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Chapter 3: Planning the project
Planning the DVD
About planning
The first task of authoring a DVD is planning. This planning can be as minimal as deciding to use a template to
organize your family's vacation photos and video, or as robust as using project management software to coordinate
a production team creating an interactive kiosk.
Whatever the scope of planning, you should understand what the project will contain and how you want to present
it. By the end of the planning stage, you should have a good understanding of the following parameters:
The navigation scheme
A well-produced DVD employs a hierarchy of navigation that gives the viewer clear and easy access to the content.
Think through your DVD project. After you decide which clips you want to include, you need to figure out how the
viewer will access those clips. Whether you use a spreadsheet or a pencil sketch, it is worth the time to draft your
navigation scheme before you start.
The intended playback environment
Is the DVD intended for television viewing? Will it play unattended in a kiosk? Is it for use in an educational setting
on computers? The playback environment affects your approach to navigation and the design of the menus as well
as the content. If the DVD will be used only on a computer (via the desktop), you can include content that a television
DVD player cannot access. For instance, you can include PDFs of exercises in an educational DVD to be used on the
computer.
Note: Some DVD players, notably set-top DVD players, may not read DVD content on CDs. Most DVD players will play
audio CDs.
Types and amount of content to be included
To make certain decisions—for instance, about disc size and video data rate—you need to know how much content
you have to fit on the disc. Small projects that include mostly audio may fit on a CD, whereas projects containing
feature-length movies and many supplemental materials may require a dual-layer or double-sided DVD.
See also
"About bit budgeting" on page 26
Planning with the Flowchart
The Flowchart feature provides a visual interface that helps you to plan and manage the creation of DVDs. Although
you can use the Flowchart at any time during the authoring process, it's especially useful during the initial stages of
the project, when you determine navigation and begin organizing assets.
Note: If you're new to authoring DVDs, it may be best to plan your first navigation scheme on paper and postpone using
the Flowchart until you are familiar with the different element types and their properties.
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