EXPORTING AN AUTOPLAY LOOPING STANDARD DEFINITION DVD FROM PREMIERE Itʼs best to use Premiere & Encore CS6 to export to DVD as you have more control over Bitrate and quality settings compared to FCX. Donʼt rely on Encore or any other DVD burning software to automatically encode your file as the quality will be significantly lower res than it should be. Under NO CIRCUMSTANCES use i-DVD! It creates awful looking DVDs. Follow the steps below and you will create the best quality SD DVD possible. You can also create a looped auto play DVD in Encore (which means as soon as you put the DVD in a player it plays and loops infinitely – useful for shows). EXPORTING DVD FILE 1/ In Premiere choose File>Export>Media 2/ The Media Encoder window will open. Select the following options:  

   SOURCE SETTINGS (in the top left) Select Scale To Fill (otherwise you may end up with black bars either side of the image) EXPORT SETTINGS Format MPEG2-DVD Output Name Give the file a name i.e. DVD FILE 1 and a destination Make sure Export Video & Export Audio are checked if you need both video and audio

VIDEO TAB Quality 5 TV Standard (Select PAL or NTSC depending on how you shot the footage – it will usually be PAL) Field Order None (Progressive) This assumes you have shot using a DSLR Frame Rate (fps) 25 (for PAL) Pixel Aspect Ratio Widescreen 16:9 (assuming youʼve shot 16:9) Check Render at Maximum Depth BITRATE SETTINGS VBR, 2 Pass (This encodes the video twice allowing for higher image quality) Minimum Bitrate (Mbps) 8 (set any higher and the file may cause SD DVD to skip) Target Bitrate (Mbps) 8 (same as above) Check Use Maximum Render Quality and Use Previews AUDIO If you need Dolby Digital select Dolby Digital otherwise select PCM Click EXPORT BURNING DVD IN ENCORE You should now have a high quality SD DVD file. It should be called filename.m2v and if you have exported audio this will be a separate file named filename.wav A good workflow is to make a new folder called ʻMY PROJECT_DVDFILESʼ etc. and save all your DVD files into it – this makes it easy to burn further copies and archive. 1/ Open Encore 2/ Make sure the project settings are correct before starting the project:

BASIC TAB Name: Name of your DVD Location: Saves all relevant files to this location PROJECT SETTINGS Authoring Mode DVD Television Standard PAL (should usually be PAL unless you have exported an NTSC file. In which case you could be in trouble later as some DVD players only play PAL DVDs!) Transcode Settings youʼve already ʻtranscodedʼ the file in Premiere so leave this as it is. 3/ In Encore firstly import the transcoded DVD files File>Impost As>Timeline Pick out the .m2v and .wav file (if you donʼt need audio just pick the .m2v file) 4/ You should now see your files in the top left project window and a timeline with your film on it at the bottom of the screen (scrub through the timeline to preview as you would in any other edit programme).

Now make sure that the DVD will play the film automatically and on a loop 5/ In the top left project window find your timeline file (this will be marked with a blue icon) Right click on the icon and ensure the option Set As First Play is selected (a tiny play image in the top left of the icon means it is selected as the first film to play when the DVD is inserted into a mac/dvd player).

6/ To loop playback make sure the timeline icon is still selected and use the Properties window to the right. 7/ In the Properties window next to the End Action option box click the arrow. A drop down menu will pop out. Select Link Back To Here. This will loop playback.

8/ Test the DVD by clicking the Preview button in the top left of the screen (looks like a disc with play symbol on it. This will preview what happens when you play the DVD. In the Preview Window you can click the Execute End Action icon to see what happens when the film ends (it should loop back to the start if youʼve followed the steps above correctly).

9/ To build the DVD insert a blank DVD (always use DVD-R rather than +R discs as theyʼre more compatible with a range of players/computers) into the drive. 10/ Click the Build tab in the top left of the screen. In this window select the following options: Format DVD (note you can also build a digital archive version by selecting Disc Image) Output DVD Disc Source Current Project

Write Speed This doesnʼt matter so much but a high speed can cause errors. 8 X is usually fine. Name Whatever you call the DVD will show up on a desktop when you insert the disc.

11/ Click Build and the DVD burns. Thatʼs it! Remember to test the DVD and make labeled backup copies if necessary. Matt Page mp223@brighton.ac.uk