DeVeDe, a video DVD creator

Current version: 2.10

Before sending a bug, please read the FAQ. (thanks).

What is it?

DeVeDe is a program that allows you to create a video DVD from an MPEG, AVI, MOV... video file, suitable for home DVD players. DeVeDe uses Mplayer, Mencoder, DVDAuthor and VCDimager, so you can use any video playable with Mplayer.

DISCLAIMER

This software is distributed as is, under the GPL license (v2 or later), and without warranty of any kind. Use it at your own risk. Press here to read the GPLv2 license.

Installing DeVeDe

To install DeVeDe, first you must ensure you have Mplayer, Mencoder, DVDAuthor and VCDimager in your system. You need Python 2.4, PyGTK and PyGlade too. Then, just run the install.sh script as root. It will copy all the files at the right place. It should even create an entry in your Gnome/KDE/freedesktop-compatible-windowmanager menu.

Description of the interface

When you launch DeVeDe, it will show you this window, asking what kind of disk you want to create. You can choose between:

Of course you aren't limited to theses options, since you can choose, if you want, another resolution for your CD/DVD. This allows you to create Super VideoCDs with a resolution of 352x240 (or 352x288 for PAL), which is a very good compromise if you want to store a lot of video in a single CD. I don't recomend to use other resolutions with VideoCDs, because CBR MPEG-1 is very limited. Choose the Super VideoCD or CVD option (which uses VBR MPEG-2) and use there the resolution you want.

After choosing the kind of disk you want, you will see the main interface:

A DVD is divided in Titles and Chapters. Each title is a film on its own, and, when played, you have to choose the one you want to see. Into each title you can add as many files you want, and cut them in chapters to allow an easy search.

In VideoCDs, Super VideoCDs and CVDs there's no title concept, so that frame won't be visible when you choose to create one of them.

In the screenshot, we see that there are two titles, and at title two we have two files. The files in a title will be played one after another, so they will be treated as a single film. So if you only want to create a DVD with one single film from multiple files, you have to put all of them in a single title. Your player will merge all in a single film.

The File info box contains all the information about the selected file: desired audio an video rate, original size, FPS and length in seconds. It has the estimated size in Mbytes, but have in mind that is an estimation, so the final size can be lower.

The Disk usage shows the percentage of the DVD currently used. You can occupy more than the 100% because it's based in an estimation, so the final size can (and probably will) be lower than the espected, but never higher. You can choose the CD/DVD size too. Have in mind another thing: a 700MB CD can contain 80 minutes of compressed audio/video, which, at 1152 kbps are about 800MB. This means that, when the media is a CD, you MUST use the bar to know how many disc space you are using, and no the estimated size of the files, because you can put up to 800MB of compressed video in a 700MB CD, or about 720MB in a 650MB CD.

Now, the Action block allows you to choose what do you want to create. The first option,Only convert film files to compliant MPEG files takes each file and converts it to a DVD-compliant MPEG-PS file, or to VCD, SVCD or CVD-compliant MPEG-PS. You can choose a generic name, being the default name "movie", so the files will have names like movie_XX_YY.mpg, being XX the title, and YY the file position into the title. An example: if you have two titles, and two files in the first title and three files at the second title, you will get five files: movie_01_01.mpg, movie_01_02.mpg, movie_02_01.mpg, movie_02_02.mpg and movie_02_03.mpg. This option is specially usefull when you want to create DVD menus with other program like DVD Styler, Q DVD Author or PoliDori. Of course, with VCD, SVCD or CVD, the title number will be always "01".

The second option, Create disk structure, is visible only when you create a DVD. It creates the MPEG files and then uses DVDAuthor to create the DVD tree structure. After that, it erases the MPEG files. You can use this option to create the folder and files for a DVD and use your own DVD recording program to create the ISO image and burn it into a DVD.

The third option, (second if you are creating a VCD, SVCD or CVD), Create an ISO or BIN/CUE image, ready to burn to a disk, converts the files to MPEG, creates the DVD tree if needed and, using MKISOFS, creates the ISO file, erasing then the MPEG and DVD tree to free disk space. With CD media, it converts the files to MPEG and uses VCDImager to create a BIN/CUE image, ready to be burned to a CD. Use this option to create a disk image ready to be burned to a CD/DVD with a program like GnomeBaker or K3b.

Finally, the option Erase temporary files allows to choose if you want DeVeDe to erase the temporary files as soon as they are needed no more. Selecting it, DeVeDe will need only about twice the final disk space, but if you don't mark it, you will need about three times the final disk space, but you will have all the temporary files.

To add a new file you have two options: first, you can drag and drop one or more files into the main window, so DeVeDe will give them some fine default values; or you can choose the "Add" button, so you will see this window:

First you choose the file you want to add (you can do it by drag and drop in this window too). After doing it, you can see its properties at the File info block. You can then choose the new audio an video rate, unless you are creating a VCD (theses have a fixed data rate). Remember that bigger rates will give you more quality, but bigger file size too.

By default, if the video will be reescaled to a width of 720 pixels, DeVeDe will put 5001Mbps; but if the final width is 352, DeVeDe will put 2001Mbps by default if final height is 288 (PAL) or 240 (NTSC), or 3001Mbps if final height is 576 (PAL) or 480 (NTSC). Of course you can change this value to the one you want in order to have more quality or more playing time.

Then, you can choose if you want to put the whole file, or only the first or the second half. This is specially usefull when creating VCDs: you can cut a long film in two disks if it's too long to fit in a single disk. But if the length of the film is less than 60 seconds, you won't be able to choose them.

Remember that this option is applied to each file, so if you put two files in a xCD and choose in both the first half, you will have a xCD with the first half of the first file followed by the first half of the second file.

Finally, you can choose if you want to create a PAL/SECAM or a NTSC DVD. DeVeDe will remember the last option you used, even between sessions, so you can choose it once and forget it.

Maybe you ask why I put this option here and not in the main window. The answer is: because this way you can create hybrid DVDs, with some films in PAL/SECAM format and others in NTSC. What is the utility of this? Simply: modern TV sets and DVD players can play both formats, so if you manually choose the one that fits better the original framerate of the file, you will have an smoother video. This is: if the original file has 24 or 25 fps, select PAL, and if it has 30 fps, select NTSC. Of course you can force one of them and DeVeDe will adjust the framerate to 25 or 30 fps, ensuring that the DVD will have the rigth framerate and will play fine in all TV sets, but maybe the motion is not as smooth as it could be.

There's a Preview button that converts some seconds (you can choose how many), allowing you to check the audio/video quality and the audio sync. It will create the temporary file by default at /var/tmp, but you can choose other place if you preffer.

Is possible that the preview doesn't play smoothly. This is because the program has a reduced priority. Don't worry about that, just keep your attention in the picture/sound quality and in the audio sync.

Finally there's an expansor named Advanced options. If you expand it, you will see that there are four tabs with new options, not needed normally but which can give much more control to advanced users:

In the Video options tab you have:

  • Use 16:9 aspect ratio for output: if this option is marked, the video will be adjusted to an aspect ratio of 16:9 instead the classic 4:3. If you have a television with widescreen, this option will allow you to enjoy more your videos thanks to the extra vertical resolution. This option is marked automatically when the source file has an aspect ratio of 1.777777 or bigger, but you can change it in the case you want pure 4:3 output or if DeVeDe fails to detect a widescreen video.
  • Have in mind that the DVD standard only allows to create a 16:9 DVD with a width of 720 pixels, so if you activate this option, DeVeDe will ensure that the final width will be 720. For the same reason, if you choose a different width, the 16:9 option will be deactivated.
  • You can create 16:9 DVDs, but not 16:9 VCDs, SVCDs or CVDs.

    • In the Quality options tab you have:

    The Audio delay box is used to adjust the audio/video sync, allowing to fix videos with audio out of sync. You can set positive or negative values.

    In the Subtitles tab you can choose a file with external subtitles, which will be added to the current video. These subtitles will be stored as true DVD subtitles, so you will be able to activate or remove them while playing.

    Have in mind that if you preview a video from DeVeDe with subtitles, they will be shown in order to allow you to ensure that the sincronization is fine.

    If you want to remove the file, just use the Clear button.

    In the Misc tab you have:

    After adding all the files you want, you will be prompted for a directory where DeVeDe will create all the files, and a generic name for them. The directory must have sufficient free space to hold all the temporary files (aprox. the double of the final CD/DVD size). The generic name will be used to name all the temporary files, so the MPEG files will be named as GENERICNAME_XX_YY.MPG, the DVD tree directory will be named GENERICNAME, the ISO image will be named GENERICNAME.ISO, and the BIN/CUE files will be GENERICNAME.BIN and GENERICNAME.CUE. You can't use blank spaces for this name (if you put them, will be changed to underscores).

    Finally, the program will start to create the files. Remember that this is a very slow process, and can need more than two hours to be completed.

    Installing DeVeDe in your Home

    DeVeDe 1.1 and later can be installed in other directories, like your own home directory. This allows to use DeVeDe in machines where you don't have root access. To do so, just copy the files:

    into a folder, and run devede.py from that directory ("barras.png" and "estira.png" are in the "pixmaps" directory).

    History of versions

    Version 2.10

    Version 2.9

    Version 2.8

    Version 2.7

    Version 2.6

    Version 2.5

    Version 2.4A

    Version 2.4

    Version 2.3

    Version 2.2

    Version 2.1

    Version 2.0

    Version 1.6

    Version 1.5

    Version 1.4

    Version 1.3

    Version 1.2

    Version 1.1

    Version 1.02b

    Version 1.02

    Version 1.01

    Version 1.0

    Contacting the authors

    This program has been created by Sergio Costas (Raster Software Vigo).
    http://www.rastersoft.com
    e-mail: raster@rastersoft.com

    Windows port done by Peter Gill.
    e-mail: peter.m.gill@gmail.com