MacFilmmakers.com - Article #1

ARTICLE #1:

TONY KNIGHT ON DVD STUDIO PRO 1.5
Article by Fred Balin, 6 June 2002 [rev. 10 June 2002]
MacResolutions : fbalin@macresolutions.com

(With input from MacFilmmaker Coordinators: Jerry Monti, Common Sense Publishing, and Mark Calice, Ardenwood Sound & DVD)

10 June 2002 — Tony Knight, Apple's Product Marketing Manager for DVD Studio Pro, spoke to our Mac Filmmakers audience on May 15, 2002.

He discussed DVD authoring in general, basic concepts in DVD Studio, and new features in the recently-released upgrade, version 1.5. Then he handled some sophisticated questions from our knowledgeable audience. To top things off, he dropped a set of $999 dollar questions. If you shined in geography and country capitals, you could have walked way with a free copy of the product.

This article reviews the key parts of Tony's presentation and follow-up question-and-answer session. For info on DVD basics, see my earlier article, "DVD Authoring on the Mac."

DVD Authoring Within The Creative Workflow

Tony began by discussing how the introduction of DVD Studio Pro has opened up the field of professional DVD authoring.

"DVD authoring has traditionally been expensive, time, consuming and technical," he explained. "DVD Studio Pro represents a sea change in professional DVD authoring. It lowers the barrier by taking you away from the paradigm of expensive hardware and technical know how."

Prior to the introduction of DVD Studio Pro in January of 2001, "you needed 20 to 50 thousand dollars and had to be pretty technically savvy" to author professional DVDs.

Apple's DVD Studio Pro, the G4 Velocity Engine, and the SuperDrive have changed all that. Now authoring is "an extension of the creative workflow you are used to."

To make this happen, Apple acquired a company name Astarté, refined their DVD authoring product and removed it from a dependency on add-on hardware. The resulting product, DVD Studio Pro, provides a polished authoring environment and enables MPEG-2 encoding in software but at much greater speeds than other software-based encoders. Encoding is in real-time or faster on a dual gigahertz PowerMac G4.

In addition, DVD Studio Pro enables you to create professional-quality DVDs because it supports virtually every aspect of the DVD Video Specification.

Nearly everything? So what does Hollywood do that you can't do with DVD Studio Pro? Tony explained: "DVD Studio Pro is not a spec-based authoring tool; it has an abstraction layer that separates you from the technical stuff, so we do a little bit less than Hollywood does. They can do cell commands [i.e., accessing the smallest addressable chunk in the DVD stream] and some very specific high-end things, but in terms of [accessing the] features [of the specification], DVD Studio Pro does all of them.

"One of the goals of DVD Studio Pro was to stay within the creative workflow and not be technically difficult. In previous applications you had to specify exactly what had to happen. Here you can do the programming by dragging and dropping."

Of course, iDVD, Apple's elegant younger sibling (free with Super Drive-equipped Macs) enables brain-dead simple DVD programming. It does not, however, tap into a wide range of authoring capabilities.

Storyboard Metaphor

DVD authoring in DVD Studio Pro, Tony explained provides a container-based metaphor that is familiar to people who do storyboarding. "Each container holds a block of information, such as a menu, movie, or slide show."

The designer then creates rules between the elements of the various containers to specify the possible navigation paths and other interactivity. For example, menu containers can hold buttons to jump the user to menus, video, or other assets. Video containers can also include markers, which serve as precise points to jump to from a select-a-scene-type menu.

Some of your content (known as assets) must be prepared before use in DVD Studio Pro. Video, for example, must first be encoded into MPEG-2 format. This can be enabled by a QuickTime plug-in which is part of the DVD Studio Pro installation. After installation, any QuickTime based application can export to MPEG-2. The MPEG-2 encoding also splits the video and audio into separate files as required by the DVD Video Specification.

The bit rate for encoding the video (a number between 1 and 9.8 megabits per second) is selected when you export your video via QuickTime to MPEG-2. Generally speaking, within certain limits, a higher better bit rate enables better video.

But how does Apple's MPEG-2 software encoder compare with other encoders? Tony addressed this issue raised by our demanding audience pros. "Our encoder is a single pass variable bit-rate encoder. It is industrial strength and does really well at higher bit rates. Hardware encoders are really good for hi quality at a low bit rate. Ours is designed [for best quality] at 7 to 9 Mbs. The Sopranos was done at under 3 Mbs. If needed, you can take your content to a service bureau, use their $250,000 encoder and then take it back to DVD Studio Pro.

"We're always improving the quality of the encoder so it'll get better and better. [In this release], we have added some pre-filtering that eliminates noise, so you get better encoding."

Of course, a 7 to 9 Mbs video encoding leaves little or no headroom for audio and other assets, and may be too high to play on some DVD players. You may need to go to a lower bit rate and see if it better meets your needs. Compressing audio can save space in your bit budget, which is why Apple bundles A.Pack, a Dolby certified encoder, with DVD Studio Pro.

Tony demoed a DVD which consisted of four main elements: a motion menu with options to either play the movie, select a specific scene, or go to special features. The attractive, pulsating motion menu was based on video frames brought into After Effects, where elements of the image were turned on and off in sync to the beat of a music track. Subpicture overlays (a means to lay an image over moving video) were applied to create buttons from the pulsating elements. Simple yet sophisticated, elegant yet accessible.

Buttons in motion menus can only be created via the subpicture overlay. But in a still menu, you can create richer button looks through the use of layered Photoshop files. Each layer can add additional elements to the menu background or button state. Unfortunately, this enhancement for still-image buttons comes at the expense of performance.

Tony discussed the issue. "This is a limitation of the hardware of DVD players; specifically the graphics processor. DVD players have [at least] a 500 millisecond seek time. Ours are pretty fast, but some payers are slower and could take as long as 3 seconds [to display a new button state]." Lets hope for a technological breakthrough and/or a good workaround.

What's New in Version 1.5?

Tony discussed the new features and capabilities of version 1.5.

First and foremost is that DVD Studio Pro 1.5 runs under Mac OS X. No longer do you have to boot back and forth between video editing in Mac OS X and DVD Authoring in Mac OS 9. Joining Final Cut Pro, After Effects, Photoshop, and other editing tools available for Aqua, most users can now comfortably make the switch to, and reap the benefits of, Mac OS X. Burn while editing? No problem.

A second important feature is a new capability to import markers from content created in Final Cut Pro.

Chapter markers serve as navigation points in a video stream. You can create these chapter markers within DVD Studio Pro as places to jump to. Sets of markers can also be grouped together to create "stories" from within a video track.

However markers may not always be placed exactly where you would like them to be. The MPEG-2 compression scheme enables only every 15th frame to be an "I-frame," and therefore to be viewed as a still image. Information for all other frames in each half-second, 15 frame group of pictures (a GOP) is stored as differences from the I-frame. If the frame you wanted was between two I-frames, you were out of luck, and had to choose the nearest I-frame instead. That limitation is removed with DVD Studio version 1.5 coupled with Final Cut Pro 3 and the 3.0.2 updater released the day after Tony's talk.

In Final Cut Pro 3.0.2, when you create a marker and then reveal its dialog box (by, for instance, hitting the "m" key twice), two new buttons are displayed allowing you to create a chapter or compression marker.

Each mechanism forces an I-frame into the video stream when MPEG-2 encoding takes place. Each chapter marker also appears with its corresponding name within DVD Studio Pro 1.5 once the video asset is dropped into a video track. If you do not need one or more of these markers, you can easily delete them within DVD Studio Pro. Compression markers do not insert a navigation point within DVD Studio Pro. Its purpose is to force an I-frame at a point where there is a lot of movement, spots where quality may degrade within the MPEG-2 compression.

Compression and chapter markers within Final Cut Pro 3.0.2, however, will not be recognized by other MPEG-2 encoders, some of which have their own ways to force I-frames.

Hybrid DVDs

DVD Studio Pro 1.5 now supports the creation of a hybrid DVD, a capability that previously required Roxio's Toast Titanium. Now you can designate one folder on your hard drive as DVD-ROM content in addition to the DVD-Video content that will be created (multiplexed) by DVD Studio Pro. Hybrid DVDs allow you to provide additional data, such as PDF, text, and HTML files, to support your DVD-Video.

The final message from Corporate: the full capabilities of the DVD Authoring Spec are within your grasp. Just add a SuperDrive equipped Mac, software and talent. Then deliver.

© 2002 Mac Filmmakers. All rights reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, Final Cut Pro, Macintosh and Power Mac are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Apple. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners. Mac Filmmakers is a volunteer-run User Group and is not not sponsored by Apple.

Comments or questions can be directed to the webmaster at webstaff@macfilmmakers.com.
Last updated on 24 June, 2002