Tip #79: Have a Blu-ray mastering workflow

By Dan Parkes (Director/editor)

Although not (yet) commercially released in the Blu-ray format, Ambleton Delight was mastered in HD and hence we created a Blu-ray master first, before down-converting it to DVD. This is something we recommend all filmmakers do, as not only will it look great on a HD TV, but it future-proofs your film and also allows for HD quality projection if shown in a cinema (e.g. cinemas such as Cineworld are now equipped with Blu-ray players that can be used with their digital projectors). This is the workflow we used:

1. Export HD master file
Since the film was shot and edited in HD we simply exported the entire film as a HD master file, in our case, from Adobe Premiere Pro CS3, as an .avi file using the Cineform intermediate codec. (For more information on this refer to our earlier blog: http://ambletondelight.blogspot.com/2011/02/tip-63-establish-editing-workflow.html)

2. Encore authoring
We then authored the Blu-ray disc in Adobe Encore CS3, making sure all the menus etc we at HD resolution (ie at least 1280x720). It is recommended to create these menus separately in image creation software and then import to the authoring programme. We created ours in Photoshop.

3. Add extras
The great thing about Blu-ray is the ability to fit up to 23GB of data on the basic 25GB discs, compared to 4.3GB on standard 4.7GB DVDs. This not only allows for higher quality video but a load more extras. On the Blu-ray version of Ambleton Delight we could include the full Making Of plus other extras such as deleted scenes and the alternate ending -something that would just not fit on a standard DVD.



4. Burn DVD and HD
Adobe Encore has a great feature -the ability to export both a Blu-ray or DVD disc from the same authoring project. It does involve creating different transcodes for each disc and so there is some extra rendering time. You also need to decide whether your Blu-ray video is transcoded in either MPEG2 or h.264. H.264 is higher quality but takes a lot longer to transcode, unless you use a Matrox system which has the ability to speed up h.246 encoding.

5. HD Image file
We also recommend not burning direct to disc but creating an image (.iso) file for both the Blu-ray and DVD discs, that can then be burned to disc using IMGburn (http://www.imgburn.com/) which can verify the accuracy of each disc that is subsequently burned.

Tip #77: Making copies - Duplication versus replication

By Dan Parkes (Director/editor)

Once you have your official DVD master, you will then need to look at how to get copies made. You have three basic options available:

1. Personal or small run copies
As mentioned in the previous blog, rather than burning straight to DVD I recommend burning an image file (.img or .iso) of the disc first. Then you can use free software such as IMGburn (http://www.imgburn.com/) to both burn and verify (check) the disc. The reason for this is that when you need to burn extra copies you simply open IMGburn and burn the image file again, rather than opening your authoring software or having to insert the original disc and make a copy. The verification function ensures you are getting the exact same copy that has been checked for 100 % accuracy.

However this can end up being an expensive and time consuming option, especially if you also need to print out the DVD wrap (printed cover) and you may want to look at either duplication or replication for larger runs.

2. Duplication
For anything up to 500 copies duplication can be a good and cheap option. It is essentially the same as what you likely used to create your home burnt master disc, employing the use of purple dye discs which are "burned" (DVD-Rs). You can easily tell the difference between a duplicated disc and a replicated disc by turning it over and looking at the bottom surface: if it has a dark purple colour the same as the DVD-Rs you burn at home then it has been duplicated (while a replicated disc will be silver). The only difference is that the company the duplicates the disc probably used a duplication tower to do it in bulk. But the end result is the same: a DVD-R. A notable advantage is that quite often the turn around times are much faster than replicated discs.
3. Replication
This is most certainly the best option, especially for quantities above 500, as it creates the proper "stamped" DVD-5 or DVD-9, DVD-10 discs as you would buy commercially (not the purple dye DVD-R discs used for duplication). A “glass master” of your original disc is made which in turn "stamps" the data onto blank media. The disc is then printed and lacquered for protection. DVD-10 can offer a double-sided single layer which can hold up to 9.4GB of media (although in reality this is about 8.75GB) rather than the standard 4.3GB discs. However, due to the necessary glass master this can mean the turn around times are slower, although the per unit costs especially for large quantities is certainly a lot cheaper than replication.

But note that replication factories, due to their large commercial clients, can have various standards that have to be met before a DVD can be processed -which can be a hassle, although it does mean that you can be confident your DVDs are meeting industry standards!

Compatibility
There has been some who say that duplicated DVDs have more compatibility issues than replicated discs. However most modern playback devices now have no trouble with DVD-R discs due to their proliferation, as long as you ensure the DVD-R brand is reliable -I personally recommend Verbatim. Instead, the key issues now come down to PAL, NTSC and DVD region issues... which we will explore in the following blog.