Exact Frames for movie in drop zone

I am trying to get some exact frames for a movie in one of my drop zones. Looks like the slider only moves in 30 second increments. I know this correlates to the length of the loop for my menu. However, I would like to know if there's a way to move the slider more precisely. There is a certain frame I would like it start on and I just can't seem to get the slider to stop on it.

Well, I have my Leopard disks, but have not installed it on this computer.....tried it out on my son's Mac mini first. Not sure I am ready for it yet. Maybe after reading that all the initial problems with it have been resolved......mayber after the 5th revision !
I do use the 7 themes in iDVD and have not had freezing issues, just the slider inexactness.

Similar Messages

What is the reason for so many Drop Zones in iDVD?

Thank you Tboake and Terry for helping with my project. Now I am convinced that to create my show which mixes pictures, Text, movie clips and music, as well all the other effects, iDVD is the right way to start.
However I have a question regarding the significance of "Drop Zones". For example if I select as a theme "Reflection White" there are 8 drop zones. What exactly are we supposed to do with these drop zones?
• Do we drop all pictures of a show in one zone?
• Do we drop only one picture in each zone?
• Do we drop the movie clip in the next zone?
• Does each zone represents a different chapter in my show?
• For example if my trip involves 8 cities and I want to make a show for each city do I drop the pictures taken in one city in one zone, the second city in the next zone and so on.
It was very helpful reading "Authoring iDVD 6" by Ken Stone as suggested by you, but even though if he works out all the details he really never explains what these zones are about.
Frank Secco

Frank
Ditto everyone's comments. The menus make for a flashy introduction to the movie itself. If you are planning to give a talk/verbal introduction, for instance, when you "show" the movie, it can help to entertain and tantalize your viewers while they wait for you to finish.
Otherwise, they seem to add a lot of rendering time if the main event is the film itself.
I usually use pretty basic ones for projects that we will not spend a long time waiting to ask to play. My kids use more interesting ones to impress their teachers at school and get better grades! For those we often add a short audio clip/song, to make it less silent as well as animated.
Also, some themes are better than others at providing you with appropriate spacing for your chapter markers. I usually experiment with few different themes to be sure that my chapter markers all fit and don't overlap, etc.
Terri

Background movie and drop zones?

Hello everyone, I'm Dion (David's son), and I'm trying to make an iDVD theme which has a custom moving background and drop zones.
I'm modifying the theme "Sliding Panes", which has seven drop zones. When I drag my custom movie either to the background of the theme or to the Background well in the Settings pane, the background movie is applied, but the drop zones disappear. I've tried everything I can think of (which isn't much, I'm not an iDVD veteran) to avoid this, which includes opening the Drop Zone Editor and then trying to drag the movie to the Background well, which, obviously, doesn't work.
I would sincerely appreciate any advice or answer anyone has - even if it doesn't work.

If you replace the theme background with anything you're going to remove the drop zones that are designed to play within that theme's background. I guess it has "holes" in the background where the drop zones play. You would have to have transparent spots in your movie so the drop zones would play thru. Even then I'm not sure replacing the theme background wouldn't remove the drop zones from use.
You could try the following. Select the sliding panes theme and make it a favorite. The in your User/Library/iDVD/favorites folder find that theme, go into the them package, locate the Contents/Resurces folder in there and substitute your movie for the backgroundmoive that's in there. You'll have to rename your movie accordingly. That may do it. Be sure to do it on a favorite copy so in case it doesn't work you can just remove that them from that folder.
Hope this has been of some help. Good luck.
OT

Can't set Poster Frame for Movies on site

Hi - Any insight into this problem is much appreciated - I've built a simple site, a few pages have 2 or 3 compressed MPEG-4 movie files on the page (they are roughly 30MB each clip). I built the clips in FCP then exported them using Compressor and saved them as MPEG-4 files. I then dragged the files onto blank pages and built the site that way. I have set the Poster Frames for these clips in iWeb08, but after I publish the site the Poster Frames only save on a few files, most do not. Also, some of the clips stop playing mid-way through. Any simple fixes for this/these problem(s)? Thanks.

"This whole thing stems from me being 41 and still bowing down to my Mother's every wish and guilt trip.
Sorry to tell you so late in your life that you only have one job when it comes to moms and grand-moms. Give them what they want!
Part of your "monicker" best describes the issue.
You can edit your published pages using hundreds of tools but the are best edited with a plain text editing app like BBEdit (any plain text editor works).
You can use Safari to view your page and even "save" the source code (Command-Option-U) and then "save as". Edit this new page to make your changes and drag it back into the appropriate Web older of your iDisk (replacing the older version).
I did it to one of my pages to add a sound file to one of my slideshow pages:
http://web.mac.com/kkirkster/iWeb/Maya/Maya_files/slideshow.html
just because others said it couldn't be done.
Darn. Now you have another mother, or worse, an in-law. Sorry.

Multiple movies in drop zones

Can drop zones accept more than one movie clip? Everytime I try, I get the message, "Action not supported in iDVD".
iMac G4 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Hi dodger48,
Welcome to the Discussions.
Can drop zones accept more than one movie clip?No. You can put the clips together into one with iMovie and use that.

Insert Movie into drop zone?

When I drop my movie in which is a logo animation I made in Lightwave the logo goes way beyond the edges in height and width. If I scale the drop zone To the size of the movie (320x240), it just scales the movie up along with it. What gives?

How are you making the drop zone?
If you drag the movie from the bin to the menu, you can scale to any size in inspector
If you are setting it into a pre-made shape such as with borders) you can still adjust in inspector but the movie is part of the inspector
(Also note that you should be careful about posting the same issue a few times in a short period of time, people will answer, just give it some time)

Movement of drop zones appears jerky on preview

Hi,
I am using the Reflection Black theme in iDVD 6. I put an individual photo into each drop zone but on preview, the movement of the panels is really jerky and does not appear smooth at all. Is it supposed to be like that ?
Also, how do you add several photos to each drop zone. I know it is possible to do this but each time I try to move several photos, it just replaces one and does not allow more.
Any suggestions ?

I used that theme and it was jerky every time I launched iDVD and in Preview. The DVD is fine.
Also, how do you add several photos to each drop zone...it just replaces one and does not allow more.
I think you can only have one image in each drop zone. Some previous drop zones allowed multiple images.

'poster frame' for movies is not saved

Hi iTunes people,
Note - this all used to work in Leopard - this feature has become non-functional since the arrival of Snow Leopard.
When I set the POSTER FRAME, via the contextual menu that appears for an entry in the movies section of iTunes, it is not saved.
Although the 'artwork' image in the lower left of the itunes window temporarily shows the frame I selected, if I go away from that item or perform the same action on another movie, the poster frame that had been selected is gone and is replaced with whatever was there from before.
The only way it appears that one can save a poster frame is to physically drag-n-drop an image into the ARTWORK tab of the 'Get Info dialog for that item.
Does anyone have any other suggestions about how to make this feature work - without having to create and deposit artowrk into the GetInfo dialog? I lost 1900+ poster frames I had created for various movies and clips because of this problem. I really am not looking forward to again having to do all that work.
Thanks!

Hi,
Change the title of the query in tcode
SQ01-->change
here change the title and save
<REMOVED BY MODERATOR>
Edited by: Alvaro Tejada Galindo on Apr 14, 2008 3:49 PM

Since 10.1.2 Drop zone cause last frame to be a still

Since 10.1.2 Update, I was trying fill a drop zone in FCPX with video from an Event and the last frame ends up showing as a still. This happens to be with a generator that I made in Motion and I have used this Generator twice a week, the same way since last september and on multiple different macs. It seems like every few updates, drop zones tend to work differently. I'm Level 2 Certified and well versed in in FCPX, but I've been racking my brain!
Here are some other steps I've tried and I still have the same problem.
I've Opened a Copy of the Generator in the newest version of Motion and re-saved it, went back to FCPX and still it didn't work.
I've added the clip to timeline and tried to fill it from there, no luck.
I've made a compound clip of the original clip, both in the Event and in the project, and tried to fill it. Still no luck.
I've gotten a clip that is longer than the drop zone, no luck
I've gotten a clip that is the exact same length as the drop zone, no luck
I've gotten a clip that was shorter, and for sure, that didn't work.
Anyone have any ideas?

I have the 10.1.2 update and everything is working fine for me... so much so that I've considered building effects with drop zones again (in general, I have hated them with a passion, until this release.) However, for the types of bugs I've had to deal with in FCPX, especially on my 09 iMac i7 (ATI Radeon 4850) particularly after the "rewrite" for the New Mac Pro (FCPX 10.1.1) and multiple GPUs, I have the feeling that Apple hasn't quite polished the code to work on all "supported" mac platforms... The wait was so long from the last update that I capitulated and bought the latest iMac i7 (late 2013) model and received it about a week before the 10.1.2 update. This update fixed most of the problems I was having on the older machine. (I've been wondering if it was a ploy to get a bunch of us to upgrade hardware... but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.)
If I may ask: what are the hardware specs of your system? You can reset preferences by holding down command + option when starting up FCPX 10.1.2 -- does that fix the problem? I had occasion once where a complete reinstall of FCPX solved a lot of issues I was having (IF you decide to try this method, you must first trash all preferences, and, you have to find all related .plist files and trash those too along with the application [Final Cut Pro X 10.1: How to remove and reinstall Final Cut Pro X go to the section "Removing Final Cut Pro X in OS X 10.9 Mavericks"] -- you're going for an absolutely clean install of the software. After trashing everything and before downloading, I recommend repairing permissions with Disk Utility.)
One more thing to check on before reinstalling: If you have backed up FCPX (or Motion) on an external drive (or "some other" location) -- this last time, the App Store found and replaced the backup on the external drive and did not update the version in the Applications folder. For a couple of days there, I thought I was running the current software until I started having some of my same old problems. I tried trashing the app again and the App Store would not let me upgrade - it showed the current version was installed. I think it took me over an hour to figure out that my backup had been upgraded and the App Store was seeing the external location for the install. Color me surprised. (Moral of the story, check the startup dialog to make sure you're running the version you think you are!)

Motion 5 / FCP X - Frustrating Drop Zones

I've been (trying) to use Drop Zones lately on a number of projects and while I've been able to kludge things here and there to get them to work properly, they sure have frustrated me. The projects I'm working on need snippets of properly timed video floating around the screen, usually within the opening sequence for the video. The trouble is I've never been able to really figure out the timing for these things.
1) Initially, the logical thought was (for me, at least) to set at least an in point for the video before dropping it into the Drop Zone in FCP X. That certainly didn't work because it appeared as though FCP X totally ignored my clip's in point. I wanted that clip video to start exactly at the beginning of that drop zone.
2) Since that didn't work I did some Internet research and someone posted that Drop Zones ignore clip in points. They said that when selecting the clip for the drop zone to place the cursor on the exact frame where you want the video to start before applying it to the Drop Zone. Well, that works to an extent.
Here's what I found after doing some experimentation in both Motion 5 and FCP X (latest versions of each). First, I created a video with timecode in it so that I could accurately track where the video really started on the first frame of the individual Drop Zone. The video starts with 10 seconds of color bars followed by 5 minutes of burned in timecode, then another 10 seconds of color bars. I created a simple Motion Generator with four Drop Zones - upper left, upper right, lower left and lower right. Each Drop Zone was placed exactly 10 seconds apart. So, for example:
For the first test I placed each Drop Zone within one Group in Motion. Drop Zones start at the following timecode for each location as follows:
UL: 00:00:00:00
LL: 00:00:10:00
UR: 00:00:20:00
LR: 00:00:30:00
After publishing the project, I loaded it into FCP X. I used the same timecode video for each Drop Zone starting it at timecode value 00:01:00:00. Now, one would think that each drop zone window, having been placed exactly 10 seconds apart, would show timecode values for the inserted videos also each 10 seconds apart. But they don't! All four Drop Zones show exactly the same timecode value. They are acting as if all four were placed within the Motion 5 timeline starting at 00:00:00:00. But they weren't.
So, I thought, what would happen if I placed each Drop Zone in Motion in a separate Group? I created four Groups, each one holding only one Drop Zone. It didn't make a difference. The timecode videos in each window were still in sync with one another.
The only way I can get this to work properly is to offset the beginning of each clip by -10 seconds. Unfortunately, if there's not enough "preroll" in the clip to do that, I'm out of luck.
But it gets stranger! Further experimentation leads me to believe that all of the Drop Zones within a project reference themselves to the very first Drop Zone within the project. I picked a new point within the timecode video - in this case, the 2 minute point (00:02:00:00) and dropped it into the UL drop zone. I did the same then for the other three and now they all track based on that 00:02:00:00 point within the video!
But it gets even stranger!!! I tried one more experiment, this time loading the Drop Zones in reverse order. That seemed to work. But still, why should I have to mess around like this trying to sync drop zones in some of weird order?
The question is, why do Drop Zones work this way and what can be done to fix this problem? However I select the first frame of video for a particular drop zone should be what that drop zone references when rendering. Ideally it would be great to be able to use an in point on the clip, but I'm also happy with just moving the clip's cursor to the first frame. It's easy enough to do. Hopefully the software team working on these apps can come up with a solution that makes sense. Thanks.
John

I've had this too and the fix then was to delete my project render files (FCP that is).
Russ

Drop zones don't seem to respect in/out...

I'm trying to get started using iMovie HD for some of my simpler projects, but I can't seem to understand the edit model of the application. It seems like a hybrid of the old iMovie and Final Cut in ways that completely confuse me.
I've imported a 5 minute clip. I then use Cmd-T to split it up into usable and un-needed pieces. Then I try to use some of the clips in the theme's dropzones. In all cases it plays from the beginning of the orginal clip and not from the beginning of the split. So it seems like Cmd-T only sets in/out point on the duplicated clip and the drop zones don't respect that. I don't seem to see any option to crop to only the non-hidden frames, nor a way to easily even see the hidden frames to delete them manually.
I would have expected this to still be one of the easy operations, and not a "power user" feature, so I must be overlooking something. Is there any good way to extra subclips from a master clip for use in drop zones? Or do I need to just reimport the master clip as subclips to begin with?
MPB Mac OS X (10.4.8) 2GB RAM

Welcome to the forum!
No, you're not overlooking something. You've stumbled across an iMovie HD bug, where the drop zone plays the entire SOURCE FILE of the clip, not the split clip that's just part of the file.
The workaround is to export your split clip to a Full Quality movie — use the "Share selected clips only" checkbox in the export dialog to export just that clip — then import THAT movie back into the project. Drop the new movie into the drop zone and it should play correctly.
Karl

Adjusting frame size for drop zones

I posted this question in the Final Cut Forum, but I thought this might be a good place to ask as well.
I exported a wide screen movie out of fce and plopped it on a drop zone on the main theme page in iDVD. The movie has that black band at the top like like it would if it was being played as a wide screen movie on your tv. It there a setting I can adjust to make that movie completely that drop zone?
Thank you,
Scott

I wish I had good news for you but I do not. I've been working for the last hour trying to find a solution for you and I cannot within iDvd alone. This particular theme is highly limited on my own system as well.
I'm wondering if there might be a way to resize the movie in QT Pro but it will take me considerably more time to find this type of solution for a movie as opposed to a still image.
I won't have a solution for you today but I will keep this in mind.

Resize Pictures for Drop Zone?

I read a thread from about a year ago that brought up resizing images to get them to fit in a drop zone correctly. I just started using idvd and just ran into this problem, and it truly annoys me that Apple wouldn't allow resizing and image within idvd to get it to fit, or drag what part of the image shows in the drop zone...
Anyone have a solution, or is this still a "pay to get it" type of thing with pro tools...

So what you really need is to reposition the image within the drop zone (as opposed to resizing) .... is this correct?
If so, have you already tried holding down the control key as you click and drag the image to the desired position?
Repositioning an image or movie in a drop zone
When you drag a picture or movie into a drop zone, the aspect ratio of the image is preserved, but it is scaled larger or smaller to fill the drop zone. As a result, sometimes part of the image is cut off and does not appear in the drop zone. In this case, you can move the image to choose which portion is visible in the drop zone.
To reposition an image or movie in a drop zone:
From the drop zone on the menu (not in the drop zone editor), click the image or movie and press Command.
Drag the image until the part you want is visible in the drop zone.
Keep these things in mind as you position an image:
◼
If you drag a narrow image to a drop zone, the image is scaled vertically, and you can move the image up or down only.
◼
If you drag a wide image to a drop zone, the image is scaled horizontally, and you can move the image side to side only.
◼
If you accidentally drag the image too far, you will remove it from the drop zone. (The cursor changes from a hand to a puff of smoke.) Choose Edit > Undo to restore the image to the drop zone.
Repositioning a movie in a drop zone is different from selecting which part of a movie shows in a drop zone (which allows you to select which frame of the movie is displayed in a drop zone). For more information, see Related Topics below.

Photo too large for drop zone

Often when I drag a photo into the drop zone of a main menu, the photo goes in but is displayed so large that much of the subject is cropped out. Anyone have a way of shrinking the photo down so that the entire photo can be seen in the menu?

I have found that size of the photo is rarely a problem. The problem is simply getting that portion of the photo you are interested in to show. The drop zone photo areas are small, therefore, you generally are placing photos of people that were taken from distances of 5 to 10 feet. The faces are the key to being satisfied with the photo in the drop zone ( or the car, or the motorcylcle, etc.) FORTUNATELY, you can drop the photo in the zone, and then place your cursor on the photo and move it around so that exactly the area of the photo you are concerned with will show! By moving my photos ( in effect a cropping occurs without the loss of any part of the photo. It would be like looking at a 4X6" photo and placing a 1X3" frame on it. Move the frame around to get what you want and VOILA! Hope this enables you to accomplish your drop zone objective.

Forever Theme Frames around drop zone pictures - can I remove them?

I'm using the forever theme. There are frames around drop zone photo's - not buttons. I've tried hitting the buttons bar with the drop zone highlighted and clicking the none button - but it stays with a white boarder around it. So - i looked in the theme contents - but I don't find anything that looks like a white frame... I checked out the plist file -and it looked all compiled - funny script and all - any way to eliminate these frames? I use a lot of transparent gifs for the purpose that I don't want a frame around them - so they just float over the background.

Does this help?
From the iDvd Help Menu:
Repositioning an image or movie in a drop zone
When you drag a picture or movie into a drop zone, the aspect ratio of the image is preserved, but it is scaled larger or smaller to fill the drop zone. As a result, sometimes part of the image is cut off and does not appear in the drop zone. In this case, you can move the image to choose which portion is visible in the drop zone.
To reposition an image or movie in a drop zone:
1.) From the drop zone on the menu (not in the drop zone editor), click the image or movie and press Command.
2.) Drag the image until the part you want is visible in the drop zone.
Keep these things in mind as you position an image:
If you drag a narrow image to a drop zone, the image is scaled vertically, and you can move the image up or down only.
If you drag a wide image to a drop zone, the image is scaled horizontally, and you can move the image side to side only.
If you accidentally drag the image too far, you will remove it from the drop zone. (The cursor changes from a hand to a puff of smoke.) Choose Edit > Undo to restore the image to the drop zone.
Repositioning a movie in a drop zone is different from selecting which part of a movie shows in a drop zone (which allows you to select which frame of the movie is displayed in a drop zone). For more information, see Related Topics below.

Exact Frames for movie in drop zone

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