When DVD is played from a laptop PC

G

garymarullo

New member
I am new to this forum and looking for some advise. I have a DVX100B and a client has hired me to shoot some interviews. The finished DVD is to be played from a laptop doing a Power Point presentation. They want to have the disc in the laptop and play parts of interviews from it as they refer to it. I presume using Windows media to play it back. What would be the best format for me to shoot it? 24pa 16x9? Stick to 4:3 at 30fps? Does it matter? I will be editing in FCP and authoring with DVD SP. Any advice would be appreciated.
 
Probably doesn't matter if it's projected off a laptop. Any progressive format will be better than interlaced. Is DVD really the best way, or do they need some video clips that can be embedded into the PowerPoint preso?
 
Thanks for responding. I know others who have had numerous problems trying to get Powerpoint to play video from a linked file. It seems like less headaches to just pause the powerpoint presentation and switch to Windows Media Player and play an interview from the DVD in the laptop. Then pause the DVD, go back to powerpoint and continue back and forth like this. As long as they have the most recent Windows Media this work around should work. Unless of course you know of a way to make Powerpoint link to video work flawlessly. I have heard nothing but nightmares. And thanks again, I will go progressive.
 
Coming to this late, I know, but my experience in working with laptops and projectors for better than eleven years now is that probably more than half the times I've seen somebody try to play a DVD from a laptop through a projector, it doesn't work. I'm never sure if it's a copy protection thing, or just not enough horsepower in the laptop's video chipset, or what.

One thing I've found that can help using video embedded in a PowerPoint is to make the projector the "primary" monitor in Windows, rather than the built-in screen. This I think is a horsepower issue, sometimes the video chipset can't play it both places and so it limits itself to the primary. (In Windows XP, right click on the desktop, go to Properties, click the Settings tab, right-click on monitor 2, and select Primary. No idea in Vista, sorry. :) ) This can work sometimes for DVD, but not nearly as often for some reason.
 
Laptop Issues

Laptop Issues

Thanks for the tip. It's good to know. I will try that. I have always had issues playing video from a laptop and especially from within Powerpoint. The banquet venue where the DVD will be played is supplying a DVD player along side of a laptop for the power point. Two separate screens should insure no problems. What could go wrong?:violin:
 
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