HomePage 2 of 5: Starting and setting up a new project
Step 2: Starting and setting up a new project
Start PowerProducer. You will be shown the following screen, click on "Produce movie disc" option.
You should now be presented with the "Select your disc" screen where you select what kind of disc you want to make. Click on the "DVD" button for step 1, select "DVD" for step 2, select the capacity of your disc in step 3 (4.7 GB or dual layer 8.5 GB disc) and then select whether you want to make a 16:9 (widescreen) or 4:3 (full-frame) DVD.
Press the "next" button 
to continue.
You will now be taken to the "Content" screen, where you can load in your input video, and access the DVD authoring options.
Before we load in our video files, we need to set up the project first. Press the "Preferences" button 
at the top of the screen.
For "Movie playback mode", select how playback will work on the disc (play title, and then return to the menu; play all titles and then return to the menu or not have a menu at all). The working directory is where the output DVD files will be placed (it is best to ensure this is a new empty folder). The temporary directory is where the temporary files will be stored.
For Menu settings, "Add a thumbnail index" will number each video title or chapter and display it on the menu. Enabling the "Enable video thumbnail" option will allow motion menus to show movie video for the selectable thumbnails, as opposed to just a still picture. You can then specify the length of the motion (taking into account that every second of motion will require more space on the disc to store the menu, which mean less space for the actual movie).
"Eject after erasing" will eject the re-writable disc after erasing. "Display TV safe zone" will show a dotted rectangle on the menu preview screen, showing what is the safe area to have your menu (some older TVs do overscan, which basically zooms in on the picture to prevent a black border from showing around it, and the safe area ensures your whole menu will be visible on these TVs).
Click on the "Video/Audio" tab to access more settings. Here, you can select the video quality and audio format to use, as well as the video system (PAL or NTSC). For video quality, selecting "HQ" will give you the best quality, but if you want to ensure everything fits exactly onto your blank media (at the best possible quality given the available space), you can select the "Smart Fit" option. For audio format, it is recommended that you select "Dolby Digital", as "PCM" (while ensuring maximum 2-channel quality) will take up too much space (650 MB for every 70 minute of audio), and MPEG audio is not that common. For "Location", select PAL or NTSC based on your input video (see Step 1).
Press the green tick button to save your preferences and return to the Content screen.
Now is probably a good time to save your compilation/project, by using the Save/Save as buttons at the top. Remember to save your compilation often.
