0.31 User Looking for Guides for 0.33 "tovid" (todisc) GUI (I've tried, but I'm thoroughly confused!)

[OzzyFrank]

Hi. I have done everything to keep from upgrading to 0.33, as I've
used tovid GUI for years, and never used todisc GUI (now known as
tovid GUI) because I just couldn't make sense of it, whereas in the
former it was so absolutely simple: add some vids, click the correct
aspect ratio, choose "ffmpeg" instead of "mpeg2enc", and either leave
the Quality at 8, or set it to 10. Click Encode. Awesome.

Now, a while back 0.31 lost the ability to make a menu, but that was
OK, as I could grab the encoded vids and author them with DeVeDe
(which would give me an .iso, so it was worth the extra effort).
However, now I've upgraded FFMPEG to the latest, and 0.31 will no
longer even encode. I'm aware it's some IDVID issue with : replacing
a . in newer FFMPEG, or whatever, but I'm thinking instead of
downgrading FFMPEG, maybe it's time to say "Farewell old friend - it
was great knowing you!" to 0.31 and move onto 0.33.

The only problem (besides me finding 0.33 completely alien compared to
the simplicity of 0.31) is that there are no guides for the newer
version. In fact, I've searched for guides/tutorials for the current
version, and was presented with old guides for 0.31 and earlier
(besides a screenshot of the General tab in 0.33 which is on a few
sites).

Now, after a previous Ubuntu upgrade, I suddenly found myself with
todisc GUI instead of tovid GUI, then found out about the name change,
so really (REALLY) did try to give it a go, but even those simple
things after adding videos - aspect ratio, encoder and quality - I
just couldn't seem to locate.

So is there ANYWHERE I can find info on how to make the transition,
even for those basic encoding needs I have? Quite simply that is all I
want to do - open videos, choose the aspect ratio, pick FFMPEG (coz of
the smaller file sizes), and have a choice in Quality. Many thanks in
advance.

[grepper]

On May 11, 4:32 am, OzzyFrank <ubu...@ozzyfrank.com> wrote:
> Hi. I have done everything to keep from upgrading to 0.33, as I've
> used tovid GUI for years, and never used todisc GUI (now known as

<--snip-->

> So is there ANYWHERE I can find info on how to make the transition,
> even for those basic encoding needs I have? Quite simply that is all I
> want to do - open videos, choose the aspect ratio, pick FFMPEG (coz of
> the smaller file sizes), and have a choice in Quality. Many thanks in
> advance.

Hi,
tovid 0.33 is pretty old - but if Ubuntu has ensured it is matched
with the correct ffmpeg version I guess it would work okay. Current
SVN tovid tries to keep up to the fast changing backends, especially
ffmpeg which regularly breaks backwards compatibility for scripts.
There is no howto for the GUI published yet, perhaps someone will take
it on the the future.

The GUI is more simple than it looks - the thing to remember is that
most options are set at sane defaults, so you don't really need to to
concern yourself with very many of them. The only 'requirements' for
making a DVD are on the opening tab:
1. to load video file(s) using the 'Add' button
2. to choose an output name using the 'Output name' entry box at the
bottom, or its 'Browse' button.
3. If you need to change the default 'TV System' (ntsc/pal) do that as
well.

That's it for requirements - this will encode your video(s) and create
a 20 second animated menu, then create a dvd filesystem ready for
burning.

You probably want to change the default 'Menu title' at the bottom to
the title you want to appear, else you will get 'My video collection'
at the bottom of your menu, and edit the default title(s) that appear
under 'Video titles' (these will appear on the menu as navigation
links for the each video. Other non-required settings are self-
explanatory: the 'Audio background' section for menu bg audio, the
'Video or image background' for the menu bg picture or video ... and
so on.

Moving on, I realize you wanted to use ffmpeg so you need to go to the
'Encoding' tab at the top. On the first window ('Basic options') you
can change the quality under the 'Output file size' section. The
default is 6 which is not bad, but use 8 or so if you are not tight
for space on the DVD. All other options can remain at defaults. Then
go to the 'Video' tab and select 'Encode using ffmpeg'.

That is pretty much it for a first run and test case. Pressing 'Run
todisc now' will get things started and take you to the 'Log' tab
where there is an input box for typing 'yes' if you are happy with the
preview, etc.

Let me know what else you want to see on the menu. For example you
might want to only have text in which case you would go to the 'Main
menu' tab and select 'Textmenu'. Fonts for the menu title and video
titles are under the 'Main menu' tab.

all the best,
grepper