Solved DVD Menu not returning after playing a clip

Its some time since I last used DVD Architect Pro 6.0 Most of my clients want their movies on USB sticks these days. Anyhow, I have a project here that has 10 movie clips. When I created the menu. I previewed it in DVA and it appeared to work fine. As I played clip 1 I could click on Menu and play clip 10 or any of the other clips if wanted.
After burning the DVD, I found as I loaded the DVD disk the menu with all the clips came up on screen and I could choose which clip to play first. From here on I could not play any other clip because the menu no longer wanted to come up. The only way around this was to eject the disk from the DVD drive and start again from scratch.

Why did this not happen when previewing the menu workers within DVD Architect? I have attached the DAR file so someone can have a look at this....

Hi Hans

I think the problem is being caused by the Set Disc Start function, which is symbolised by a purple star.
When I opened your project file, you had the Scene Selection Menu marked as first object to appear when DVD starts playing, instead of the Main Menu.
Press on top of Menu (Page 1) and then press *purple star next to the + button.

Ignore broken links in this screen shot - this is simply because I don't have your video to test with and had to insert a test video instead!


A secondary thing to mention, just as a general comment.
I learnt how to use DVDA through webinars on Sony Creative Software, many years ago now.
Gary Rebholz taught a superior method for importing video files, which ends up giving you more complex menu options in the top right corner control boxes. So when you import your video, right-click on top of Untitled and select Insert Media.

The next step would be to insert your Scene Selection Menu.
Then finally, drag the original video onto Menu page 1 and also the top Scene Selection Menu link.
This will then auto generate the correct links for you and look something like this:



Regards
Derek

Hi Derek, Thanks for all the info! I will do a test using your suggestions later on today. I would have done that earlier, but my Network Adaptor threw a hissy fit so I could not get on Internet. Talk about bad things all happening at the same time! I will let you know later how I get on.

Cheers and thanks,
Hans.

Unfortunately I am not having much luck! Must be old-age creeping in.

I have tried your suggestion to use a different workflow:

(a) I right-clicked on top of untitled and Inserted the media files
(b) I right - clicked the media file to insert the Scene Selection Menu
Thats as far as I got!
I just cannot follow the following instruction:
"Then finally drag the original video onto Menu page 1 and also the top Scene Selection Menu link."

The auto generation to get the correct links did not happen

Do this:
Hint: Make sure to double-click Menu 1 page 1, before you attempt to drag any items onto the Main Menu screen.



Creates this:

I am having a bad time here with DVD Architect! I need to have this up and running within the next week as I have an order for 29 movies that have to go onto a DVD.
Yes, I double clicked Menu 1 page1 . (I presume you mean left clicked). Nothing appeared to happen. I tried dragging Media and Scene selection to the Main screen. The programme allowed me to drag the media to the main screen, but not Scene selection. I got a message "this is not allowed"

Come to think of it, there is no list of links in the left frame. Obviously I missing some major items! A few hints is not helping the situation at all, because somewhere I am missing the boat completely!

I am giving up today as we are going out - I will have another look tomorrow.......

I will go back to the basics for you.

I presume you mean left clicked

Yes I mean Left-Click which is the default mouse click for selecting anything.
Double-clicking left mouse button on Menu 1 Page1 in the tree menu of extreme left side.
This makes sure that the Main Menu screen you are seeing (big blue area in middle of screen) is the first menu and not a sub-menu.

Step 1
Start new project and select File/New
Make sure to select a template that matches perfectly the video and audio you are using.

Step 2
Right-click Untitled and select Insert Media - find and select your prepared video.

Step 3
I assumed you already new this step, since you had already created a scene selection menu in the file you sent me.
Right-click video file in disc tree menu and select Insert Scene Selection Menu
Your project file showed 10x Chapters, so make sure to set 10 links per page.
Scene Selection links will now be generated.

Step 4
Make sure you are on the Main Menu by double-clicking Main Menu in disc tree.
Now that you are safely on the Main Menu, drag the Video first and then Scene Selection Page 1 onto the Main Menu screen.
All links needed will be auto-generated for you.
That's it!

You must be about as frustrated as I am!

I followed yesterdays' post with its 4 Steps. This time all the Steps worked and I got exactly what you described. It all looked good and also worked fine in the Preview window.

So I burned a DVD (luckily I bought Re-Writable disks) and commenced the Burning process. There were no warning messages (such as Links overlap) so I thought this all looks promising! Helas not so!!!
The main menu did not come up at all. Something did come up on the screen. Looks very similar to an example you sent "Creates this"
On the screen I got Menu 1 in big white letters, the clip 00013 and a light blue box with Scene Selection on it.

Now you might say: Don't think that Hans doesn't know what he is doing. I had been making DVD's for several years with DVDA without a problem with Windows 7. A year or two ago DVD customers went to a trickle and stopped. NZ started using USB sticks and portable HD. In the meantime a few months ago I switched to Windows 10. I thought last night maybe its a compatibility problem and I tried using Win 10 in Win 7 compatibility mode.
The result :NO difference.
There seems to be something wrong, maybe the Disc Start function is in the wrong position. At the moment I can see the Main Menu screen in Preview, but not on the burned DVD disk. I have enclosed a new screen shot so maybe you can see what's wrong with the workflow settings. If you would find it useful, I could send the 10 short movies (about 6 GB) to you.

Just send me another copy of your .dar DVDA project file.
I can load it up with my own videos and burn a test disc and then report back.

The project you have created is about as simple as you can make, so I don't understand what the problem is.
There must be a setting wrong in DVDA somewhere?

It could also be a problem with your DVD Player.
Please note that most DVD players will remember the last place/menu the video was playing at.
When you put the same DVD back in the machine, it will go directly to the last spot.
Pressing the STOP button twice, will normally reset the current DVD playing and remove "last position" from the internal memory.
*Pressing STOP only once, does not reset last played position.
Then if you eject and then re-insert the DVD, it will play from the actual beginning.

It may also be a good idea to reset DVDA, to delete the cache.
Reset instructions are the same as for Vegas and are shown here:
www.moviestudiozen.com/doctor-zen-faq/573-how-to-reset-sony-software-to-default-settings

The first thing I did on receiving this afternoon's email, was to reset DVDA to delete the cache. This went without a problem. Sure looked we were back to original settings. eg. the program suggested 6 links instead of 10.

Just for the hell of it I thought lets make another DVD now that we have done a reset. Sad to say nothing was different. When I loaded the DVD disk into the player the same thing came up on my monitor : Menu 1 in big white letters, an icon with the first clip, and a sentence with white lettering "scene selection" No main menu of course.

I thought what the hell! What will happen if I click on "scene selection"? Guess what suddenly I got the menu!
I think we are close to a solution. I will now attach the dar file for you to test. Good Luck!