Burning to a Dual Layer DVD

[AaronS]

Hey all ,

I am attempting to burn a dual layer DVD of a Stargate SG-1 episode disc (dual layer). I understand that straight DVD-DL -to-DVD-DL backups are rather easy, and do not require any other programs than DVD Decrypt. However, there was a "questionable" scene in the disc that I edited out using DVD Shrink. I reauthored the DVD with Shrink, and used pgcedit to hook up the original menus (they function rather well, actually).

My problem is that I am unsure (or perhaps merely want reassurance) of how to proceed. All DVD-DL backup tutorials I have read, instruct me (with straight DVD-to-DVD backups) to simply rip with DVD Decrypter and then select the MDS file and burn again. However, apparently when I reauthored with DVD Shrink, it never exported a MDS file. I am unsure as to exactly where I get this file.

Any help would be appreciated .

[blutach]

Hiya Aaron and welcome

First, congrats on what you are doing. Reauthoring a DL is at the cutting edge.

The only thing you need to watch out for is the layer break. PgcEdit shows you where it is. I'd keep it there. Note: It's a real layer break, not just an SCR discont.

You can burn in DVD Decrypter, mindful of the LB. DVD Decrypter may suggest a new LB for you, but I would stick with the old one.

As for the MDS, don't worry. Simply output in PgcEdit to an ISO and don't burn yet. Double click on the ISO (it shouod be associated with DVD Decrypter) and bring up DVD Decrypter write mode (or press w). Check your settings to enable you to select the LB yourself.

Oh, yes ... Make sure in your "shrink" that you haven't removed the real LB or you will need to reinsert the 6 sectors of 00s. This may not be easy.

Good luck and please keep us informed of your results and progress


PS I am very happy about your reauthoring the menus in PgcEdit as this is the method I devised and I am very pleased to see someone using it!!!

[AaronS]

I'm sorry, but how do I find if Shrink took out the layer break? Forgive my ignorance, I'm rather new to the DVD writing scene .

If Shrink did remove the Layer Break, would you suggest I "reinsert the 6 sectors of 00s" (not really sure what that means, actually), or go ahead and let Decrypter do it? As I understand it, the problem with letting Decrypter insert the layer breaks is that it often puts them in awkward places.

Oh, and I found your walkthrough to reinserting the original DVD menus very helpful! The only thing I had difficulty with was the fact that the original DVD has three episodes on it, and I had to juggle some of the commands around to get it to jump to the right places.

Actually, now that I look over it again, I see that it's still not quite right (There are three titles, PgcEdit sees them all as one). I suspect that's a result of reauthoring in Shrink though. So it plays the whole title straight through. I'll have to figure out a way to either split the titles again, or get the playback to break after a certain chapter and then point the menus to start up at the next chapter.

[blutach]

Check your DVD Shrink preferences under the output files tab. Uncheck the remove layer break. You will probably need to encode again. But you won't need to do deep analysis, so its probably no more than 30-40 minutes, since you are stripping nothing.

Good luck and thanks for the feedback (I must admit, the guide was written for one main movie, but you can import as many titles inn as many titlesets as you like).

Regards

[blutach]

One additional thing. About layer breaks. There are real layer breaks which are 6 "00" sectors (12k) which the player never plays. It simply gives the player time to focus the laser on the 2nd layer (actually this is called layer 1, LOL).

Other, so called, layer breaks are introduced by STC discontinuities, which happen whenever a VOBID is changed (seamlessly or not), a cell command is encountered, and of course, at the start of playback of any PGC. This is why you see in PgcEdit the 2 plus greyed out tick at the start of a playback of any cell which has video. It's just a STC discont., not a real LB and can't be changed.

The real LB is almost always in the middle of the movie. Some studios actually author their VOBs and VOBIDs to change at the LB (this is why you don't just see say 7 files of 1GB plus a residual on some DVDs, but a smaller VOB in the middle, around the 4GB mark).

In your case, never rip and eliminate the real LB unless you are going to reintroduce it somewhere else of your choosing later! Always be mindful of the maximum that can be stored on a layer - 3.97GB. As well, layer 0 must hold more than layer 1 (about 50MB will be enough). A good layout would be 3.95GB on layer 0 and 3.9 on layer 1, totalling 7.85GB (giving you 100MB surplus).

In the future, IMHO, the safest thing for you to do is to rip in ISO mode and if you want to play around with the commands, then mount the ISO as a virtual drive with daemon tools and play around in the virtual drive, touching nothing to do with the LB.

Good luck.

[AaronS]

Yes, it looks like Shrink was set to remove layer breaks. I'll re-encode, and report back . Thanks again!

Oh, and I'm sorry to ask something else, but do you know if there's a way that I can preserve separate titles while reauthoring in Shrink, or is Shrink not what's splicing the titles?

[blutach]

Can you please explain a little more about what you mean regarding the other titles? I don't understand what you're driving at.

Regards

[AaronS]

I'm sorry, I'll be more specific.

Since the movie I'm reauthoring is an episodic DVD, the original had multiple titles. After I had ripped and decrypted the movie, it still retained the separate titles. I reauthored the episodic movie (Stargate SG-1: Season 1: Disc 1) which contained four titles. The first three titles were episodes, and the last was a little ad which I left it because I didn't need the space.

Now, when I reauthored the movie, I removed the scene in question by duplicating the first title and cropping the duplicates on either side of the scene, leaving me with the episode on two tracks. I didn't give it a second thought. I reauthored the movie.

I imported the movie into pgcedit and reimported the menus. However, the menus to the second and third episode were broken (they were jumping to the second and third title which pgcedit claimed did not exist). I opened the movie in my computer's DVD player, and sure enough, I only had one large (three hour long) title that was all three episodes combined.

So, is this something that DVDShrink did (perhaps an option I didn't know I had selected), or do I need to do something else to preserve certain titles?

Thanks,
Aaron

[blutach]

Eeek.

Here's what you should have done.

Kept the structure and titles intact. Use VobBlanker to cut the part of title 1 out that you don't want. No need for duplicate titles, no need to change chapter marks and all the menus still point to where they should point. No need for DVD Shrink either (kinda wondered what you were doing with it for a DL disk).

Get VobBlanker here. It's a gem. Got a very good help file too. It's author, jsoto, is very active in answering questions at doom9 in the IFO/VOB editors forum.

Cutting inside a cell is pretty intricate, but it can be done. You might get a little hiccup at the next cell (as it will be an STC discontinuity, so the playback can't be seamless), but it's not enough to ruin the enjoyment of the show.

I hope you understand what I am driving at - minimal interference with the disk structure while still giving you exactly what you want.

Good luck

Regards

[AaronS]

Thanks for the help, blutach . I told you I was new .

Well, I won't need to cut inside a cell, thankfully. Since apparently each track is in its own separate cell, and I just need to cut the whole track, I just blanked the entire cell. I'm processing the changes now, and I'll report back when it's finished.

EDIT: Just finished reauthoring the DVD with VobBlanker. It took a while, as I had to process the cuts and blanks one at a time, which was a very slow process. I looked to see if it had the layer breaks in pgcedit, and they appeared to have remained intact.

Like you said when I ran it through my software DVD player, it hiccuped up a bit. At the places where I cut or blanked scenes, the counter jumped around to random numbers, and the DVD would freeze for a moment at that point. I could resume play by hitting the play button or fast-forwarding though. However, from what I'm reading, it's a normal thing.

So, the DVD is pretty much ready for burning. I'm going to burn the DVD in a little bit and report back again. Thank you very much for your help!

[AaronS]

Hmm, odd. I used pgcedit to export the edited files to an .ISO file. I then burned the DVD using DVD Decrypter. The burned DVD played fine on my computer (the DVD+r DL media is Verbatim) I plugged it into my standalone DVD player (Panasonic DVD-RV32, if it makes any difference) and it started to load the DVD, but then froze.

I'm not quite sure what to do. I did some searching, and the only explanations I can come up with are: a) My DVD media is bad (it's Verbatim, which I've heard good things about though) or b) I need to burn at a lower speed. I selected Max Speed in DVD Decrypter, and the media can only burn at 2.4x, does that make a difference?

[jmet]

Read the comments left by others who have had this DVD player regarding dual layer media. - http://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers....y=Name&hits=25

[AaronS]

Oh, thanks jmet. I had already checked that list, but I must have missed the comments. Well, according to one of the comments, my DVD player will read DVD DLs when they have the DVD-ROM booktype... whatever that means. I'll have to look it up, thanks!

EDIT: Well, apparently it means that I'll have to update my firmware.

[blutach]

Sounds like you're nearly there Aaron.

One thing I find useful when you are doing a lot of reauthoring - even tho VobBlanker does a magic job at this - is to run a Mock Strip over the the title you have edited before your final ISO creation in PgcEdit.

See this thread to find out how.

When you're done, maybe you can publish some of your findings and tips. Well done!

Regards

[blutach]

To set the booktype in DVD Decrypter, don't let it start writing immediately from the PgcEdit burn.

Start DVD Decrypter manually after ISO creation, press W if necessary and check out the little folder on the extreme right, next to write speed (hover over it - it says change book type). Click it and change it, if you can, to DVD-ROM for your burner.

If what I'm saying makes no sense, look here.

This will make your disk 100% readable by any hardware player.

Regards