Ulead 1.0 - Manual (Page 25)

SpruceUp User’s Guide 2—3
What Else is Needed to Make a DVD?
SpruceUp plays a crucial role is the DVD title creation process, but it can't do it alone. What
other bits you need depends on the types of titles you intend to create, as well as the
sources you will use.
Note: The equipment listed below is not by any means complete – it
is intended to provide examples of products that have been successfully
used with SpruceUp.
Movie Sources
The typical reason for making a DVD title is to present one or more movies, typically
containing both video and audio. These may come from a VCR, camcorder, or a live feed
from elsewhere. It is important that the source provides the video and audio in formats that
the video capture card is designed to handle.
It is also important to get the highest quality possible. Starting with a digital source, for
example a DV camera with an IEEE-1394 ("FireWire") output provides very good results.
Among analog sources, component is preferred over S-Video (Y/C), which is far preferred
over composite.
Avoid generational losses as much as possible – capturing video from a VHS dub will provide
disappointing results. Once video has been converted to digital, avoid converting it back to
analog only to have to digitize it again later. Try to correct any video problems (lighting and
such) at the source.
Video and Audio Capture Cards
Video Capture Cards provide the means of getting a movie source converted into a file and
stored on your hard drive. This device must be able to support the source, preferably at the
highest quality output the source provides.
This is typically a PCI card that plugs into your PC's motherboard, although newer external
versions using IEEE-1394 (also known as FireWire, DV, or i.LINK) or USB interfaces are also
available.
Use care to select one that provides the output formats you need - MPEG outputs are great
if you are going straight into SpruceUp, but there are not many of these and other formats
are required if you are going to use an NLE (Non-Linear Editor) to edit the video before
authoring.
Capturing audio suitable for DVD authoring must also be carefully approached. All DVD
audio must be sampled at 48Khz, not the more common 44.1Khz rate used for audio CDs.
SpruceUp supports uncompressed PCM (WAV and AIFF files), MPEG-1 layer II, and Dolby
Digital AC-3 (2 and 5.1 channel) audio.
Editors
Unless you are making a very simple title or are very efficient when shooting the video, you
will need to edit the video and audio to create the finished movie. This could involve
trimming in and out points, cutting different scenes together, adding dissolves and other
effects, adding credits, and many other things. SpruceUp cannot cut directly from one
movie to a different one or alter the audio. This means each movie must be complete as you
wish it to be seen.
There are a wide variety of non-linear editors available that make it easy to create the final
movie. See the Ulead Media Studio Pro 6.0 topic for information on it.