New tool: Reauthorist (previously DoItFaster4me)

Well, for my very first post to these forums, I would like to tell you about a new tool that I am writing that designed to be used in conjunction with doItFast4U. I must apologise for the name, doItFaster4Me, but then immitation is the sincerest form of flattery. :) It is designed to take out some of the manual processes involved in producing CCE and Scenarist projects, which I find a pain! So I hope some people other than myself will find it useful. Anyway on to the features:[list=1][*] Automatically creates a CCE ECL file for a VTS including chapter stops.[*] Automatically creates a Scenarist script, including creating tracks and scenes.[*] Removes the need to use ChapterXtractor and ScenChap.[/list=1] To use it:[list=1][*] Run DoItFast4U on your VTS.[*] Once this has finished, open up doItFaster4Me.[*] Point it at your rip directory where DoItFast4U output its files.[*] Choose your VTS and PGCs.[*] Select the number of passes for CCE.[*] Select the directory where Scenarist will create the DVD files.[*] Click Go.[*] In a few seconds the process will finish and two new files will be produced: VTS__nn.ECL VTS__nn.SCP [*] Open the ECL in CCE and adjust the bitrate (an automatic bitrate feature is imminent).[*] Let CCE do its thing.[*] When this is finished, import the Scenarist script - this may or may not be quick depending on whether it wants to check your MPVs. This will depend on how well I've worked out the MPV durations, but remember this is only the first alpha version![*] Add the audio tracks and import your subpicture streams.[*] Create your PGCs and add the tracks.[*] Author your DVD![/list=1] At the moment, this is a version 0.1 alpha and has only been tested on my machine and on two or three projects, but it has worked well so far. I would appreciate any feedback. See the to do list below for limitations... NTSC is not yet supported - sorry guys! Download it from: Good luck! To do list/limitations:[list=1][*] At the moment the tool will only do PAL projects but NTSC will be incorporated once I've got some more time.[*] The tool assumes the project is 16:9, but this should be simple to add soon.[*] Audio tracks are not yet added automatically - this is nearly there.[*] Subpicture streams are not yet added automatically, but this should be possible soon.[*] I built the tool with CCE 2.50 in mind - I expect some tweaking of the ECL will be required for later versions.[*] Automatic bitrate calculation and incorporation into the CCE script - I am collecting metrics and my current tests are producing very good results. Coming soon.[*] Advanced CCE options.[*] Does not support multiple angles[*] Does not support rips by v/c id.[*] Some more things that I can't remember![/list=1]

Actually, you might be able to use some of it with an NTSC project as it is now, but the files it creates will require some tweaking. It any rate, it will save you some time setting up CCE since it will add all your AVS files and include chapter positions automatically. Then all you need to do is change the settings that are appropriate for NTSC and set your desired bitrate. The Scenarist script might also be able to be used even though the video assets will be marked with an incorrect duration. When Scenarist imports a script it will check the duration of the video in the script against the duration in the actual file. If they're different then it will show a warning but carry on and adjust the settings itself. It might be worth giving it a try... if someone could try this and let me know if it works I'd be very grateful. Once that is done, all that is needed is the importing of Audio and Subtitles, which is quite easy compared with the other steps. Your mate's tool sounds very similar to what doItFaster4Me does, except it probably calls CCE by a CLI. It might be useful to know the CLI commands for it - do you know where I can find them? BTW, part of what I'm thinking of doing for the bitrate calculation is for the tool to process all VTS sets at once. Therefore, if extras have been re-encoded then these will be given a bitrate in proportion to their size in comparison with the others. This will then be adjustable by the user.

Nah, i really doubt your tool is going to work with NTSC at this point. You're going to have to grasp a firm knowledge of "drop frame" before you can attempt to get chapters correct for NTSC. Even the earlier versions of Scenchap didn't do it correctly! Only the latest versions of CCE have CLI capability, and we don't use that. He operates CCE by opening it up in a thread and sending key commands to it. Very interesting operation. One very esteemed user I mentioned your program to said, "I don't want anything authoring my Scenarist for me." Many have echoed the same feelings in the past. Just letting you know. Most of us that really know what we're doing feel that there's never going to be a tool that can do what we do in Scenarist as well as we do it manually (especially vobid, etc). So yes, n00bs will love your tool. Anyone lazy will use it as well, if it works. But getting the die-hards convinced will take some work! Only when it can do what the elite scenarist users can do will their doubt be lifted. Want a real challenge? Get your program to correctly reauthor an infinifilm DVD ()!

He he he... well it sounds like I've got some tough nuts to crack eh? Well, I'll see if I can do myself some justice with my upcoming releases. :) I primarily built this tool for myself but I can definitely see it being useful to n00bs and experienced re-encoders alike. Even if it makes a script that just has all the assets, removing the need to go to and from ChapterXtractor and ScenChap, without doing any authoring I think it would save some people some time. Once it's ready for them, it would be good if experienced people could at least try it and let me have feedback as to why they wouldn't use it and what would make them want to use it. Maybe for now I should be posting about this in the basic authoring forum? ;) For now though, it's good to have feedback like this even if it is a little disheartening! Interesting about the Infinifilm DVDs... I don't have any of those in my collection. Perhaps I should have a whip-around to get some dosh to buy one!? Looking at their descriptions I can see why they might be more than a little complicated. (Incidentally, I don't think it would be the chapters positions that would be the problem for NTSC projects but rather the MPV durations passed to Scenarist. I might give it a whirl later to see what happens.)

Motivation indeed! Much appreciated. :) Now I'm bound by my promises to produce the goods. To give you an update on where I am, I've now worked out the AC3 audio stream header, the MPEG audio stream header and the subtitles (via SubRip). Hopefully I should get this into the code in the next week or so. Unfortunately, I'm having a little difficulty getting information about the DTS audio stream header - anyone know where I can get some documentation on this? Now I know the AC3 file structure I should be able to put in an option for choosing audio files and which ones to make as dummies, which it should do automatically. Once I have the audio and subtitles working, I'm then going to work on the Scenarist Scenario scripting. Then it's on to working on the vob/cell id demuxed projects. Once this is all working I will finally move on to NTSC. So there's my road map. BTW, an Infinifilm title is on its way!

Yet another tool 

aquabubble just a note to see if there had been any more development with doitfaster4me?

Thanks for the interest adamandhelen. Good news: you can expect to see a new version in the next couple of days. I'll post back here when it's ready. Many of the additional features I wanted to add will be available and it's looking good so far.

Source Code?