Bypassing iDVD formats

I am quite happy editing camcorder footage with iMovie. However, when I get my project the way I want it, I just want to burn it to a DVD and I can't seem to be able to bypass the imposed iDVD formats. I can't find a way to just burn my iMovie project to a DVD the way it is. I must be doing something wrong.

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IDVD cannot open files in iDVD format

When attempting to open projects more than a year old i get the message 'iDVD cannot open files in iDVD format'!? Has anyone had a simila experience?
David. Australia

Hi
Just thinking.
• Where did You store Your iDVD project - on external hard disk ? FORMATTED AS ?
MUST be Mac OS Extended (HFS)
• Does Your original Movie projects still exist too and stored on same type of hard disk (HFS-formatted)
• Was it saved as a "DiskImage" too ? - If so how does this Play ?
Yours Bengt W

Is iDVD format NTSC R (0) or R (1) or R (2) or... etc.?

is iDVD format NTSC R (0) or R (1) or R (2) or... etc.?
I'm submitting to a festival, and their exhibition entry form requires me to designate which NTSC type it is.

Hi
You can do NTSC or PAL (29.97fps or 25fps) in iDVD - (but You should use material in that frame rate to start with or convert it outside iDVD and iMovie/FinalCut - I use JES_Deinterlacer to do this)
If You let iMovie/FC or iDVD convert to another frame rate - it will work - BUT the RESULT WILL BE VERY POOOOOR !
BUT - in regard to Region settings - iDVD can only do R(0) = Playable in all regions.
Yours Bengt W

Can you bypass iDVD???

Hi,
Does anyone know if you can connect a DVD player to your iMac, and somehow record an iMovie '08 project directly into a DVD player, without going through iDVD?
My problem is that I have a perfectly good quality iMovie project. When I run it through iDVD with all of the highest (professional) settings, it still takes a big dip in quality.
Before you suggest that I re-do the project in iMovie '06 or iMovie HD, my photos went blurry as soon as they left iPhoto and went into either of those versions. I switched to iMovie'08, and it did not have a loss of quality when converting my photos.
So---I'm looking for some technical or other advice. I have a beautiful family project that I hate to show in the dull, blurry end-product of iDVD.
Sorry for the long-winded question. I'm really hoping for a solution to my problem.
Thanks!
Todd

My iPhotos are picture perfect clear in both iPhoto AND iMovie'08, but appear fuzzy and blurry after being burned onto a DVD by iDVD.
You neglect to mention what your source content is. Both HD video and multi-megapixel photos are downscaled to a 720x480 encode matrix as part of the iDVD process of converting your iMovie project output to MPEG-2 video for multiplexing with PCM audio. Some loss in definition is to be expected with each conversion in format even with standard definition content and the differences can be even more pronounced when going from high definition to standard definition DVDs. In addition, since iDVD uses PCM audio instead of AC3, the maximum data rate for the MPEG-2 conversion is more limited than with other authoring applications like Toast.
If I brought my entire iMac to a professional studio, could they use some other application to get me a better final product?
It goes without saying that I would expect a project professionally edited in a professional application converted to MPEG2/AC3 content and burned to a DVD using a more professional authoring application to look better. However, there is the question of how much you are willing to spend on such an endeavor.

IDVD - Formatting error

Alright - Unfortunately for our iMac, this will be the last straw. Our experience using Apple products has been EXTREMELY painful.
1) I spent HOURS creating a movie of our vacation in Alaska (in iMovie). Each day of the trip was represented as a project under the folder "Alaska 2008".
2) After 'sharing' the media to the media browser - I created a DVD. It was awesome except for the fact that each time a clip (project) finished playing, it returned to the main menu screen. So,....
3) I went back into iMovie and created one single project out of all of the clips (the movie is about 1 1/2 hours), then I 'shared' it to the media browser.
4) I went back into iDVD and created a new dvd. I set it for doublelayer 7.7 gigs and Professional Quality. The **** thing spent 5 hours encoding, multiplexing, etc. BUT AT THE VERY END IT EJECTED THE DISC AND SAID THERE WAS A FORMATTING ERROR. I've tried using several new disc (all with the same specs).
Bottom line - if I can't get our vacation put on this DVD, then we're going to sell the iMac and go back to a PC....much less painful.
Any input would be GREATLY, GREATLY appreciated

Have you tried using Roxio Toast? It might help meet your objective/s better than iDvd which by default always returns to the main menu after each movie or slideshow. That's the way apple designed it. There is more latitude within DVDSP (part of FCS2) as well as Roxio Toast. The latter is much easier to learn and significantly less money than DVDSP btw.
Hope this helps but if not just come on back.

Idvd format error

I am trying to do a burn in idvd. It keeps stopping near the end and saying there is a format error. It doesnt tell me WHAT KIND of error. It just says there was an error in the formatting. What could be causing this. I only have three videos on the dvd (short clips). I just burned a dvd successfully a day before with MORE clips and a slideshow. The three clips I'm trying to burn now were also on that dvd. I just dont understand why all of a sudden it wont burn. HELP!
I'm running on an imac G4 1GHz and idvd 7.0.1. All my content was created using Final Cut Pro 5.
Any help at all is appreciated as I am relatively new to Final cut and idvd and dvdpro.
Thanks so much.
Troy

I just tried to use the disk utility to burn my .img file. After I select the .img file and then try to "verify" it, I get an error message "Unable to veryify disk2, This image has no checksum information to verify".
Have no idea what that means.
Again all I am doing is trying to burn 3 QT short content movies. I burned them before with no problems. The only thing that has changed since then, is I went back into FCP and edited some black at the top of each one and then RE0exported to QT. I trashed the old QT versions and am trying to burn the new QT verstions with the black at the top of each one. That is the only difference between this burn and the last, besides the fact I have LESS content on this burn.
Any Ideas are appreciated as always. Thanks for the forum!
-Troy

Is it possible to bypass iDVD?

I, too, have the problem of iDVD freezing when I try to burn a DVD. I have a move I completed in iMovie, it has everything I want in it, so I don't need anything extra from iDVD.
I tried exporting it to the desktop as a Large file and using the File menu in finder to burn the DVD, but it ended up just doing the music and putting it on iTunes. This is very frustrating!

Thanks for the help. I did make a disc image when I was talking to someone at AppleCare, who had been leading me towards doing a new installation from my startup discs. He kept looking things up, so I wasn't confident he could help.
I'll follow up on the Roxio Toast suggestion, too. But first I'll try to burn a disc from the disc image.
Thanks to all for the help.
I'm also planning on buying a new iMac, and when I transfer my data to it, I hope if iDVD is still a problem on the MacBook Pro, maybe it'll work on the iMac...

Formatted iDVD project complete with Themes, etc...burning through Toast?

I need to use Toast to burn my completed iDVD project. Worked a looong time making it perfect with formatting using Themes, custom Text pages, etc... I'd hate to lose all that, but need to use Toast to compress the video to fit a Single Layer DVD. Does Toast preserve the iDVD formatting or not? Can iDVD finalize a project with Toast burning in mind? Help?

If I'm not mistaken, you can create a disc image to the desktop from the file menu in iDvd. Then burn said image in Toast while selecting the fit to dvd option.
But you may be restricted to selecting one of Toast's basic themes.
click here
step 1
step 2
Message was edited by: SDMacuser

Will quick time pro convert avi format do idvd

what is the best way to convert avi format to a dvd or idvd format?

There is no single codec for movies that have .avi extensions. AVI is a container format, not a specific type of file. An AVI movie may use one of the Indeo codecs (there are at least four that I'm aware of, none of which have been ported to Mac OS X) or one of the various flavors of DivX, among other possibilities. You'll have to find out what codec was used for the movies you want to convert to determine what you need. Note that not all codecs for the various .avi movies are available for QuickTime.
If you want to try "hit and miss", Perian, which rolls several codecs into one package, might work. If not, you can try the codecs at http://www.divx.com/ and http://www.3ivx.com/ and see if one of them will work for you.
You can also try a third-party such as Handbrake or MPEG Streamclip. Those will convert at least some AVI formats.
Regards.

IMovie and iDVD, Stupid Upgrade Questions, Sorry Must Ask

Okay, the deal is I have a PowerMac G4 Version 2.1 with a Combo Drive. I am upgrading to Mac OSX 3.0 so I can do certain things in iMovie and acquire a better browser. (My constraints on the iMovie project about which I've been inquiring are that at least 40 people have been waiting for copies of it for about a month and wondering why I don't come through with it--I sent a lengthy explanation to the guy who'll be duplicating it in case anyone asks. That's one reason I'm in such a hurry I have to ask urgent questions at forums and newsgroups and don't take the time to read every word ever written on every one of these systems and their various applications, abilities, and uses.)
I started out thinking I was about one step from having a completed project and the more I learn, the more grim the situation looks. Yet I've done ALL THIS WORK already to create beautiful titles and elaborately-edited outtakes. I HATE to ditch it all if any faint hope flickers into sight!
My Mac came with the following:
iMovie 3.0.3 -- which seems to be working fine, only problem is, due to deficiencies in other equipment, I'm having trouble getting my movie to DVD or into any other form where it can be played anywhere outside the Mac!
iDVD 2.1 -- My feeble brain, inadequate as it may be, has so far gathered the information that to go to DVD, a project can't be played in iMovie and sent straight to a DVD burner (can it?) There has to be some intermediary step. (Right?) People have argued the various merits of iDVD vs. Toast to accomplish this step. I hadn't opened my copy of iDVD because I am in no way near the point of being ready to make a DVD--I have not yet finished editing the project in iMovie. I made the hideous error of ASSUMING that since this came installed in my Mac, it would work fine when needed, just as iMovie did. When I tried to open it just to see what version I had, it wouldn't open and told me this:
System Requirements
iDVD 2 requires a PowerMac G4 computer with 256 Megs of RAM, a built-in DVD-R Superdrive and Mac OS 10.1.3 or later.
Stupid redundant bonus question #1: WHY would this come installed on a Mac which lacks the hardware to use it? (iMovie could still be used to edit, and then copy projects--if I had a digital video camera--which I don't. The only other way we've figured is to send it back through the Canopus ADVC110 converter I used to get the video in there, and play it out to a VCR--a cumbersome process I've been assured will result in crummy quality.)
Okay, here are the REAL questions:
1. I don't suppose there's any way the Canopus could be connected to the DVD burner and the information sent to a DVD that way? Just asking.
2. Obviously the upgrade isn't going to fix things to make iDVD work, as I'm already using Mac OSX 10.2.8, so I would assume its discontent stems from not having the Superdrive--at least, it was complaining something about inadequate hardware and I think that's what it meant. Will connecting a DVD burner via FireWire convince iDVD to work (either automatically or after some sort of tweaking), or am I stuck replacing the drive? I bought a DVD burner the minute I realized my drive was a Combo Drive and not a Superdrive (which is the first time I stuck a blank DVD in it and nothing happened) before learning details about this intermediary step and that there is more than one way to accomplish it.
3. Is it even worth replacing the Combo Drive with a Superdrive or is it more worth buying a whole new Mac? If I am FORCED to buy a new Mac, what should I do with the old one? (Not only am I ethically opposed to tossing a perfectly good piece of electronic equipment into the ravine, I might get fined for littering. Can a good home be found for it? For that matter it would be a pain as I've saved all sorts of stuff to the Hard Drive which would have to be transferred to the new one before I could get rid of the old one. So can I keep the old one...PLEASE?)
4. After making the system upgrade, will I be able to bypass iDVD entirely by using Toast, or does Toast also have all sorts of requirements my hardware does not possess so I'll still be SOL, stuck replacing drives or even the whole Mac, or going directly to crummy-quality VHS as there is NO OTHER WAY OUT?
5. After making the system upgrade, would I be ready for more advanced versions of iMovie and iDVD? Are any upgrades free, or does every improvement cost? Do I get them all at the Apple site, order some of them from some supplier or other the way I did with the Mac OSX upgrade, or what?
Thanks for helping to clear up my massive confusion!!!

Wow, thanks. It's good to know iDVD is still an option, even if I don't buy the Superdrive (is that even possible, to get the Combo Drive taken out of my current Mac and a Superdrive put in? There's a question still unanswered.)
(I think this is good to know--because part of my reasoning in asking the question was to eliminate one option or the other, and now I'm ending up with options of options, but hold on for Part 2 as I do have some questions concerning the capabilities of iDVD and Toast.)
Partly answering one of my own questions (although I'd appreciate confirmation from someone who actually knows,) if these Toast 7 requirements mean what I think they do, I don't see anywhere that it says the computer MUST have a Superdrive and CAN'T use an external DVD burner!
Toast 7 Titanium
Requirements:
* PowerPC G4 processor or faster (G5 recommended for viewing DivX files on your Mac)
* PowerPC G3 processor and Mac OS 10.2 users, see Toast 6 Titanium or Popcorn
* Mac OS X v10.3.9 or later
* 300 MB of free disk space to install
* Up to 15 GB of temporary free disk space during usage
* QuickTime 7 or later
* CD or DVD burner and recordable media
If this is true (that I can use an external DVD burner) I like Toast already! My Quicktime Player is only version 6.5.2--is it going to be difficult, expensive, or both, to upgrade that? If it is or the other System Requirements are not met I can just go with Toast 6.
As far as those requirements, I promise you I don't understand a word of it but here is what my System Profiler says my Mac has. Maybe someone can make sense of it and help me decide which version of Toast to get or, if not, what to do:
System Profile
Software Overview:
| |
| System version : Mac OS X 10.2.8 (6R73)
(As I said, I'm upgrading to 10.3.0 soon, and obviously if I want Toast 7 gotta figure out the best way to go to 10.3.9 or higher.)
| Boot volume : Hard Drive |
| Kernel version : Darwin Kernel Version 6.8: Wed Sep 10 15:20:55 PDT 2003; root:xnu/xnu-344.49.obj~2/RELEASE_PPC |
Hardware Overview:
| |
| Machine speed : 867 MHz |
| Bus speed : 133 MHz |
| Number of processors : 2 |
| L2 cache size : 256K (times 2) |
| L3 cache size : 1MB (times 2) |
| Machine model : Power Mac G4 (version = 2.1) |
| Boot ROM info : 4.4.6f2
Memory Overview:
Location Type Size
DIMM0/J21 DDR SDRAM 256 MB
DIMM1/J22 DDR SDRAM 512 MB
DIMM2/J23 empty
DIMM3/J20 empty
Network Overview:
Built-in:
| |
| Flags : 0x8051<Up,PpoinToPoint,Running,Multicast> |
| Ethernet address : 00.00.00.00.00.00 |
| IP : 67.0.142.95--> 67.0.128.6 |
| Subnet Mask : 255.0.0.0 |
| |
Devices and Volumes
PCI:
SLOT-1(AGP):
| |
| Card Type : NVDA,GeForce4MX |
| Card Name : NVDA,Parent |
| Card Model : GeForce4 MX |
| Vendor ID : 10de |
| Device ID : 172 |
| ROM# : 1121 |
| Revision : a5 |
| |
USB Information:
USB Bus 0:
Apple internal modem:
| |
| Product ID : 33282 ($8202) |
| Vendor : HCF USB V.90 Data/Fax Modem |
| Device Speed : Full |
| Power (mA) : 500
FireWire Information:
No FireWire devices found.:
(Unsure why it says this as the Canopus Converter is a FireWire device and it's connected, turned on, and has been working.)
Bus:
CD-RW/DVD-ROM:
| |
| Disc Burning : Fully supported.
(Obviously this means CDs only, not DVDs.)
Hard Drive:
| |
| Disk Size : 57.26 GB (1K = 1024) 62 GB (1K = 1000) |
| Unit Number : 0 |
| ATA Device Type : ata |
| Device Serial : VNC303A3L6AAHA |
| Device Revision : VA3BA52A |
| Device Model : IBM-IC35L060AVVA07-0 |
| |
Hard Drive:
| |
| Volume Size : 57.26 GB (1K = 1024) 62 GB (1K = 1000) |
| Ejectable : No |
| Writable : Yes
One thing which may really sway me in favor of Toast is, will it make possible burning 2-hour DVDs? Supposedly iDVD will not enable anything longer than 90 minutes, and when I get to the other big project for which I really want to use the Canopus ADVC 110 converter, that is, converting my home movies from either VHS or 8mm video camera tape to DVD--well, ALL of my tapes are two hours long, because that's the way they come!! I don't see being limited to making 90-minute DVDs as anything but another GIANT PAIN of which I'm already amply supplied! So if Toast will fix this dilemma I'm ALL FOR IT!
As always, thanks for help and advice.

Poor sound quality in iDVD

When I previewed my music video in iDVD it looked and sounded exactly right but when I burned it to a DVD and played it on my home DVD player, the sound quality was not "CD quality". It sounded crappy like a cassette. I played the DVD on the built in DVD player in the computer and it played back perfectly. When I play commercial DVD's on my home player the sound is fine, CD quality.
So far I have not attempted to play the DVD on other DVD players but I will do so although I doubt it will help. A friend of mine claims that this is all the MAC can produce at this level and that IDVD5 is only good for "consumer" applications like family slide shows and home movies. I disagree. I feel that the music recorded on an iMAC should sound extremely close to the quality that you hear coming out of the computer itself. There has to be a reason for that much degradation to occur in the audio upon burning a DVD. Has anyone else experienced this problem with the audio? I may try to bring a data copy of the video to a production house and burn it there, bypassing iDVD. My feeling is that even home movies should have CD quality music. Otherwise there's no point in using MAC at this level if the sound quality sounds terrible on all players except the MAC. As a pro songwriter, I wanted to try my hand at making music videos at home. Well, the video looks great but the audio sounds terrible. HELP!
iMAC G5 Mac OS X (10.4.4) 20"

Thank you for those reassuring words. I'll try to give as many pertinent details as I can. I created the project in iMovie and exported it to iDVD. The song was taken from my professionally recorded CD and was loaded to iTunes. It was recorded at a pro-tools studio at a 24-bit rate. It sounded perfect when played in iTunes. The DVD I used was 8X DVD+R. (pro-media brand) They were pretty cheap. Could that be the problem? I didn't actually change any export settings. They seemed to have all been pre-set (checks in blue boxes) to "highest quality". When I first opened iMovie I simply clicked on "audio" and chose one of my songs from iTunes Library. If you have any other questions, let me know. Please point out what to click on to find the answers. Access to the cool people on this board has given me new hope about getting the most out of my iMAC. It's an incredible tool that has inspired my creativity far beyond my expectations. (Garageband is a great bang for the buck..kind of like Pro-Tools Jr.!) I think I may take classes at the Apple Store in NYC. The "missing manuals" are really of very little value when tackling specific problems in detail.

Export parameters for iDVD compatibility

Hi everybody,
I export some keynote presentation with sound capture to quicktime.
When I collected several of those exports, I'd love to create a DVD with iDVD.
When I drop the generated quicktime movies onto iDVD, iDVD will re-encode them to a proper iDVD format for burning.
I noticed that when I use Share->Transfer to... -> iDVD, Keynote generates a quicktime movie that is included in iDVD but that does NOT require a new encoding of the movie.
My question is: Which Keynote quicktime export parameters should I use in Keynote to prevent re-encoding in iDVD? (codec, format, speed, throughput, etc. are they all important?)
Many thanks for your help.

Hi,
Check the below code
PERFORM get_materialbatch CHANGING i_mchb.
FORM get_materialbatch CHANGING fp_i_mchb TYPE ty_tab_mchb
The values that are changed will get updated in the i_mchb..
<REMOVED BY MODERATOR>
Edited by: Alvaro Tejada Galindo on Apr 10, 2008 3:13 PM

IDVD question

I've got a DVD I'm hoping to send to people on both PAL and NTSC versions.
My question is, how do I find out what region setting hte DVD is going to be set to.
I'm a recent switcher from PC, and in the PC program I used, it let me select the region.
Any ideas?

Hi Michael,
Welcome to the Discussion.
To set your new iDVD project format: see Setting the video format for a new project. Please note that your movie assets that you import into iDVD must also match the iDVD format, i.e. NTSC is 720x480 29.97fps, PAL is 720x576 25fps.

Why don't pictures from a slideshow made in iPhoto and then burned on to a DVD in iDVD not use the full screen?

Why don't pictures from a slideshow made in iPhoto and then burned on to a DVD in iDVD not use the full screen?

All I want to do is send my family the pictures for them to be able to see them on most dvds and use manually control.
If you want set top DVD player playback, I suggest you create a a series of slideshows IN iDVD that each contain a MAXIMUM of 99 images. Do not create the slideshow in iPhoto or iMovie.
Is there an easier way to do this, bypassing iDVD?
Some DVD players will play a disc containing jpeg images

HT4997 I want to burn a movie to a dvd with iMovie but idvd doesn't show up in the "share" menu--why? My SuperDrive indicates that my DVD+R can be written to. Please Help.

I just spent a week creating an iMovie and wanted to burn it to a DVD. The instruction tutorial said to go to the "Share" menu and select "iDVD", however there is no "iDVD" listed in that memu. I checked to see that my DVD+R was writeable in my SuperDrive--it is? Why doesn't "idvd" show in the "share" menu? Please help, thank you. Fustrated Mark.

I may have found a way around this issue. I have the old style mouse with a wired usb connection. I've learned from other discussions that by holding down the 'Control' key and pressing the mouse button on an Apple a menu similar to the right-click menu of a PC will appear. When I tried this from the 'Project Library' on iMovie on my iMAC, a menu appears that DOES contain the export to iDVD choice. This choice is still not visible from the 'Share' menu in the menubar. This appears to be some glitch in the Apple software, but my computer is currently formulating the iMovie into the iDVD format. I have my fingers crossed.

Bypassing iDVD formats

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