User manual DVD-Arabesk 2 for Casablanca
Legal notices To avoid making mistakes during operation, we recommend that you carefully follow the instructions provided in this manual. We have taken a great deal of care whilst programming and checking this software. Nevertheless, since it is not possible to guarantee totally error-free software applications in all environments and at any time, we unfortunately cannot rule out the possibility that some errors may have crept in.
Contents Page 1. General............................................................................................................... 5 2. Installation and Starting the Program ............................................................. 5 3. The DVD-Arabesk 2 Menu ................................................................................ 6 3.1 Creation.................................................................................................. 6 3.2 Info / Play ..............................
1. General Thank you for buying “DVD-Arabesk 2”! We thank you for your trust and hope that this product will meet your expectations. If you want to install “DVD-Arabesk 2” as a demo version only (also possible for Casablanca systems without a DVD burner), select the program in the list and click “activate”. This guide will show you how to easily create your own DVD. If you are working with SMART EDIT version 2.5 or higher, click on the “Cancel” button in the displayed number code window.
3. The DVD-Arabesk 2 Menu Now you see the “DVD-Arabesk 2” menu, which is divided into three different blocks. can select the desired film or project. You can see that the active project is the same one you were last working on. It is not necessary to enter “Project settings” in order to change the project. This can be done from the DVD menu. Note: Only those projects marked with a white point contain video material.
• The button “Audio mode” is used to specify the audio quality: “uncompressed” or “compressed”. Compressed audio requires only a fraction of the capacity, but at the cost of slightly reduced quality. When creating a music video, it is recommended that you use uncompressed audio. Note for the technically interested: Uncompressed audio uses PCM audio with 16 bits and 48 kHz. Compressed audio uses MPEG audio. • You are also shown the “Size approximation” for this project.
3.1 Creation: Edit Menu (2) Click on the “Edit Menu” button and you will see the title“Casablanca DVD” in the background (or the title of the previously edited DVD) and the first image of each of the added film projects with the project name appearing below it. The foreground displays an operating panel containing various options for laying out the DVD menu.
image, go to the main “Edit” menu and trim the scene or split it into two scenes and select the second half of the scene as your icon stamp selection. The “Mode” button gives you the choice of “Still” or “Animated”, so that you can specify a fixed or moving background scene. The duration of a moving background scene is limited to one minute. You can choose a scene that lasts longer than a minute, but the material will loop after the first minute. The DVD menu is played in an infinite loop.
• “Film Texts”: If you have set this function, activate the desired stamp icon. As soon as you select the menu “Stamps”, a dashed-line frame appears around one of the scene icons. Now activate the desired film simply by clicking on the image currently representing it. The frame now surrounds this image. If you click on the button “Type”, you have two options: the function “Stamp f. scene” causes your film to be represented by the first image of a scene.
text color, italic setting, frame size, shadowing, etc. stamp icon the DVD menu screen when played in a DVD player. • “Borders”: With this function you can specify the border style options of the inactive film stamps in the DVD menu. The button “Selection Color” specifies color of the border of the film stamp when it is active. “Activation Color” defines the color the frame shows momentarily when the frame is selected. • ”Shadow”: This function lets you specify the shadow that is thrown by the icon.
3.1 Creation: Write DVD (3) You can write the DVD after you have made all the settings in the previous menus. To do this, click on the button “Write DVD”, open the cover on the front of your machine and press the button of the drive that is now visible in order to open the drawer for the DVD.
keyboard so that you can change the name of the film that is activated in the upper list. Please note that changing the name also causes the film name in the DVD menu to be changed! virtual DVD exists on the hard disk but has not yet been written to an actual DVD. The information fields “Image quality” and “Audio mode” let you review the settings you made in the window “Add Film”. They cannot be changed.
instantly returned to the main menu of the DVD and the operating panel remains in the foreground. With the “Chapter” button you enter a selection list in which you can directly access each chapter so long as it has already been created (see section 3.1, item (1) Edit chapter). The button “Film” has a function comparable to the button “Chapter”. With its help you can move film-by-film through the menu. With the two buttons in the bottom line you can move chapter-by-chapter through the menu.
Instead, a background image appears in which the films existing on the DVD are represented by text. Only the films themselves can be restored. With the help of “DVD-Arabesk 2” you can create a completely new menu. two different speeds with the help of the selection button, “Normal” and “High”. For DVDs with small data volume the write duration can be significantly less than the actual film length, even for “Normal” speed. Of course the original films remain unchanged.
4. Practice Example for Layout of a DVD Menu The following section offers two practice examples to introduce you to the creation of DVD menus. It is not necessary to write a DVD for these practice examples. You can view the result with the built-in player, because the virtual DVD is on the hard disk. 4.
“Free capacity” shows you how much free space is still available on the DVD. This lets you know if additional projects can be added. In the lower portion of the window the selection button “1. Film” is displayed, that you now set to the function “Trailer only”.
and set the position of the icon. After you have made these settings for the first image, you can do the same for the other images. You might wish to vary some of the settings, e.g. set another size. After you have made these Background settings, go to the menu item “Title”. Here you can give a name to your background menu. By clicking on the button “Text” you call up the screen keyboard (or with the Power Key-Option) with which you can enter a title of your choice, e.g. “Vacation 2000 to 2003”.
Use the button “Activation Color” to select a nice blue. This defines the momentary frame color when the frame is selected. These settings also apply to all of the stamp icons. Now you can begin to specify the layout of the shadows cast by the icons. Make the settings for a black “Color”, for “Size” 10, “Border” 8 and any desired “Direction”, e.g. decreasing below right.
foreground: Under “PIP” select “Single” and under “Effect” set “Hard Cut” for “IN” and “OUT”. Now select as “Shape” a “Rectangle” and set the “Size” 120 x 96 (for NTSC 120 x 80) in order to obtain an average-sized picture. Note: In order to obtain a small reference picture, select 80 x 64 (NTSC = 80 x 50), for a large picture use 160 x 128 (NTSC = 160 x 100).
of video scenes as you have inserted projects with “DVD-Arabesk 2”. You will also have a 20-second long background image with several PIPs on it (and the complete DVD menu). You can now set audio clips under this scene. To do this, insert your new scene into the storyboard and go to “Audio Mix”, set the original audio off (in order to delete the audio of the video scenes on the background image) and insert an audio clip of your choice.
Now you can continue to specify the DVD menu layout as described in Chapter 3 of this manual (frame color, title, etc.) animated heading for the DVD menu without having to use a supplementary program. Create a fixed image or a moving scene with a nice motif from your video material representing the contents of the films on the DVD. This scene should be 15 seconds long. Alternatively, you can use a 15-second pattern scene from the image pool. 5.
Calculate the heading and create a scene from it, so that the scene titled with “horizontal scroller” is in the active frame of the scene bin. Start “DVD-Arabesk 2” and click on “Edit Menu”. Select the menu item “Background”, and then select the function “Type” under “Scene” and call up project selection with the button “Select”. Confirm the activated project so that the corresponding scene bin appears, and confirm the selection of the previously created scene by clicking on “Ok”.
Calculate the effect and create a scene from it that should appear in the scene bin. a white color with an alpha value of 50%, and show a white frame with a thickness of 4. Start “DVD-Arabesk 2” and enter the function “Edit Menu”. Center the text and calculate the effect over the entire scene. Then create a new scene from it and insert it into the storyboard. Now enter the menu Image Processing effects and select the Particle Magic effect “PM Draw” and insert it.
the magnifying glass) and drag the mouse to size the rectangle. A medium-sized background icon for “DVDArabesk 2” must be of size 102 x 96 (NTSC = 120 x 80). Add this value to the coordinates and subtract 1 so that the rectangle is positioned at the coordinates 565, 185 (NTSC = 565, 169). Confirm by clicking on the left trackball key. You have just created a window as a wall.
Repeat stamping until you have four windows in the wall. 5.5 Suggestions for layout In the following you see some examples for DVD backgrounds that have been created with Casablanca and diverse supplementary programs. We hope to have given your creativity extra impetus and recommend that you simply try out all possible ideas! Finally, exit Akaba - New Concept and click on “Ok” in the “Special” menu so that the 20second scene is calculated. Start “DVD-Arabesk 2” and enter the menu item “Background”.
