IfoEdit or whatever you want. You can also create different VTSs with different tools and
put them all together. It doesn't matter. Each VTS is independant. The trick is to sort out the
navigation aferwards (and this is what this guide is about).

You can, for example, take three different movies from three different DVDs and put them
together with this guide on one DVD with your own custom menus. Just rip the VTS of the
main movie of each DVD, put them together (obviously rename the second and the third into
VTS_02 and VTS_03 as you did) and follow this guide on how to add the menu and sort out
the navigation.

Quote:
I didnt have to edit any of the ifos, everything seems to work fine.

Should I have to edit any of the ifos to do what I want to do? I have a basic menu
where you just choose what episode you want to play.

Not necessarily, depends on what's in them. I had to make this guide generic. If it works fine
that's because the CallSS command is already in there (whichever tool you used to author
the original DVD put the command there). However there may be other commands too which
may not be needed. To keep things tidy I'd follow the guide. If you just want to go back to
the main menu after each movie has done playing and you don't want any Random Play or
Play All buttons, you only need one post command (and no pre) in the VTS_XX_0.IFO files -
30 08 00 02 01 c0 00 00.

Btw, you can also use CallSS VMG 1 (30 08 00 01 01 c0 00 00) or CallSS Title Menu (30 08
00 00 01 42 00 00) or CallSS First-Play PGC (30 08 00 00 01 00 00 00). If whichever of
these commands is already in your IFO files, it will work just fine.

mnkyboy - Jun 30, 2004 07:13

Thanks for the info

I thought everything was fine, but the dvd stops playing after a chapter change for some
reason. It will change chapters, than stop after 2-3 seconds. I added these chapters to the
video file in DVD Lab. Does this sound like something in the navigation doing this? Any idea
what I have to edit?

Another weird thing, the dvd plays fine on my computer.

petar wrote:
 Quote:
1st, I create a menu to "dummy" video files in DVD Lab. I compile, then
delete the VTS_01..VTS_02... files. I then use IFOEDIT to generate a dvd
with each movie. For second movie, I rename the files VTS_02... Then I copy
these files into the folder of the VIDEO_TS... files that DVD Lab created.

Yeah, that's fine. Remember, all we are doing with this guide is creating VMG menus
(which are in the VIDEO_TS.* files) and these are independant of the VTSs. You can
create the VTSs with IfoEdit or whatever you want. You can also create different VTSs
with different tools and put them all together. It doesn't matter. Each VTS is
independant. The trick is to sort out the navigation aferwards (and this is what this
guide is about).

You can, for example, take three different movies from three different DVDs and put
them together with this guide on one DVD with your own custom menus. Just rip the
VTS of the main movie of each DVD, put them together (obviously rename the second
and the third into VTS_02 and VTS_03 as you did) and follow this guide on how to add
the menu and sort out the navigation.

Quote:
I didnt have to edit any of the ifos, everything seems to work fine.

Should I have to edit any of the ifos to do what I want to do? I have a basic
menu where you just choose what episode you want to play.

Not necessarily, depends on what's in them. I had to make this guide generic. If it
works fine that's because the CallSS command is already in there (whichever tool you
used to author the original DVD put the command there). However there may be other
commands too which may not be needed. To keep things tidy I'd follow the guide. If
you just want to go back to the main menu after each movie has done playing and you
don't want any Random Play or Play All buttons, you only need one post command (and
no pre) in the VTS_XX_0.IFO files - 30 08 00 02 01 c0 00 00.

Btw, you can also use CallSS VMG 1 (30 08 00 01 01 c0 00 00) or CallSS Title Menu (30
08 00 00 01 42 00 00) or CallSS First-Play PGC (30 08 00 00 01 00 00 00). If
whichever of these commands is already in your IFO files, it will work just fine.

petar - Jun 30, 2004 07:46

The guide doesn't modify the chapter points (in fact, it doesn't modify anything in the VTSs,
except the PGC commands) so you have probably had the problem to start with.

Quote:
I added these chapters to the video file in DVD Lab

At which point? With this guide you can't add/modify/delete chapter points. They will remain
exactly the same as in the original. The chapter points have to be on a start of a cell.
Without complete reauthoring (rewriting the VOBs) it's not possible to modify chapter points
(unless you're lucky and a new cell starts exactly where you want your chapter point but this
is very unlikely). You can delete them but add or modify - no.

Quote:
Another weird thing, the dvd plays fine on my computer.

It may be that the sectors info is wrong. Do "Get VTS sectors" with IfoEdit before burning.
Maybe this is all that was wrong.

Tommee Gunn - Aug 02, 2004 04:22

hi folks
i am trying to follow the guide, but dont seem to have 'commands'
i am using dvd-lab....not pro as it doesnt seem to be released yet
that is what the site says anyway!
what am i missing? how can you guys be using it when its not on the company's own website
yet

petar - Aug 02, 2004 07:42

http://www.mediachance.com/dvdlab/historypro.html
It's still in Beta. Doesn't matter for this guide though as you'll only use it to create the VMG
menus. Won't touch your movie(s).

Giorgos_g13 - Aug 06, 2004 18:18

Hi. I am a new member at this forum. I found your guide very interesting but, I have one
question. If I want to add two or more menus with chapters (there is no room for all the
chapters in one menu), how can i do it? Thanks!

petar - Aug 07, 2004 05:01

Welcome to the forum. Saw your PM yesterday just before closing at work so didn't have time
to reply. I'll do it here so that if someone else has the same issue, he'll find the answer.

Create as many chapter selection menus as you need. Command object 3 should be the same
and all the links from Chapter Menu 1 should be the same (plus one more button to link to
Chapter Menu 2).

Then for Chapter Menu 2, create a new Command object (number 4) and link all Chapter
selection buttons to it (the rest of the buttons link them as needed - back to main menu,
back to chapter menu 1, forward to chapter menu 3, etc). Then add in the Command 4:
GPRM0 = SPRM8
GPRM0 /= 1024
GPRM0 += X (where X is the first chapter number in this menu minus 1; for example, if in
Menu 1 you have chapters 1 to 9 and in Menu 2, 10 to 19, X will be 10-1 = 9)
JumpTT 1

Similary for Chapter Menu 3, create a new Command object (number 5) and put the same
commands (X would be 19, if the first chapter is 20). And so on for Chapter Menu 4 etc.

Just don't forget to make the buttons in order - the first chapter button in the menu to be
button 1, the second button 2...

Giorgos_g13 - Aug 09, 2004 02:50

Thanks a lot! It worked fine.

I have two more questions.
1. When I press the button "off" in the subtitles menu and then press the "play" button in the
main menu there is no problem. But if I press the "off" and then goto the chapters menu and
select a chapter, the subtitles switch to the last I had chosen (not off). This doesn't really
bother me, but if you know how to fix this??...
2. When I start the movie the default subtitles are English. How I can change that?

petar - Aug 09, 2004 05:56

1. That's weird. I can't think of why this would happen. Both menus jump to the beginning of
the title and it's there that audio/subs are set and link to a chapter is made (in that order).
The only way for this to happen is if the the SetSTN command is put last instead of first in
the step where you add the PGC commands with Ifoedit. Double-check that it's the first (it's
the one starting with 41 00...)

Also does it happen all the time? For example, you set sub off and play the movie from the
main menu. Then you call the menu, go to the chapter menu, select a chapter. Are then the
sub off when this chapter is played?

2. I overlooked that you may start the movie from the main menu without going to the
language menu to switch the sub off, so they don't default to off. We need to add a Mov
GPRM3,62 command in the first play PGC before the jump or link command (either can be
used and I can't remember which one DVD-Lab Pro uses).

With Ifoedit open the VIDEO_TS.IFO file, click on VMGM_MAT, then on the +, then on the
first-play PGC. Scroll down to the PGC command table and add a pre command. It will add it
at the end so modify it to be exactly like the previous command (which is either jump or link)
and then modify the previous command to 71 00 00 03 00 3E 00 00.

Giorgos_g13 - Aug 09, 2004 06:31

Ok. I will follow your instructions and I will let you know about it.
Thanks again, for your help!

Giorgos_g13 - Aug 09, 2004 15:28

1. I checked the SetSTN command. It's first. But I forgot to tell you that it is a little different
than yours because in my movie I have only one audio stream and in the language menu I
only have to select the subtitles. (So the SetSTN command is: 41 00 00 00 83 00 00 00). The
VM Commands in DVD-Lab are:

GPRM1 = SPRM8
GPRM1 /= 1024
if (GPRM1 == 1) GPRM3 = 64
if (GPRM1 == 2) GPRM3 = 65
if (GPRM1 == 3) GPRM3 = 62
LinkPGCN 2

The commands related with audio streams don't exist. I don't think that changes I made, is
the problem.
Is it?

I noticed that when I choose "sub off" in the menu and then play the movie from the main
menu, and then go to chapter menu and select a chapter, ALLWAYS the "GREEK" subtitles are
chosen, which are my second
subtitle stream. To sum up the "sub off" button only works with the main menu play button.
In chapters selection menus "GREEK" subtitles ALLWAYS chosen.

2. About the default subtitles, I inserted the command you told me and worked fine!

Thanks again for your response.

petar - Aug 09, 2004 16:11

The modifications you made are fine.

I'm puzzled why you're having this problem. Could you try something? Play the DVD with
Mark's DVD Tray Player (you can download it from here http://videoproductions.com.au/dvd-
lab/) and note down the values for SPRM2 and GPRM3 as you browse through the menus and
the movie. For example, when you select play movie from the main menu, SPRM2 changes to
X and GPRM3 to Y. Then when you call the main menu, they change to whatever. Then when
you select a chapter to... you see my idea?

Post the results and that should give me a clue of what's happening.

Giorgos_g13 - Aug 13, 2004 18:10

I tried what you told me, and I realized that there was no problem with the DVD I had make.
The problem was the software I used (PowerDVD 5 Patch 1107).
When I tried to play the DVD with Mark's DVD Tray Player all worked fine (even though the
problem with the default subtitles). Then I played it with Media Player 9 and no problem
again. I also played it with some standalone players and all worked fine. I don't know why
PowerDVD had that problem. Anyway. Thanks a lot for all the answers you gave me. You
helped me a lot!
mikkaa - Oct 16, 2004 11:21

I'm new here. And i have some questions.

I have one audio file, one sub. is it posible to give the sub choose to the main menu. so
there is only one (main) menu and 3 buttons (play, sub1 and sub_off). and post the
commands please.

And can anyone tell me how the commands work...i dont understand lines like this (If
(GPRM1==3) GPRM3 = 64 ).

Tommy____ - Nov 17, 2004 14:08

Hi! I'm a newbee...

I've made a menu just like your example 3, it seems to work fine in DVDLab, but when I try
to play my movie in WinDVD it skips the meny and jumps right to the first VTS.
Whats wrong? And ho do I fix it?

Tnx! Tommy

101 - Nov 20, 2004 20:31

Hi, your guide is great however I have problem in playing the next episode when one is done.
I dont know what is the command to use so that when I finished with eps 01 it will
automatically play eps 02. In my menu I did not use the random or the continuous button. All
I want is if I randomly select ep04 when I am done with it ep 05 should be playing without
going back to the main menu and select ep 05 chapter 01.

Thanx!

101 - Nov 20, 2004 20:35

Tommy____ wrote:
Hi! I'm a newbee...
I've made a menu just like your example 3, it seems to work fine in DVDLab, but when
I try to play my movie in WinDVD it skips the meny and jumps right to the first VTS.
Whats wrong? And ho do I fix it?

Tnx! Tommy

I think that is how it works in WinDVD but if you play in stand alone DVD player everything
works just fine. If you want to start from the main menu in WinDVD just right click on the
screen and select root menu. I did that to get to the main menu too when playing with
WinDVD.

Lolena1888 - Jan 14, 2005 20:18

Dear Petar,
I try to follow your guide, because I have more, than 1 subtitle in a movie and I want to
create subtitle menu.

Your guide is very understandable. But I have one confusion. In 1 VTS I have 3 movies: main
movie, movie intro and menu intro. How can I describe this with JumpTT X command?

Thank you.

Doctor_Zero - Feb 15, 2005 15:58

Hi peoples, first, excuse me to my poor english, I brazilian, my question is:

making my dvd menus following this tutorial, i had problems, the subtitles before white color
,after with new menu has changed subtitle color for purple, somebody help turn to old color,
please.

very thanks to your attention

All times are GMT - 6 Hours

Powered by phpBB 2.0 © 2001 phpBB Group