Burn 360

Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Design Principles
  3. Requirements (Short)
  4. Requirements (Long)
  5. Why I have done it
  6. Issues
  7. Use
  8. Testing DVDS
  9. DVD Catalogue

Introduction

It is a GUI to ffmpeg and standard VCD/DVD tools(VCDimager,dvd+rw-tools,dvdauthor,vobcopy) using perl-gtk2, with a few of my own ideas about layout and structure (and using information gained by using these tools).

I have designed it to do three things

All three are separate actions and can be done individually.

It should run on any version of Linux, probably any of the *BSDs and maybe windows (if backends are available).

Apart from a couple of image files and this file the programme itself is totally self-contained in one file.

Design Principles

I have designed it to be simple and intuitive to use, while still being flexible and extensible. The Component parts are

After installation there should be no need to use the shell for anything to do with the program. However 95% of user feedback that would be provided by the shell is echoed to the user within the GUI (so any problems with video files and media are obvious and functions not imlemented by the shell can be used)

In addition the actual command used is printed underneath (highlighted in yellow), so it can be copied to terminal

Requirements (short)

Long (may vary but should be close enough)

Install

To install either install provided RPM (FC13 but should install fine on any RPM system), or open a terminal window,untar burn360.tar.bz2, cd in directory and run ./upgrade.pl

Why Have I done it


Originally after loads of googling I could not find any GUI encoding or ripping app for Linux. This came to light while attempting to convert someone to Linux.

I have now extended the program to include Video and Screen capture and DVD capture and authoring with nice single level menus

I have followed the vlc philosphy when adding functionality ie: all functionality has to be around the core role of the application, in this case, getting and saving media files in various formats, hence the name.

Issues

The script uses vcdxrip from the VCDimager suite to rip VCD's. At least on Fedora these will not work as a normal user so need to be set suid (the setup script does this - so if you are not happy with do

chmod -s /usr/bin/vcdimager and chmod -s /usr/bin/vcdimager.
However the ripping of VCD's will not work.

Use

General

Each module prints out the information from the shell in a scrolling window per operation. There are two modes, a trailing window and a two part window. This has a static log with the last line of output printed below it.
The mode can be selected via a lookup button on the sidebar.

Each Module is selected from the File menu (and can be run in the same window).

Each module allows you (and encourages this) to select a directory to save all files into.

The main window is scrollable vertically if the contents are too large.

The Window title changes to reflect operation being performed. In the case of Encoding the filenames will be shown up to limit of the window width

Capturing Files

  1. Capturing Videos from VCD,DVD or external device
  2. click "Select Capture Type from "Capture Video from External List Box
  • VCD's and DVD's
    1. Choose save directory.
    2. Select drive where VCD or DVD is
    3. For VCD's only, if you only want one track, select track number
    4. DVD's uses vobcopy to get original vob files (using dvdunathor, part of the dvdauthor package)
    5. For VCD's and Vob files a sub directory with the name of the DVD selected will be created and files will be ripped there
    6. Click "Capture" button
  • Capture from TV Card
    1. Select Capture Device from drop-down list
    2. Then select input source followed by values for video size, audio sampling (for a/v issues) can be selected.
    3. All other opts from TV card can be amended in the last column shown
    4. Amend file name to capture to
    5. Click "Capture" button
  • Record Screen
    1. Select either "Full-screen" or the appropriate window from drop-down menu. The default is full-screen
    2. Select Capture Quality from drop-down list
    3. Select appropriate options such as frame-rate in GUI
    4. Enter file name to capture to
    5. Click "Capture" button
    6. For optical disks and Screen capture there is a refresh button which will update selection

    Encoding Files

    1. Choose files to be transcoded (this uses gtk file chooser and lists files vertically in the main window underneath action buttons), Drag and drop from Nautilus is now supported
    2. Select Save directory
    3. Select type of encoding wished from the drop-down list (self-explanatory).
    4. Choose additional options for start time, length, track number for audio/video (only for files with multiple a/v tracks such as on Commercial videos or DVB Transport Streams), quality adjustment (this is to downgrade quality level on poor quality captures mainly to prevent unneccesary large files with no improvement in quality)
    5. You can now adjust the a/v sync by choosiing how much you want to adjust it. For example if audio comes in 10 seconds too early choose -10 seconds, (you will need to check this manually)
    6. When Encoding Audio files a slightly different field list appears with the Ogg/Mp3 tags in the original file. These can be amended to update created file (and of course to create tags when none exist)
    7. click encode
    8. The entry for "Fix DVB" is special and when it is first run looks for a file called "ProjectX.jar" in the /usr hierarchy and updates opts. This can be overidden by typing the fullname (inc path where ProjectX is

    There is a facility to cancel each operation

    Burning DVD's

    1. DVD's
    2. VCD writing is replaced by the option to create miniDVDs on CD media
    3. When the sub-window shows process is complete, choose CD or DVD writer device and click "burn DVD" for DVD's . Again the output shows up in sub-window.
    4. It now checks for CD media and alters speed lookup and burning operation if one is found. This can be forced by clicking "Create Image for CD" checkbox
  • A scrolled window will appear in the main window for each operation and will indicate when process is complete

    • DVD Previewer

    This is a simple program for previewing DVD file Systems before burning to disk. It uses either VLC or mplayer (selectable if on system), preferbly vlc. Mplayer is of limited use as support for menus is limited.

    Usage

    Open application - dir_dvd_play.pl.
    A list of root directiries appears at the the top of the window.
    To add, click "Add Search Directory" button. The program will then search for all sub-directories called VIDEO_TS, ie: a DVD file system, and add to the drop-down list.
    Select appropriate one from list and click "view DVD"

    DVD Catalogue

    This is a cataloging program using SQLite as a backend.It includes

  • DVD description
  • Details including DVD, Video Name, Category
  • Filtering on Video Name, DVD and Category, with multiple criteria split on :.
  • User defined Categories
  • Import of DVD details based on dvd.xml file created by Burn 360

    • Usage

    Open application - dvd_cat.pl

    Where appropriate multiple files can be selected (neccesary for creating VCD's or DVD's).

    Further Info

    The presets that I use may not be perfect, but work very well for me. for example I get 12-13 hours of acceptable (for me) quality video on a DVD. These are normally captured using the presets I use.

    All files go into the global save directory except files modified with ProjectX and temporary files for DVD creation which go into sub-directories, tmp and dvd_tmp respectively

    I use the following other programs

    vlc - for playing videos avidemux2 - for editing videos

    Bugs

    With this release I hope I have eliminated all bugs (famous last words)

    Thats it.

    Copyrighted under GPL Mike Martin


    mike@redtux.org.uk
    www.sourceforge.net/burn360