1.1. DVD Storage Issues and Formats
One issue you should be concerned about is how much
content will fit on the DVD. Windows DVD Maker works with standard
recordable DVDs, so the storage capacities are based on the media you
use. With a standard single-layer recordable DVD, you can have up to 60 minutes of high data rate (that is, DVD movie quality) video. With a standard dual-layer recordable DVD, you can store up to 120 minutes of high data rate video. With lower quality video, you can often fit more.
NOTE
Another issue, of course, is that there are
several recordable DVD types out there. To create a DVD movie that will
work in virtually any DVD player in the world, use write-once DVD-R or
DVD+R media. Both work well, though DVD+R seems to have won the format
wars and is more common, while DVD-R offers better compatibility with
older DVD players if that's an issue.
Avoid rewriteable DVD formats, such as DVD+RW or
DVD-RW, because they won't work with most standalone DVD players
(though they're fine for testing and PC-based use). If you see the
acronym DL used, that describes dual-layer, a technology that doubles
the capacity of a recordable DVD's storage space. Note that you might
also be confined by the capabilities of your DVD writer. If your
hardware is only compatible with, say, DVD+R, then obviously you will
need to use DVD+R recordable disks; but if you have a multiformat DVD
writer, it's your choice; you can use four different recordable DVD
formats: DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD-R, and DVD-RW. Confused? Welcome to the
club.
1.2. Arranging Content
When you've added two or more items to your Windows
DVD Maker project, you can start thinking about the order in which they
will appear on the final DVD movie. While DVD Maker doesn't offer a
huge selection of DVD menu layout options, it does let you reorder
items. You'll notice that the list of videos and photo slide shows in
the wizard has an explicit order, as noted by the Order column heading,
which assigns each item a number, starting from 1.
You can easily reorder items in the following ways:
Drag and drop:
Using the skills you've no doubt honed over the years in Windows,
simply grab an item in the list and drag it to the position in the
order you'd like it to appear.
Move up and Move down buttons:
In the Windows DVD Maker toolbar, there are two arrow-shaped buttons,
Move up and Move down, that enable you to reorder the selected item as
indicated. This is shown in Figure 5.
Right-click method: You can also right-click any item and choose Move Up or Move Down from the resulting pop-up menu.
NOTE
You can also move multiple items up or down in
the order. To do so, first multi-select items by clicking them, in
turn, with the Ctrl key held down. Then, right-click and choose either
Move Items Up or Move Items Down.
1.3. Previewing Content
If you'd like to play a video or preview a photo
that's in your DVD Maker project, simply double-click that item. Videos
play back in Windows Media Player by default, while photos are
previewed in either Windows Photo Viewer or Windows Live Photo Gallery,
depending on which you've configured as the default picture viewer.
(
NOTE
Note that you cannot "play" the Slide
show folder as an animated slide show. You can only open the folder and
view the files inside, one at a time.
2. Naming Your DVD Movie
Under the content list of this initial window,
you'll see a small and easily missed text box called DVD title. (This
was called Disc title in Windows Vista.) By default, it's set to the
current date in M/D/YEAR format, where M is a one- or two-number
representation of the month (1), D is a one- or two-number
representation of the day (30), and YEAR is a four-number
representation of the year (2007).
You will want to change this title to something
descriptive, because it will be used on the DVD's menu as the title of
the DVD movie. A home movie DVD, for example, might be called Our 2009 Summer Vacation or similar.
NOTE
You can pick whatever title you want, but only 32 characters are allowed.
