2ManDVD

2ManDVD is a very nice DVD menu creator for linux. There are other DVD menu creators for linux, for example qDVDauthor, however 2ManDVD is by far and away the easiest to use, and is a very good looking app to boot. Unfortunately for English speakers, the website for 2ManDVD is in French, so there’s not a lot to go on in terms of documentation, or information about the application.

Installation

Generally this application is well supported in the main distributions’ repositories. I know both ubuntu and openSuse have packages available. There are some packages on the 2ManDVD website, but these are for distributions that are now a generation old. Obviously you can always install from source. Download the tarball from here. The compile instructions are on that page. Please bear in mind that you need a number of applications installed which 2ManDVD relies on. Also a trick for the unwary is that the openSuse version of mjpegtools (which 2ManDVD requires) is missing the mpeg2enc binary. You need mjpegtools from the packman repository to fix this.

Features

2ManDVD has a number of great features, that allow you to create basic DVD menus, including:

  • PAL/NTSC 4:3/16:9 menus
  • Transcode video files to be DVD compatible
  • Menu templates for quick creation
  • Button clipart
  • Editing tools for editing buttons and layout
  • “Coverflow” interface for choosing video thumnails
  • Chapter creation
  • Animated menus
  • Introductory menus
  • Submenus
  • Render to ISO image
  • Variable render quality for transcoded videos

Usage

2ManDVD has one of those interfaces that is very intuitive, and doesn’t need much explanation. There are a few buttons at the top of the main window, some tools in a toolbar to the left of the screen, and a pop out list for templates, masks and buttons. The included templates give you a wide range of layouts and backgrounds to choose from, and provide you with a quick way to get a DVD menu up and running fast.

Simply add your video files using the “Medias” button at the top left. As you are adding media, you can choose the video thumbnail that will represent each video. You can also add chapters to the video. Once you’ve got your media imported, simply click on a button in the menu, and add the video as a button action. You can edit the button, by changing its size and shape. Once you’ve added the videos to the necessary buttons, simply create the DVD from the “Generation” menu. Hey presto, you’ve got a DVD. You can then create an ISO image, or create an ISO image direct from the “Generation” menu.