iDVD 6 and iMovie HD:

Video Storytelling
on a Less-than-Indie
Budget

The Challenge 

A couple of months ago, a fellow artist asked me if I could help him produce a
digital portfolio of his art that he could send out to galleries and museums

I had recently replaced my G4 Desktop with a Power Mac G5 Dual 2.3GHz beefed
up with 4.5GB RAM, so my computer was up to the job. As I got into the project, I
soon realized that, instead of merely burning a DVD of static images,
I could give my friend a full-blown multimedia movie, including a soundtrack.

Fortunately, I already had the software, iDVD
and iMovie, (preinstalled as part of the iLife
suite on my hard drive). And my G5 had the
necessary processing muscle, including a
graphics card that was up to the task for video
production. It seemed like a doable option.

Well. I did it, and I’m here to report that iDVD and iMovie are terrific, and not
difficult to use. Although iDVD is a complex program, it works effectively and
transparently behind the scenes. But keep in mind that the quality of the content—
images, movies, music, good taste, skill and editorial judgment on your part—is
what ultimately determines the quality of the DVD viewing experience. Good
stuff in, good stuff out. Film editors need good material to work with for a
memorable product. Whatever a DVD contains—movies, video clips, photographs
and other still images, documents or any other files that can be copied onto a
computer—quality input is essential.

Anatomy of a DVD

To appreciate the power of iDVD, consider all the decisions that had to be made
in producing this DVD:

• Will the viewer have to play a sequence from beginning to end, or be
  able to select any scene or chapter, at any point?
  
• Can the image be viewed at a 4:6 ratio? 9:16? Both?
  
• Will the images be shown as an unadorned series of frames, or be tied
  together in a visually thematic way?
  
• What kind of transitions? Jump-cuts? Fade outs? Cross-disolves? Or
  something even fancier?
• Will there be any special effects? Are they within the competence of the
  film-editor?
  
• How about music? Voiceovers? Live, recorded conversation?
  
• and that's only the beginning.

iDVD puts all of these possibilities at your fingertips, to use or not, as
you please, and to edit and tweak the final product until it suits you. Here
are some particulars:

Menus. The first thing you see on your television or computer screen
when you insert a DVD into an optical drive or DVD player is the main
menu. When you create your own DVD, that menu is the first thing you
build. For my project, it was a list of exhibitions.

The menu can be a simple black screen with the contents of the DVD
listed, or it can have still or moving background images with clickable
text or graphic buttons.

Navigation.  When you click a button on a DVD menu, something happens:
a movie or song starts to play, a slideshow appears, or you see another
menu (called a submenu). A submenu is simply another way to lead your
viewers to more content. You can have many submenus on your DVD.

When you design your own menus, you add buttons that take the viewer
wherever he wants to go.

Themes. You  could  present the content  of your DVD as a simple succession
of images, titles  and text frames, but that might be dull. Would you prefer
to show your vacation pictures, for example, as if you were flying over them,
then zooming in for a close-up? Complex special effects like this are simple
with iDVD, which offers a set of templates  called themes—professionally
designed scenarios and special effects that, with some constraints, you can
modify and personalize. Below, for example is how I used iDVD’s “Reflection
Black” theme to display my friend’s art.





iDVD Main Menu & Media Pane: The main menu window
of my iDVD project (left) shows the Reflection Black theme,
with my submenu button links listed on the exhibitions
panel (far left). I dragged the artwork images from the Media
pane (right) into the available drop zones (number 3 is left
open for clarity), which are special containers where you
can add photos, QT movies, even slideshows that become
integrated with the template menu art. The integrated Media
pane (right) provides access to files in iTunes, iPhoto, and
iMovie. Cool, isn't it?

Drop Zones. Reflection Black has eight drop zones, which crawl across the screen
in a loop. If you add more than one photo to a drop zone, multiple images will be
displayed, one at a time in rotation, for added interest.

In short,  iDVD enables you to present content in an engaging manner that the user
can easily navigate.

Overview: What’s New in iDVD 6

Here are some of the things you can do with v.6 that you couldn’t do before:

—Shoot material using the latest HDV (high-definition video) and widescreen DV
cameras, and produce widescreen, high definition DVD’s that can fill every inch
of the newest widescreen TVs.

—Design your presentation using any of ten new Apple-designed menu themes in
both widescreen (16:9) and standard (4:3) formats.. Each new theme family
includes a coordinating main menu, chapter or scene selection menus, and extras.

Drop Zone Editing. Fill  drops zones automatically. Add your videos
and photos to all the drop zones of a DVD menu with one click. The
new drop zone editor is easier to use and makes short work of filling
the drop zones on a menu. You can add audio, too.

—Customize these themes via the new autofill drop zones.

—Burn, using compatible third-party DVD burners. (Apple has lifted its former
restriction.You are no longer limited to a built-in SuperDrive).

—Or, forget about all the foregoing and use new Magic iDVD, the easiest way ever
to make a DVD. Just choose a theme and select your movies and photos; iDVD
creates a complete DVD project for you. Magic iDVD projects include a main menu
with buttons for your movies, slide shows and scene-selection menus for movies
with chapters. Drop zones are filled automatically with your content. You can then
burn the DVD or continue editing it like any other iDVD project.

 (Note: HDV is also able to use MiniDV tapes, which have over four times greater 
resolution than standard MiniDV. But, although you can import and edit HDV in iMovie,
your final DVD when burned from iDVD will— because of compression
limitations— have the same resolution as if you had used a standard MiniDV camcorder. )

—Go widescreen all the way. Create DVD’s with widescreen themes, menus,
movies, and slideshows. With its new, resizable window, iDVD makes it easier for
you to work in the 16:9 aspect ratio.

—Flexibly edit the menu and buttons. Design DVD menus and buttons exactly the
way you want. Adjust the volume of the background audio and make it fade in
and out. Choose from more button styles, customize the button highlight color,
and set the in- and out-points  for motion buttons. You can even mix button styles
on a menu if you like.

—Produce quality slideshows. They can include titles and comments, and one
slideshow can hold thousands of slides. You can create slideshows from iPhoto
books and import Keynote slides to make a professional presentation DVD.

—Manage huge projects, via enhanced map view editing. With this new feature,
you can reorganize even the largest DVD project by dragging and dropping DVD
menu icons in map view to move elements from one menu to another. You can delete
a section of the DVD project and the menus will reconnect automatically. Map view
also alerts and identifies potential problems with your DVD before you burn it to a disc.

—Use any DVD burner. Previous versions forced users to burn an iDVD project to
a built-in SuperDrive. You now have the option of using whatever drive you have.

Here are several links that will help you get up to speed on what iDVD 6 can do.
Apple’s Discussion Group is a gold mine of information for resolving issues.

Ken Stone’s Website

Apple iDVD 6 Multimedia Tutorial

Apple iDVD Discussion Group

My iDVD Art Project

To make sure my iDVD project files were all in the right format, I worked with
photos from within the iPhoto library, music files that were in iTunes, and movies
created in iMovie HD.

After choosing the standard aspect ratio of 4:3 (widescreen 16:9 is also an option) for
the DVD, I selected my theme (Reflection Black), various preferences (best performance
also enables background encoding, and fade volume out at end of menu loop and
slideshow. (Note that certain settings in preferences apply only to new projects). I then
went to work on the main template menus, submenus, and developing the slideshows.
I had nine different slideshows plus nine movies planned. All my media files (photos,
music, movies) were readily available from within the Media pane in iDVD.

Aural Dimension

The primary benefit of presenting art in a slideshow is that there is a perception
of movement; adding an audio track presents yet another dimension of mood. I
could also add special transitional effects (cube, dissolve, push, etc.) between slides.

The slideshow maker of iDVD is good, but I also wanted to pan and zoom—the “Ken
Burns” effect—across the static images of the paintings for certain slideshows in
the project;  and although iMovie has the Ken Burns effect feature  (you export the
slideshow from iMovie to iDVD), I used FotoMagico instead. This is a dedicated
slideshow-authoring tool ($79) from Boinx Software. FotoMagico has a simple,
powerful interface that gives you superior control over timing between transitions.
It offers many cool transitions to choose from as well. You can also add a music track
and voiceovers created with iMovie or in GarageBand.

FotoMagico Interface. The idea behind pan and zoom in a slideshow
presentation is that you start with an image in the desired zoom and
rotation state and then finish up with image in the final state. You
choose the desired transition (fade, dissolve, twirl, angular wipe, etc.)
and music from the panel on the right, which has access to images
and audio via iTunes and iPhoto. FotoMagico’s intuitive interface is a
welcome sight.

A Legalism Stops the Music

But you can’t add music-protected  files from your iTunes library to your FotoMagico
slideshow. This limitation is imposed by Apple, not by FotoMagico. According to
Apple, songs bought from the iTunes Music Store are protected to “prohibit
unauthorized copying"—meaning,  copying to anything other than Apple-approved
software or devices, such as the iPod. Some would argue that this practice is unfair
because it restricts users from using their playback mode of choice. (Unprotected
files, e,g., from your CD’s, are no problem.)  Nevertheless, I didn’t want to infringe
on copyright laws by distributing and selling a finished DVD project using music I
don’t legally own. 

However, no money was changing hands in this case, so I was free to use music
tracks from iTunes for my FotoMagico slideshows. But how? With Audio Hijack Pro.

Audio Hijack Pro from Rogue Amoeba makes it simple to record any audio on your computer. In the process, the audio file is stripped of any copy-protection encoding scheme and you can easily save audio from almost any application to an AIFF, ACC, or MP3 file. This file can then be burned to a CD, or played in any software audio player like iTunes, or FotoMagico, or any hardware audio player like an iPod. Which is what I did.

Audio Hijack Pro. After using Audio Hijack Pro to record tracks
from iTunes, I placed my Hijacked files in an iTunes playlist. And
now, with the music no longer copy protected, it became available
to FotoMagicoand my slideshow

QuickTime

I assembled my (16:9) pan and zoom slideshows in FotoMagico with the selected
tracks from iTunes;  although my iDVD preference was set to the standard 4:3
aspect ratio, I wanted the movies themselves within the drop zone containers
to have the widescreen look found in films

DVD: Widescreen Preview   Here is a slide in widescreen. I
exported this slideshow as a QuickTime movie from FotoMagico.
Shown here is how it appears in the iDVD preview window in
widescreen (also known as "letterbox").

 
Foto Magico Export. I exported my FotoMagico slideshows as Quick
Time movies in the appropriate widescreen format; I accessed these
preferences in the export dialog box: Customize > Size. For your work
with iDVD and iMovie, it is essential that you use the most recent
version (currently 7.1.2) of QuickTime. Upgrading to QuickTime Pro
($29.99) provides extra options that you will need.

With my QuickTime movies of the slideshows now stored in the iMovie document
folder, I had access to these files from the Media panel in iDVD. I then went to work
as follows: I created standard slideshows from within iDVD to display each artwork 
individually, but grouped by category—say portraits,  for example. Then, to
complement each iDVD slideshow, I created a companion pan and zoom slideshow
with FotoMagico using the same artworks. This approach gave me more dramatic
control in presenting the art; for example, I could zoom in and pan on a portion of
art as a teaser in the slideshow movie without revealing the entire piece.

Burning

I now had all my menus and visual components, including text, images, and movies,
in place within the iDVD template, and was ready to burn my first DVD. I burned
several DVD-RW discs, apparently smoothly, but then discovered  that the Apple
DVD Player would not recognize any of them! They were now,  officially, coasters. 

I thus learned that DVD media are not all created equal for burning video DVD’s.
Rewritable discs had worked well for burning data such as documents and still
images, but they were useless for recording video onto DVD.

What to do? A click to Apple’s busy iDVD discussion group put me in the right
direction; a number of discussion group members recommended Verbatim DVD-R
DataLifePlus discs for their reliability, and they were right.  I also learned that
burning at slower speeds (2x or 4x) would produce more reliable, error-free results.
(For  an in-depth guide to DVD blank media, check this site.)

Tip: Sometimes iDVD acts up inexplicably. It may not launch correctly, or crashes,
or themes may not appear, or the Spinning Beach Ball strikes— or other
anomalies. Try this: Quit iDVD. Search in User/Library/Preferences for the file
named com.apple.iDVD.plist. Trash it. A new one will be created the next time
you launch iDVD. This may also resolve project-loading errors. Remember to
Restart and use Disk Utility to Repair Permissions. 

iDVD Project Info. Hitting Command + I from within iDVD gives you a
detailed overview of your project settings.

Disk Image to DVD

There is a convenient option for burning from within iDVD worth noting. Instead
of burning directly to a DVD, save your project onto your hard drive as a Disc Image.
You can then play and pre-flight your DVD for any problems such as typos before
burning to a physical disc (which, depending upon the complexity of your iDVD
project and the speed of your computer, can take from a couple of hours to
overnight). Things will move much more quickly if you have enabled background
encoding in iDVD preferences.

You have two options for burning your Disc Image to a DVD. In the first, you can
work directly with the OS X Disk Utility: From the Desktop, double click on your Disc
Image to create the Disc Image “drive,” which is an exact virtual copy of a physical
disc. Next, launch Disk Utility from your utilities folder. Select the Disc Image and
then the burn speed. As I mentioned above, lower burn speeds (2x or 4x) will result
in fewer errors  in copying.

Toast Titanium 7

The other option—my preference—is get Toast Titanium 7 ($79 with rebate) from Roxio, for the job. (Note that versions  earlier than 7 do not support the disc image file format). Toast is an indispensable app that offers more flexibility in setting up your documents for copying to CD and DVD media. 

Toast’s media browser gives easy. fast, integrated access to your iTunes music,
iPhoto pictures, iMovie projects, EyeTV shows and DVD’s, including discs from
set-top DVD recorders, DVD camcorders, iDVD discs and VIDEO TS folders. All
your music, photos and video are easily accessible when you want to burn. No
need to launch separate applications—drag and drop right from the media
browser into the Toast content area.  

Toast Media Browser. Drag your iDVD disc image file from your hard
disk into the Content Area or click  Select to add the image file. Insert
a blank recordable DVD. Click the red Record button and choose a
recorder from the list and optional recording settings, such as “Number
of Copies.” Click Record to continue.

Speed Zone. Here, I’ve set the write speed to 2x in Toast’s dialog box
for the slowest burn speed—which translates into error- free DVD’s.

Viewing DVD

My objective for this project was to create a DVD that could play on the widest possible
array of hardware. After burning my DVD, it played well enough on my computer screen.

When you burn your iDVD projects, it’s a good idea to test them on various other
machines—Mac and IBM-compatible. And, keep in mind that your iDVD project will
shine most when played on a DVD player and your Television.

Try it out and see for yourself.

(Part 2 follows:
iMovie HD, tutorials, books)

___________________________

Eden Maxwell is an artist and published book author. He has contributed to many publications, including
Popular Science, Art Calendar Magazine, Drachen Foundation Journal, Popular Mechanics, MacStreet
Journal Online, Omni, MacUser, MacDigest, and Computer Gaming World. His art has been exhibited on
both coasts and his work has appeared in the Encyclopedia Britannica. Visit Eden's Atelier and Gallery
website. You may also reach him via email at artist@edensart.com

Copyright © 2009
Metropolitan New York Macintosh Alliance