Update:

I wasnt able to find anything about playlists(using encore 1.0) so ended up rendering a long file and using chaptermarkers, works ok but the music will of course change when skipping back and forth.

For my second problem I just edited the music(snipped off the first five seconds for the intro and started five secs into the song on the menu) before importing into encore, works a treat :) .

Now I've burnt the project and everything works fine on my workstation and laptop, but I cant get it to play on my Xbox. Does anyone know if the Xbox is difficult to get DVDs to play on or will I have a problem getting the DVD to play on normal players?

I found that the greatest compatibility for DVD playback on most DVD players and game consoles is to burn a DVD-R (not RW) on the slowest speed possible. I purchased a couple of DVD players to verify compatiblity (Zenith/LG, a Sony PS2 and an Initial $39 player). It seems like the PS2 and Zenith have issues with DVD+Rs and high-speed DVD-Rs. That $39 Wal-mart special plays back everything I throw at it. But I've made it a habit to burn only 2x DVD-Rs for distribution (Imation and TDK I find to be the most reliable brands for PS2 playback). I have two DVD burners, on from Lite-On and the other from Toshiba, so I don't think burner brand is an issue.

I know that doesn't help you with your Xbox specifically, but try burning at a slow speed on a DVD-R and see if that works.

Can anyone tell me the best way to burn all my .jpgs, .wavs, .txt, and other misc. files on my computer using adobe encore dvd v. 1.0.1.. I cant figure it out.
thank you. These files are not part of any dvd project, I just want to get them of my computer.

Can anyone tell me the best way to burn all my .jpgs, .wavs, .txt, and other misc. files on my computer using adobe encore dvd v. 1.0.1.. I cant figure it out.
thank you. These files are not part of any dvd project, I just want to get them of my computer.
Encore DVD is NOT the tool for this. Download a trial version of Nero and burn everything as a data disc.

Agreed. Technically, you CAN archive with it by adding content to the DVD-ROM folder of the DVD (see the manual or help for the steps), but it is not the most elegant solution. Far easier to use the software that is bundled with your DVD writer or one of the inexpensive apps like Nero or Roxio for those kind of tasks.

I don't know why this is happening, but I recently upgraded my system (now have a Pentium Dual Core 2.8Ghz with 1GB DDR on Asus P5LD2) and when I click on Render Motion Menus in Encore's file menu the computer becomes unresponsive at first and eventually freezes completely. I sometimes get a few green bars, sometimes it even goes up to half the task, but it always ends up either crashing or completely locking up.

By clicking on Ctrl/Alt/Del I accessed the performance tab to monitor what was going on and I've noticed that when I click the Render Motion Menus in Encore, both CPUs (or should I say both cores) peak to 100% usage and stay there until the freeze. Now Encore is the only application that will bring the CPUs to their very limit. Even encoding MPEG2s or complicated effects in PPro 1.5 will only use between 70-90% CPU consumption. Note that this system is not overclocked.

So I'm thinking the problem is with either Encore overloading the CPUs (if that's even possible) or (gulp) a hardware defect, maybe overheating, not sure really, but before bringing the whole computer to the store and pay a premium price to have the tech guys figure it out, I thought I would ask here first if this is a known problem and if there is a known solution. Is Encore having compatibility issues with dual CPUs? Or should I dig deeper to find what's wrong?

Thanks for the help.

EDIT: After installing Asus PC Probe, I was able to see that normal usage temperature for the CPUs is 50-55°C (around 130°F). It climbs to 60-65°C when I try to render the animated menus in Encore. It looks like the computer becomes abnormally slow when it hits 60°C or just about. Now I might be way off here, but this doesn't seem like crazy values for a dual core CPU. If it was going up to 75-80°C I would be worried but 60°C? Can this really be the problem? Hmmm...

Hi David,

Hmmm, not sure on this one. Just guessing, but the only software issue I can think of is that Encore uses the same encoding engine (Adobe Media Encoder) as PPro, so if you haven't gotten the Main Concept update or PPro 1.5.1, it is possible that this is a variant of the "Cannot render video frame..." error people have gotten in PPro.

On the hardware side, I presume that the system is transcoding during the motion menu operation, which is very CPU intensive. If your CPU actually is getting hot enough for the system to throttle it back, it may be that it isn't actually locking but just rendering so slow that it seems like it? I would at least double check that the CPU fan is in fact operating properly, that the cooling fins are not clogged with dust, and that there is adequate air flow through the case (maybe even try leaving the cover off while troubleshooting).

Those are just wild guesses...hopefully they help but if not maybe someone else has a better idea.

Thanks for the suggestions Pete. I had updated the MainConcept encoder a while ago (I was getting errors), and it now works fine in PPro. The problem is exclusive to Encore.

As for airflow, the CPU is 1 month old, sparkling new, fan is working at optimum speed, no dust and I always leave the case cover off. I don't know what it is honestly, but I'm really starting to get the idea that either there might be an Asus defense mechanism that kicks in at 60°C, or that the CPU is damaged. I have operated applications at 100% CPU activity before, and although it makes it hard to use other programs, the task responsible for the high CPU usage should continue just fine. I'll call Intel on Monday to know a bit more about safe operating temperatures, but it would come as a shock to me if they said this high a temperature was risky. My last AMD CPU would regularly go as high as 75°C without a glitch.

You're right about it getting extremely slow, rather than completely stoping responding, but it becomes so slow that there is pretty much nothing else you can do. You can no longer open other programs, you can no longer click on anything, it is just no longer functional, and the render pretty much gets stuck at whatever number of green bars it was at when the performance started to go down the drain. Moreover, if I click on something fast repeatedly (I confess, out of impatience), the mouse freezes for a couple seconds and I get a beep sound from the BIOS. I then have to reset the computer. This doesn't sound good I'm afraid.

I always leave the case cover off.
I don't think that is a good idea for optimal air flow. An average computer case is designed to have an airflow that has air drawn in at the bottom front of the case, and then flowing up over the CPU and out the top back of the case. Leaving the case open would disrupt this flow. It's okay for short periods of time if you are working on the computer, but I wouldn't leave the case open for long periods of time.

I don't know what it is honestly, but I'm really starting to get the idea that either there might be an Asus defense mechanism that kicks in at 60°C, or that the CPU is damaged.
I know that Intel CPU's have a feature that throttles back the CPU should it get too hot to prevent damage to the processor; I'm not sure that AMD processors have a similar feature.

I don't think that is a good idea for optimal air flow. An average computer case is designed to have an airflow that has air drawn in at the bottom front of the case, and then flowing up over the CPU and out the top back of the case. Leaving the case open would disrupt this flow. It's okay for short periods of time if you are working on the computer, but I wouldn't leave the case open for long periods of time.


I know that Intel CPU's have a feature that throttles back the CPU should it get too hot to prevent damage to the processor; I'm not sure that AMD processors have a similar feature.

I get cooler temps with the case opened though. That's why I leave it that way for now. It's also because the only place I have under my desk to put the case is partially obstructed, making it hard to have proper airflow.

Today I encoded a few video files using my newly acquired Procoder software and it brought the CPU temperature to a whoping 72°C without any glitch whatsoever performance wise, so I now know my problem with Encore is definitelly not hardware related (at least not as far as the CPU temp is concerned).

Having done some additional tests with Encore, I can say that it progressively got much worse. I got abnormal operation errors all over the place and trying to create subtitles was a nightmare. It was so slugish and slow. I could count 5-10 seconds between finishing writing a line and being able to play back the MPEG2 asset once again. I then started getting some out of memory errors (got 1024MB). I just had to give up. I embeded the subtitles into the PPro timeline and gave it that way to the client. If not I would still be trying to figure out what was wrong. I don't think I'll use Encore again unless I find somewhere a fix for this. I might go the Ulead route instead for now (damn shame because I liked working with Encore/Photoshop so much).

I searched Adobe's Encore forum and found only a smattering of somewhat similar problems. Seems that the Matrox RTX100 Video editing card was associated with problems for some, and there was at least one who used a Pinnacle card. Another person accidentally exceeded the bitrate limit for a motion menu and got a freeze. So not sure what the problem could be.

There are only a few basic things I can think of to try:
- Double check bitrate settings for rendering (no extra 0's, etc)
- Disable as many tray icons and apps, and non-essential hardware as possible to seek out a driver conflict
- If this is happening only with a particular clip, try creating a new project and linking only the problem clip.
- Try transcoding in PPro first and see if the same footage imported as DVD-compliant MPEG still has a problem.
- If you haven't already done so, try uninstalling Encore, rebooting, re-installing and rebooting.
- If you have a second computer with a DVD burner and different hardware config available, try installing on that to see if the problem continues.

Sorry, I can't think of anything better than that so far.

I get cooler temps with the case opened though. That's why I leave it that way for now. It's also because the only place I have under my desk to put the case is partially obstructed, making it hard to have proper airflow.
Ah, I see.

By the way, Adobe has released an Encore 1.5.1 patch. Have you installed it? You can download it here: http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=76&platform=Windows

Hi
I cant find in the original posting wether You are using a Matrox RT.X100, if You are try disabling the WYSIWYG, output to external TV monitor.


Regards.


Peter.

Hi everybody,
I am producing DVDs with Adobe Encore 1.51 burning them to a Philips DVD+-RW DVD8631 (Firmware CD21) which is the newest firmware. Encore's preview function shows me perfect DVD menues, buttons, firstplay, etc. But, when putting them into a PC-based DVD drive, or stand alone DVD player (I tried even two different ones.) it spins around like crazy and then either never starts or starts with very slow, interrupted video with or without audio and in some instances even crashed my Bose Lifestyle 28 system--had to pull the plug to get it reset so I can get the DVD out again. Looking at the file system via Windows Explorer looks fine--I was even able to copy the bad DVDs without any improvement obviously.
I burned data DVDs with the same burner without ever having trouble.
What could be the reason?
I use Adobe Premier 1.5 Media Encoder to export to m2v files (High quality, CBR transcoding of DV content) MPEG2-DVD, NTSC, Maximum Bitrate [Mbps]: 8.0000 (high quality), PCM audio.
As stated, in Encore all looks cool: audio transcoded, video not. I build then with "Set Layer Break Automatically" set and more or less using the defaults. I define the first play which ends which has the menu as stop action. No subtitles or any fancy multiple audio settings, etc.

Any help would be appreciated. BTW: I used for two years more or less the same procedure but on a different computer, with an older version of Premier and an older version of Encore---never touch a running system, I know. But, the old box was too slow, I had to upgrade.

Any idea in which direction to trouble shoot?

Thanks!!!
Heiko

To pinpoint if it's Encore, build the DVD to a folder, then use Nero or whatever burning software to burn the Disc. If it works, it's Encore, if it doesn't it's your burner, or possibly the brand of DVDs.

Kevin

Hi everybody,
I build then with "Set Layer Break Automatically" set and more or less using the defaults.
Are you burning dual layer? Pretty much the only decent dual layer DVDs at this point are Verbatims.

To find out what is the best quality DVD media visit http://www.digitalfaq.com/media/dvdmedia.htm

I've found that I burn more compatible discs if I burn at 1x or 2x. I usually test a DVD on three different players: a samsung stand-alone player, Sony Playstation2 and a cheap $30 Wal-Mart special before handing them off to clients. The Playstation 2 is the player that gives me the most trouble with 4x and higher DVD-Rs and +Rs.

For me and my LiteOn DVD burners, TDK seems to be the most reliable brand. Once the disc is authored to my clients satisfaction, I use Nero to dupe the disc.

Try doing a slow burn and see if that helps.

SOLUTION:
[QUOTE=Kevin Janisch]To pinpoint if it's Encore, build the DVD to a folder, then use Nero or whatever burning software to burn the Disc. If it works, it's Encore, if it doesn't it's your burner, or possibly the brand of DVDs.

Thanks for your idea and my late reply is due to the fact that I had to try it. I thought it is excellent reasoning and had completely buy in into your idea. As it turns out THIS WAS THE SOLUTION. The only funny thing is that is neither Encore nor the burner but the combination: I build a DVD folder and then used another burner to burn the DVD. Worked! But, when I used my burner to burn it it worked as well. So it appears that it is Encore building AND burning with the Philips DVD burner which causes the trouble.
Any, now its fine nad Kevin saved my day! THANKS!!!!

Heiko

No problem Heiko, glad I could help. I actually had a hanging problem while burning recently and did what I recommended to pinpoint what it was, in my case it was my burner.

Kevin

I just got Encore the other day (yep, I'm a newb to it) and am trying to create my first DVD. My project has one menu, one chapter list, and one 1h 24m HuffYUV AVI file. It's a really simple project, but when I go to transcode and create the DVD folder (or even burn to disc), Encore only encodes the first 3m 19s of my video, resulting in a 300MB file! I then go back to the timeline and Encore has automatically trimmed the video track down to that 3m 19s (however the audio track is still the full 1h 24m).

Any ideas? This is driving me mad and I've been trying to get it to work for the past 7 hours...

TIA...

Well, I've tried some other ideas. I tried to just transcode the file, without adding it into a timeline (create a new project and imported the AVI, then transcoded). I also turned on the logging. There are no errors in the log files, but it just outright stops at 5200 frames or thereabouts. It then does a second pass (2-pass VBR) and then 2nd pass goes up to about 5000 frames, and then the transcoding "completes". No errors tho.

Are there known problems with Encore 2.0 handling HuffYUV files? Could my AVI file have some sort of corruption in it?

I finally figured out that it was a problem with my file.

I'm hoping someone out there knows how to fix this problem.

I was seeing interlacing artifacts in between clips so I thought it might be because of the way it was transcoded, but I tried many different combos of the transcoding and tried upper, lower and progressive for the fields. I'm also having issues with the dvd stopping to load on certain chapters for a second.

I am using Premiere 2.0, Encore 2.0, a hp zd7000 laptop, and I tired maxell DVD+R, fujifilm DVD+R and RW, and a Memorex DVD+RW

The footage is a mixture of 24p and 60i which both are getting these artifacts or lines.

So..what is going to fix this?

Thank you!

James

So nobody has any ideas?

I've been trying to solve this problem for a long time and I'm not having any luck, I know someone out there will have some answers...


James

James, what file are you importing into Encore? I always do my transcoding before I get to Encore and the program seems to be happier. You may want to try using After Effects to de-interlace before you go to Encore.

James,
You need to deinterlace before you import into Encore. I used to have the same problem. You shouldn't have the artifact with the 24p footage, though. What do you mean "between clips". Interlace artifacts are visible during the clip. As far as the delay between chapters, I think that's just the way Encore works. I haven't found a solution, and it prevents you from continuing an audio track from one chapter into the next. If you figure a way around it, please post it.

James,As far as the delay between chapters, I think that's just the way Encore works. I haven't found a solution, and it prevents you from continuing an audio track from one chapter into the next. If you figure a way around it, please post it.
I'm not sure that a delay between chapters can be blamed on Encore DVD. My previous set top DVD player seemed to have a habit of pausing for a second when switching tracks and/or chapters. My new DVD player does not share the same habit.

Thanks for your help!

I just exported a standard avi. file from premiere.

I did deinterlace all of my movie in premiere, except for anything that I had slowed down. I don't have after effects either.

When I say "In between" clips I mean that in between one shot to another you can see like weird horizontal lines for a split second. My daughter noticed those lines when I played it back on our tv. So I can't have that.

Its also unacceptable to have the DVD stop for a moment to reload. Do you think that may be because the rate is too high?

Does anyone have any recommendations for a different DVD tool if I can't fix all of these issues?

I appreciate your help,

James

Can anyone recommend some reading material for this prog? I find myself wanting to embrace it but not knowing how. Damn the learning curve! Damn it!

Thanks in advance!

I'm not personally able to recommend any specific book. However, Adobe has quite a few clips from Total Training and a number of PDF tutorials available for free on their web site, so that might be a good place to get a jump start:

http://www.adobe.com/designcenter/tutorials/

Wrigley Video has some excellent and very short video tutorials to get you started - check out http://www.wrigleyvideo.com/videotutorial/tut_encore.htm

25 bucks a month no minimum buy and you can watch all the videos you want. Encore, After Effects, Premiere.......

I have a 40sec video I want to use as a video menu in Encore 2.0. The menu also has music, a song that lasts 5min. So I want the video to loop until the music ends, but if I have to make a 5min. video file it's going to be way too big. Any way to set the video and audio loop points independently?

What If I want the music to keep playing (not start over) when you click on a button and change menu (go to a chapter menu for example)?

The audio and the video in DVD menus are somewhat coupled, so things such as loop points or jumping to a new asset (due to a menu change) always affects both. This is not a limitation of the authoring software, but rather the DVD specification.

Not knowing Encore myself, here is what I would do to solve your particular problem: use Premiere (or whatever your editing software is), put the music on an audio track, and copy a sufficient number of copies of the 40-sec video clip to the video track. In other words, do the looping of the video manually to end up with a five minute clip for both audio and video. Then use that clip as the background for your DVD menu.

It's possible that Encore can do this for you in an automated way - like I said, I don't know Encore.

- Martin

Thanks Martin. Thing is, if I loop the video file in premiere and import that, it will create a huge file and I'm afraid it could be too big. But I'll give it a try, maybe when compressed to MPEG2 it won't be that bad. I think I'll cut the song in half, it was created with Sonic Fire Pro anyway so I can have it at any length.

Also, I could swear I saw some commercial DVDs that had navigating chapter menus and the music would not stop each time you changed a page (say going from chap. 1-4 to chap. 5-8, etc.). It would be pretty weird having the music restart every time you switch page in the chapter submenu.

It would be pretty weird having the music restart every time you switch page in the chapter submenu.Yes, that would be annoying.

I just did a search on this topic, and found an explanation on Adobe's user forum FAQ pages. Do a google search for the following phrase:

"Spanning Audio across multiple menus and timelines"

(including the double quotes) and you will be led to the following description:
"Audio is always tied to either a timeline or a menu. Switching menus will always switch the audio as each timeline or menu has it's own Audio stream multiplexed into it."

Again, this seems to be a limitation of the DVD specification, and has nothing to do with specific authoring software products.

Other places discuss possible workarounds, but they all seem to revolve around timing the video and music to make the transition more seemless in some cases.

If you find a workable solution for the chapter submenu pages, by all means please share it with us!

- Martin

Yes Martin I think you're right. Sometimes memory is an inacurate thing.

I just checked a bunch of commercial DVDs of mine and they all stop the music for the chapter selection. Guess it is indeed a limitation of the DVD specs.

bummer.

I have Encore 2.0, PPRO 2.0, and Sorenson 4.5... Which is the best to use for encoding DVDs?

Avoid Ppro's Mpeg encoding like the plague. Yuck yuck yuck. I think a lot of people will steer you away from Encore's encoding as well. I use TMPGEnc and love it; I get that crisp picture with zero artifacting that I'm always looking for.

I use TMPGEnc and love it;
Thanks Ben. I checked out the website and they have numerous products listed. Have you used TMPGEnc 4.0 XPress or do you use a different version?

Yes, TMPGEnc XPress is what I use. Costs like $30 or something.

Encore 2 keeps crashing during the build phase and frankly I'm tired of rebuilding my DVDs because Adobe won't provide patches to commonly known problems!

I'm producing a DVD that needs to go out to replication on Monday so and I'm looking for another DVD authoring program to get the job done. My project will go on a Dual Layered DVD with motion menus (preferably with seamless transitions.)

I've come across DVD-lab Pro 2.2 and DVDit® 6 Pro. Any thoughts on these? or are there better choices out there? If it's under $500 then I'll consider it.

Thanks in advance!

Personally I would troubleshoot my computer rather than go out and buy another software, then spend the time learning how to use it. As many, if not all digital media related programs, Adobe software is often the victim of conflicts generated by incompatible codecs and/or other programs that configure codecs their own way.

Just my opinion... I also had most of the problems I am reading about on this forum. So I erased my hard drive clean, reinstalled only XP and the drivers and voila, all my problems are gone! No crashes, no slow-downs, the Adobe Suite 1.5 runs like a charm.

I just finished a film that I shot at 24p with the XL2. I edited and rendered it as a 24p video file and then I go to make a DVD in encore 2.0 with it and after I import the file, it says that I have to re-transcode it. It gives me 5 or so options for different VBR settings. I have tried the progressive scan 7mb high VBR one and when the disc finishes and I watch it on my TV, there is much more motion blur than there was before. I have burned files at 24p to DVD and never been prompted to re-transcode in the past and they all looked on the TV the way they looked on the computer, which is what I'm going for. Can anyone give me anymore info on this. I need some help because the final version of it is needed in about 24 hours. Thanks.

Mitch

What editing program are you using? What file format are you rendering out from it? What specific settings are you using for that format?

If you want to let Encore DVD handle the encoding and retain the highest quality, make sure to render to an AVI. If you are rendering to MPEG-2 from your NLE, make sure it conforms to the MPEG-2 DVD specs (the Encore DVD help file/manual lists the MPEG-2 specs that the program can import without having to re-encode the file).

So if I output to avi, encore will take care of all additional encoding? I had been outputting to a 24p video file and it came up to re-encode.

So if I output to avi, encore will take care of all additional encoding?
Yes, that is correct.

Hello. I recently joined this forum and only just read this thread.

I've been a user of DVDLab since its pre-Pro version days and it is a fantastic piece of software which is stable, intuitive and feature packed. I've had three computers, all with different specs, in the years I've been using DVDLab and am yet to experience a compiling error.

Unlike Encore DVD, support for DVDLab Pro is superb. Bugs will always be the bane of software but in the case of DVDLab, bugfixes appear quickly - even for bugs that might only manifest themselves on a Tuesday in June of a leap year and only then if the planets are in alignment.

DVDLab Pro can author DVD's from the most basic of disc's to disc's which feature complex navigation and branching features seen on so-called Hollywood DVD's.

Encore, like the majority of DVD authoring packages, has always paled in comparison to DVDLab Pro. The feature set is rich and flexible and you can't beat the price (the cost might be cheap but the quality of the software isn't).

I've heard good things about Sony's Vegas DVD that comes with Sony's NLE Vegas Video + DVD but haven't studied up on it; you might like to consider that as it has built-in Dolby Digital 5.1 encoding (whereas DVDLab Pro doesn't have native DD support - but will happily accept AC3 tracks created via third-party programmes).

cheers.

Hi

Can anyone help with the following?

1) I have a project, which is set across several motion menus ( 15 chapters wont fit on 1 screen ). I want the background audio track to play continually across them all, without restarting each time I change a menu. Is there a way to do this? All I have at present is the facility for a separate audio track per menu, hence changing menu, in effect restarts the audio track.......

2) I want a carousel effect for the chapters. ie all the chapters appear on the 1 screen, and the user navigates left/right and the relevant chapter comes to the foreground, with the other chapters like in a 3D circle. Any ideas?

Many thanks

Steve

I wanted to do that but found it really can't be done. Each menu has its own "timeline", which means it can't span to another menu. I tried to make a video clip that jogs the menus across the screen but the problem is that you can't:
1: tell when the user will want to jog to the next menu
2: hide or unhide menu links at any given point in time (menu A has to hide its links and show menu B, etc.)

If anyone else out there found a way, please explain every detail of how you did it because I days trying to do this.

-Michael

EDIT: I should point out the this post applies to one continuous menu with a song that won't restart each time you navigate. It IS possible to make menus "move" from one to the next. You have to make transition clips. Email me for more details.