Have a quick question for those who have output 720P to a DVD.

I shot some footage on my HD-1, edited it in Premiere PRO, output the files in WMV9 720P-HD format on my computer, now I'd like to put them on a DVD.

I've been able to burn them to a DVD as a DVD-ROM type file where you have to double click on the DVD file folder icon under "My computer" to open them like a standard computer file..... but does anyone know a way to author the WMV9 files to a DVD so that a standard DVD style menu appears - and the user can then simply press a button on the DVD menu which would launch the WMV9 player and associated file??

It's would be the same way the Terminator 2 HD-DVD works. It has a menu that looks like a standard DVD menu, but when you press the play button, it launches the WMV9 movie in the WMV9 player.

Any help would be appreciated.

-Chris Gordon

Just realized I put this post in the wrong area. Probably better in the "editing" forum.

I believe the "Terminator 2" HD-DVD was done using the HighMat format. see http://highmat.com/ I haven't use HighMAT yet myself.

I am creating WM9 files from my GR-HD1 footage using Vegas and creating 5MBPS 720P files for viewing on my 2.8 Ghz PC. They play well through windows media player.

I am eagerly awaiting the Bravo D3 supposedly released this Q2 by http://www.vinc.com (under Latest News) and will buy one as soon as it is. My hope is to be able to play my WM9 files with it.

As far as I know this is the only device announced that will play a DVD with WM9 files in this way. I am not sure how you would set up a DVD menu or choose the clip though.

If anybody knows of any other similar devices or announcements, let us know.

Thanks.

Chris,

Moved it!

heath

I have created a DVD which will launch a web page containing a hyperlink to the WMV.
You need to create a file called "autorun.inf" which will launch the page.
autorun.inf will launch an executable when the user pops in a CD or DVD, if you want to use a web page you need to use a tiny free program called "browser call" http://www.ashzfall.com/products/autorun/browsercall.html
You could also use a program like Macromedia's Director or Flash to create your menu, these will create executables which can be launched from autorun.inf directly.
None of this will work on a Mac however.

I read somewhere that the Bravo player will not run the Terminator WM9 disk, becuase the bitrate is way too high. I'm interested in the Bravo for the same reasons you are. This will be an interesting topic to watch.

I took 720p footage shot with an HD-10, converted it to 720p MPEG-4 and burned it onto a DVD. I tried to play it on a Momitsu V880 DVD player. This player has 720p and 1080i output and plays MPEG-4 files. the player recognized the file, but when I tried to play it, nothing happened. I think this player can only handle files up to 480i/p which it can upconvert to 720 or 1080, but it cannot handle as input high resolution files. Looking forward to trying out the new Bravo.

Paul St. Denis wrote:

"I have created a DVD which will launch a web page containing a hyperlink to the WMV...
...You could also use a program like Macromedia's Director or Flash to create your menu, these will create executables which can be launched from autorun.inf directly.
None of this will work on a Mac however."

Not true! You can create a Flash menu that will work on both platforms. You'll just need to create a Flash file (.swf) as your menu instead of an executable file (.exe) On Macromedia's website they have instructions on how to do it. I haven't done it myself, but I read up on it for a project that fizzled a couple years ago.

Now as to the problem of playing WM9 files on the Mac, THAT I don't know about. But I think they should play fine with Microsquishes latest player.

Hope this helps for those interested!

I shouldn't have said "none of this" you can create a swf which is playable on either platform. This will require that the user has a flash player available (pehaps it could be included on the DVD). Flash has the very nice feature of allowing you to create executables for both platforms, Director requires you to buy a version for each platform to make your application play on both Mac and PC. Mac OS9 had a Quicktime autostart feature which would allow you to have an executable (like a menu) start when the disk was inserted. I have read that this feature is no longer available in X.

Thanks for the information. I'm going to try the .inf and .swf file options to see how successful they are.

I'll post results at a later time.