--- Forwarded Message from "Michael Bush" <[log in to unmask]> ---

>From: "Michael Bush" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: "Language Learning and Technology International Information Forum"    <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: First DVD Title
>Date: Thu, 17 Jun 1999 09:50:46 -0600
>In-reply-to: <[log in to unmask]>
>Importance: Normal

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I am pleased to report that I just returned from a trip to Spruce
Technologies in San Jose, CA, where we worked on the DVD title I have been
pursuing for over a year now (a re-purposing of the Italian classic film.
"C'eravamo tanto amati" to which BYU has purchased the rights). I was
graciously received and was impressed with DVDMaestro, Spruce's authoring
system that sells for something under $50,000 and includes MPEG 2 encoding,
Dolby encoding, a computer, and software that runs under Windows NT. Their
ability to easily import sub-titles was what got my attention in the first
place when I asked a question of authoring system panelists at the DVDPro
gathering last year in Santa Barbara regarding how the various systems
handled sub-title entry. This capability turned what had promised to be a
nightmare into a very pleasant experience. Indeed, one potential
collaborator on the project had suggested turning 3,594 sub-titles (1747
times 2) into TIFF or BMP files. Ouch!!

We placed 6 different sub-title tracks (full Italian, full English, Italian
and English main ideas that stay for a whole segment, and Italian and
English main ideas that stay on the screen for 5 seconds). We have research
planned into how these get used by students. In addition to being useful in
a standalone mode on a regular DVD player, we are devising bar code access
and computer-based software interactions.

With respect to sub-titles the biggest problem turned out to be with the
data files I took with me to Spruce. Despite having been gone over and over
by several people, there were errors there like phrases with a run time of
less than 9 frames (It is hard to do anything in less than a third of a
second!  *grin*) and subsequent sub-titles that began before the previous
one ended (something that is not in the DVD spec!  *grin*). I have already
done some tools in Excel to do some checking for this sort of problem, so
this was a beneficial experience in many ways.

I cannot compare this with other systems out there since I have not used
them, but I was extremely impressed with what Spruce has done. It is tools
like this that will help make DVD the success I think most of us believe it
will be. The next step is to develop a direct interconnection between an
"offline" tool like Pioneer's DVDesigner and the DVD authoring tools,
something I hope all of the companies will follow through with. There will
be improvements on both sides along the way, but that is what will make DVD
a reality!

Cheers,

Mike
Michael Bush
Associate Professor of French and
Instructional Psychology and Technology
http://moliere.byu.edu/digital/