Hello all, New to this forum but I must say it's a great place from what I've seen so far, tons of knowledgeable people. Anyways, I came here because I am trying to backup the THX optimizer that comes on all THX certified DVD's. The DVD I am trying to do this with is Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. I have located the THX optimizer that I want to back up using DVD Shrink. I have tried re-authoring the DVD, and including only the titles and menu where the THX optimizer is located, however the menu is not preserved and is instead converted to video. Which makes it useless to me as the optimizer is in menu format, and you must click your way through the steps. I am sure there is a way to do what I am trying to do without backing up the whole DVD. The THX optimizer is essentially an interactive menu, so having it converted to video will be of no use to me. Thank You in advance for any suggestions. If you require more information please let me know.
From the normal (full) backup screen you could 'compress' (convert) the main movie to a single still picture and shut off all the audio tracks. That would keep the menus intact.
DVD Shrink won't work with the THX optimizer menus in Re-author mode unless you do a full backup as suggested above. If you want just the THX menus along with the audio and video test screens, then this will require advance re-authoring. DvdReMake Pro is the right tool for this. PgcEdit maybe able to do it also, but I don't know how yet. VobBlanker probably won't be needed for this. If you're interested in using DvdReMake Pro, then I'll provide some more info.
Yes Toaddub, that would be very helpful if you could help me out with that. I have DVDReMake Pro but don't know how to use it very well.
What version do you have? Are you familiar with DVD commands? I have only SWII, which has the THX menus, but I don't know if the navigational structure is the same as SWIII, so I'm gonna need you to upload the files so I can take a look. Download the Navpack Extractor program. Load the original DVD and extract it. Zip up all the files (IFO, VOB, you don't have to include BUP) and upload to some file hosting site, like savefile.com. The files will contain only navpacks, no audio nor video, so it will be only a few MBs especially zipped. From SWII, I can see 4 VTS will be in the final compilations. Well, we'll see from your files.
I'm not familiar at all to the program, it is brand new to me. I have version 3.5.3. I have sent you a PM containing the navpack files, I appreciate your help.
Toaddub, do you happen to have AIM or any other messenger where I can contact you for some help on DRM. I've been working on trying to rip the optimizer all day and have learned how to use the program quite well but I'm still having problems with some things. Namely, I cant figure out how to choose which VTS will be the opening title when the DVD is started. I have a feeling this is done in VGM titles, but I couldn't figure it out. I made a test DVD and had most of the optimizer working, but the order of the titles was all messed up. Also there is a test clip that plays through the optimizer so that you can see if the changes you made to your TV were sufficient. If i click the appropriate button to launch this clip, it starts playing fine, but only plays about 5 seconds of the clip (clip is 47 seconds), then skips to the next title. I am positive I didn't block that scene, so I'm a bit confused as to why that's happening. Again, if you have a messenger such as AIM, MSN, it would be great to chat with you about some of the problems I'm having, thanks.
You should update to 3.6.1. I can't help you if you have problems with the output from 3.5.3. This is advance authoring. Some of the functions I mention you probably haven't used before. Don't worry about the red highlighted items during the procedure, they will be fixed. So here are the general steps: 1. Delete VTS 1-4. Just start at VTS 1 and select 'Delete VTS' or hit Del key. Do this 4x. Note that each time you delete, all the remaining VTSs move up by 1. 2. In First Play PGC, delete the first 3 pre-commands. Change "Jump VMG PGC 2" to "Jump VTS 1 "root" menu (title 1)". 3a. In VTS1/Menus en/PGC1, delete all post-commands. 3b. Then in the Buttons pane, delete buttons 3 and 4. They are not needed. Button 4 can never be reached. The following is optional: Since button 3 is the Main Menu button, you can remove the button graphics in the background with some photo editor. Here's the GUIDE. If so desired, you can substitute step 3 of the guide using AutoMux. This nifty tool will automatically convert BMP to VOB with 1-click. 3c. Change button 2 command to "Jump VTS Title 2". You can just copy button 1 command and modify it. 4. Delete VTS1/Menus en/PGC2. Not needed. 5. In VTS1/Program Chains/PGC10, delete pre-command #4. Then delete the corresponding PGC14 (title 2) that never executes. Select Titles pane, on the right window, expand Title 2 node, delete the red unreferenced Chapters 18 and 19. As for the test clip part where you're having problem. If you follow the trace from the Final Test screen (use Open Destination or Ctrl+Space on Jump/Link/Call/goto commands), it'll finally lead you to play a portion of the movie feature for 47 sec. This is in VTS3/Program Chains/PGC2 (just know that it is originally in VTS7 before any edit). If you did a Test Export, the program will cut off every video segment to 5 sec. Well, since the test clip is in the movie VTS3, and I want to delete VTS3 and replace the test clip over VTS2/PGC2. The only difference between the test clip (AC3 6-ch) and VTS2/PGC2 (AC3 2-ch) is audio which can be fixed. So let's continue. 6. Delete VTS2/Program Chains/PGC2. 7. Copy VTS3/Program Chains/PGC2. 8. Right-click on VTS2/Program Chains and select 'Add copied PGC'. Ignore the warning. Also notice that all audio and subtitle streams are copied as well but they are undefined. So let's fix the audio/sub attributes. 9. Go to VTS3 title domain, Audio Tracks pane, select 'Copy tracks info'. Then go to VTS2 title domain, Audio Tracks pane, and select 'Paste tracks info'. Then select Track 1 and 'Delete tracks from selected'. 10. Repeat step 9 for SubPicture Tracks. Then select Track 0 and 'Delete tracks from selected'. It seems redundant but it's the way to actually delete the audio/sub streams and its info at the PGC level. 11. In VTS2/Program Chains/PGC2/Programs pane, select the first program and 'Delete program and block(s)'. This blank cell never executes. Then delete the last pre-command 'Link Chapter 2'. Then modify the Call post-command to 'Call VMG PGC 28 (resume cell 1)'. 12. Now let's fix the red Titles pane. Make Chapter 1 to refer to PGC2/Program 1 and Chapter 2 to PGC2/Program 2. Then right-click on any chapter and select 'Set entry PGC'. Only PGC2 is available. Click OK and the red Titles item is gone. 13. In VTS2/Menus en/PGC1, have only 1 pre-command 'Jump VMG PGC 28'. 14. In VMG PGC 27, change pre-command to 'Jump VMG Title 3'. This will fix the jump to the test clip. Now let's clean up. 15. Delete the movie VTS3. 16. Go to VMG Titles pane. Multi-select (Ctrl+click) all the red VMG titles and Delete. 17. Set VMG PGC 26 to be the Title menu (right-click on it and select 'Set menu category -> Title menu'). By doing this, you can press the Title button on your remote to access the main menu. 18. Delete VMG PGC 1-22,24,25. Start deleting from the bottom up so you won't get confused. You should have only 4 VMG PGCs when done. There should not be any red items at this point. Test in the debugger. Export. Then test in software player to make sure everything plays fine. It's a lot to absorb as you're skipping a few grades, so take your time.
