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19 <title>DCP-o-matic</title>
20 <author><firstname>Carl</firstname><surname>Hetherington</surname></author>
23 <chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
24 <title>Introduction</title>
27 Hello, and welcome to DCP-o-matic!
31 <title>What is DCP-o-matic?</title>
34 DCP-o-matic is a program to generate <ulink
35 url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Cinema_Package">Digital
36 Cinema Packages</ulink> (DCPs) from DVDs, Blu-Rays, video files such as MP4
37 and AVI, or still images. The resulting DCPs will play on modern digital
42 You might find it useful to make DVDs easier to present, to encode
43 independently-shot feature films, or to generate local advertising for
50 <title>Licence</title>
53 DCP-o-matic is licensed under the <ulink url="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html">GNU GPL</ulink>.
59 <title>Acknowledgements</title>
62 This manual uses icons from the <ulink url="http://tango.freedesktop.org/">Tango Desktop Project</ulink>, with thanks.
68 <chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
69 <title>Installation</title>
72 <title>Windows</title>
75 To install DCP-o-matic on Windows, simply download the installer from
76 <ulink url="http://dcpomatic.com/">http://dcpomatic.com/</ulink>
77 and double-click it. Click through the installer wizard, and
78 DCP-o-matic will be installed onto your machine.
82 If you are using a 32-bit version of Windows, you will need the 32-bit
83 installer. For 64-bit Windows, either installer will work, but I
84 suggest you used the 64-bit version as it will allow DCP-o-matic to
85 use more memory. You may find that DCP-o-matic crashes if you run
86 many parallel encoding threads (more than 4) on the 32-bit
93 <title>Mac OS X</title>
96 DCP-o-matic will run on Mac OS X version 10.6 (Snow Leopard) and
97 higher. To install it, download the <code>DMG</code> from <ulink
98 url="http://dcpomatic.com/">http://dcpomatic.com/</ulink> and double
99 click to open it. Then drag the DCP-o-matic icon to your
100 <guilabel>Applications</guilabel> folder or wherever else you would
107 <title>Ubuntu Linux</title>
110 You can install DCP-o-matic on Ubuntu 12.04 (‘Precise
111 Pangolin’), 12.10 (‘Quantal Quetzal’) or 13.04
112 (‘Raring Ringtail’) using <code>.deb</code> packages:
113 download the appropriate package from <ulink
114 url="http://dcpomatic.com/">http://dcpomatic.com/</ulink> and
115 double-click it. Ubuntu will install the necessary bits and pieces
116 and set DCP-o-matic up for you.
122 <title>Other Linux distributions</title>
125 Installation on non-Ubuntu Linux is currently a little involved, as
126 there are no packages available (yet); you will have to compile it
127 from source. If you are using a non-Ubuntu distribution, do let me
128 know via the <ulink url="mailto:dcpomatic@carlh.net">mailing
129 list</ulink> and I will see about building some packages.
133 The following dependencies are required:
135 <listitem><ulink url="http://ffmpeg.org/">FFmpeg</ulink></listitem>
136 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.mega-nerd.com/libsndfile/">libsndfile</ulink></listitem>
137 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.openssl.org/">OpenSSL</ulink></listitem>
138 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.openjpeg.org/">libopenjpeg</ulink></listitem>
139 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.imagemagick.org/script/index.php">ImageMagick</ulink></listitem>
140 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.boost.org/">Boost</ulink></listitem>
141 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.libssh.org/">libssh</ulink></listitem>
142 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.gtk.org/">GTK</ulink></listitem>
143 <listitem><ulink url="http://www.wxwidgets.org/">wxWidgets</ulink></listitem>
144 <listitem><ulink url="http://carlh.net/software/libdcp/">libdcp</ulink></listitem>
149 Once you have installed the development packages for the dependencies,
150 download the source code from <ulink
151 url="http://dcpomatic.com/">http://dcpomatic.com/</ulink>,
152 unpack it and run the following commands from inside the source
163 With any luck, this will build and install DCP-o-matic on your system. To run it, enter:
177 <chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
178 <title>Creating a video DCP</title>
181 In this chapter we will see how to create a video DCP using
182 DCP-o-matic. We will gloss over the details and look at the basics.
186 <title>Creating a new film</title>
189 Let's make a very simple DCP to see how DCP-o-matic works. First, we
190 need some content. Download the low-resolution trailer for the open
191 movie <ulink url="http://sintel.org/">Sintel</ulink> from <ulink
192 url="http://ftp.nluug.nl/ftp/graphics/blender/apricot/trailer/Sintel_Trailer1.480p.DivX_Plus_HD.mkv">their
193 website</ulink>. Generally, of course, one would want to use the
194 highest-resolution material available, but for this test we will use
195 the low-resolution version to save everyone's bandwidth bills.
199 Now, start DCP-o-matic and its window will open. First, we will
200 create a new ‘film’. A ‘film’ is how DCP-o-matic refers to
201 some pieces of content, along with some settings, which we will make into
202 a DCP. DCP-o-matic stores its data in a folder on your disk while it
203 creates the DCP. You can create a new film by selecting
204 <guilabel>New</guilabel> from the <guilabel>File</guilabel> menu, as
205 shown in <xref linkend="fig-file-new"/>.
208 <figure id="fig-file-new">
209 <title>Creating a new film</title>
212 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/file-new&scs;"/>
218 This will open a dialogue box for the new film, as shown in <xref
219 linkend="fig-video-new-film"/>.
222 <figure id="fig-video-new-film">
223 <title>Dialogue box for creating a new film</title>
226 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/video-new-film&scs;"/>
232 In this dialogue box you can choose a name for the film. This will be
233 used to name the folder to store its data in, and also as the initial
234 name for the DCP itself. You can also choose whereabouts you want to create
235 the film. In the example from the figure, DCP-o-matic will create a
236 folder called ‘DCP Test’ inside my home folder (carl) into which it
237 will write its working files.
243 <title>Adding content</title>
246 The next step is to add the content that you want to use. DCP-o-matic
247 can make DCPs from multiple pieces of content, but in this simple
248 example we will just use a single piece. Click the <guilabel>Add
249 file(s)...</guilabel> button, as shown in <xref
250 linkend="fig-add-file"/>, and a file chooser will open for you to
251 select the content file to use, as shown in <xref
252 linkend="fig-video-select-content-file"/>.
255 <figure id="fig-add-file">
256 <title>Adding content files</title>
259 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/add-file&scs;"/>
264 <figure id="fig-video-select-content-file">
265 <title>Selecting a video content file</title>
268 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/video-select-content-file&scs;"/>
274 Select your content file and click <guilabel>Open</guilabel>. In this
275 case we are using the Sintel trailer that we downloaded earlier.
279 When you do this, DCP-o-matic will take a look at your file. After a
280 short while (when the progress bar at the bottom right of the window
281 has finished), you can look through your content using the slider to
282 the right of the window, as shown in <xref linkend="fig-examine-content"/>.
285 <figure id="fig-examine-content">
286 <title>Examining the content</title>
289 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/examine-content&scs;"/>
295 Dragging the slider will move through your video. You can also click
296 the <guilabel>Play</guilabel> button to play the content back. Note
297 that there will be no sound, and playback might not be entirely
298 accurate (it may be slightly slower or faster than it should be, for
299 example). This player is really only intended for brief inspection of
300 content; if you need to check it more thoroughly, use another player
302 url="http://projects.gnome.org/totem/index.html">Totem</ulink>, <ulink
303 url="http://www.mplayerhq.hu/design7/news.html">mplayer</ulink> or
304 <ulink url="http://www.videolan.org/vlc/index.html">VLC</ulink>.
312 <title>Making the DCP</title>
314 <para>In most cases, some adjustments would be made to DCP-o-matic's
315 settings once the content has been added. For our simple test,
316 however, the default values will suffice, so we can go straight onto
317 making the DCP.</para>
320 Choose <guilabel>Make DCP</guilabel> from the
321 <guilabel>Jobs</guilabel> menu. DCP-o-matic will encode your DCP.
322 This may take some time (many hours in some cases). While the job is
323 in progress, DCP-o-matic will update you on how it is getting on with
324 the progress bar in the bottom of its window, as shown in <xref
325 linkend="fig-making-dcp"/>.
328 <figure id="fig-making-dcp">
329 <title>Making the DCP</title>
332 <imagedata scale="30" fileref="screenshots/making-dcp&scs;"/>
338 When it has finished, the DCP will end up on your disk inside the
339 film's folder. You can then copy this to a projector via a USB
340 stick, hard-drive or network connection. See <xref
341 linkend="ch-files"/> for details about the files that DVD-o-matic creates.
345 Alternatively, if you have a projector or TMS that is accessible via
346 SCP across your network, you can upload the content directly from
347 DCP-o-matic. See <xref linkend="sec-tms-upload"/>.
353 <chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
354 <title>Creating a still-image DCP</title>
357 DCP-o-matic can also be used to create DCPs of one or more still images, perhaps
358 for an advertisement or an on-screen announcement. This chapter shows you
363 As with video DCPs, the first step is to create a new
364 ‘Film’; select <guilabel>New</guilabel> from the
365 <guilabel>File</guilabel> menu and the new film dialogue will open as
366 shown in <xref linkend="fig-still-new-film"/>.
369 <figure id="fig-still-new-film">
370 <title>Dialogue box for creating a new film</title>
373 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/still-new-film&scs;"/>
379 Enter a name and click <guilabel>OK</guilabel>. Now we need to add
380 the content. As before, click <guilabel>Add file(s)...</guilabel>.
381 For our example, we will add a single image file, as shown in <xref
382 linkend="fig-still-select-content-file"/>.
385 <figure id="fig-still-select-content-file">
386 <title>Selecting a still content file</title>
389 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/still-select-content-file&scs;"/>
395 As with video DCPs, most of the default settings will be fine for a
396 simple test. The one thing that you might wish to change is the
397 length of the still. Select the <guilabel>Timing</guilabel> tab and
398 you will see a <guilabel>Length</guilabel> setting, as shown in <xref
399 linkend="fig-timing-tab"/>.
402 <figure id="fig-timing-tab">
403 <title>The timing tab</title>
406 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/timing-tab&scs;"/>
412 This length is a ‘timecode’: it consists of four numbers.
413 The first is hours, the second minutes, the third seconds, and the
414 fourth frames. Enter the duration that you want and then click <guilabel>Set</guilabel>.
418 Finally, as with video, you can choose <guilabel>Make DCP</guilabel>
419 from the <guilabel>Jobs</guilabel> menu to create your DCP. This will
420 be much quicker than creating a video DCP, as DCP-o-matic only needs
421 to encode a single frame which it can then repeat.
426 <chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
427 <title>Handling content</title>
430 The previous chapters showed DCP generation using the default
431 settings. DCP-o-matic offers a range of features to adjust the
432 content that goes into your DCP, and this chapter describes those features in
437 <title>Adding and removing content</title>
440 At the top of the <guilabel>Content</guilabel> tab is a list of the
441 content that will go into our DCP. There can be as many pieces of
442 content as you like, and they can be of the following types:
446 <listitem>Movie — a file containing some video, probably some
447 audio and possibly some subtitles; for example, a MOV, MP4 or VOB.
450 <listitem>Sound — a file containing one or more channels of
451 audio; for example, a WAV or AIFF file.
454 <listitem>Still image — a file containing a single still image; for
455 example, a JPEG, PNG or TIFF file.
458 <listitem>Moving image — a directory containing many still
459 images which should be treated as the frames of a video.
464 To add one or more movie, sound or still-image files, select
465 <guilabel>Add file(s)...</guilabel> and choose them from the selector.
466 To add a directory of images, choose <guilabel>Add
467 directory...</guilabel> and do similar.
471 You can remove a piece of content by clicking on its name and then
472 clicking the <guilabel>Remove</guilabel> button.
477 <title>Content Properties</title>
480 Below the content list are the controls to set content properties. To
481 adjust the properties for a piece of content, click its name in the
482 content list. The content property controls will then become active
483 for that piece of content.
487 The content properties are split up into four sections:
488 <guilabel>Video</guilabel>, <guilabel>Audio</guilabel>,
489 <guilabel>Subtitles</guilabel> and <guilabel>Timing</guilabel>. Not
490 all of these sections will be active for all content types. The controls
491 in each section are described below.
500 The <guilabel>Video</guilabel> tab controls properties of the image, as shown in <xref linkend="fig-video-tab"/>.
503 <figure id="fig-video-tab">
504 <title>Video settings tab</title>
507 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/video-tab&scs;"/>
513 <title>Image type</title>
516 The first option on this tab is the ‘type’ of the video.
517 This specifies how DCP-o-matic should interpret the video's image.
518 <guilabel>2D</guilabel> is the default; this just takes the video
519 image as a standard 2D frame. The other option <guilabel>3D
520 left/right</guilabel> tells DCP-o-matic to interpret the frame as a
521 left-right pair, as shown in <xref linkend="fig-3d-left-right"/>.
524 <figure id="fig-3d-left-right">
525 <title>3D left/right image type</title>
528 <imagedata scale="100" fileref="diagrams/3d-left-right&dia;"/>
534 This option can be used to generate a 3D DCP. Other means of creating
535 3D will be added in the future.
541 <!-- ============================================================== -->
543 <title>Filtering</title>
546 The ‘filters’ settings allow you to apply various video
547 filters to the image. These may be useful to try to improve
548 poor-quality sources like DVDs. You can set up the filters by clicking the
549 <guilabel>Edit</guilabel> button next to the filters entry in the
550 setup area of the DCP-o-matic window; this opens the filters selector
551 as shown in <xref linkend="fig-filters"/>.
554 <figure id="fig-filters">
555 <title>Filters selector</title>
558 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/filters&scs;"/>
564 After changing the filters setup, you will need to regenerate the DCP
565 to see the effect on the cinema screen. The preview in DCP-o-matic
566 will update itself whenever filters are changed, though of course this
567 image is much smaller and of lower resolution than a projected image!
572 <!-- ============================================================== -->
574 <title>Other settings</title>
577 The ‘crop’ settings can be used to crop your content,
578 which can be used to remove black borders from round the edges of DVD
579 images, for example. The specified number of pixels will be trimmed
580 from each edge, and the content image in the right of the window will
581 be updated to show the effect of the crop.
585 The <guilabel>Scale to</guilabel> option governs the shape that
586 DCP-o-matic will scale the content's image into. Select the aspect
587 ratio that your content should be presented in.
592 <title>Video description</title>
595 At the bottom of the video tab is a short description of what will
596 happen to your video with the current settings. In the example of
597 <xref linkend="fig-video-tab"/>, DCP-o-matic is telling you that the
598 video file is 1920x1080 pixels (which is a ratio of 1.78:1). Since
599 the controls specify ‘Flat’ for the ratio, DCP-o-matic
600 scales the content image to 1998x1080, which is the DCI flat
605 This description also gives the frame rate of the content and what
606 will happen to it when it is played at the DCP's frame rate.
607 <!-- XXX: link to more detailed discussion of this -->
618 The <guilabel>Audio</guilabel> tab controls properties of the image, as shown in <xref linkend="fig-audio-tab"/>.
621 <figure id="fig-audio-tab">
622 <title>Audio settings tab</title>
625 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/audio-tab&scs;"/>
631 <title>Show audio</title>
634 The <guilabel>Show Audio</guilabel> button will instruct DCP-o-matic
635 to examine the audio in your content and plot a graph of its level
636 over time. This can be useful for getting a rough idea of how loud
637 the sound will be in the cinema auditorium. A typical plot is shown
638 in <xref linkend="fig-audio-plot"/>
641 <figure id="fig-audio-plot">
642 <title>Audio plot</title>
645 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/audio-plot&scs;"/>
651 The plot gives the audio level (vertical axis, in dB) with time
652 (horizontal axis). 0dB represents full scale, so if there is anything
653 near this you are in danger of clipping the projector's audio outputs.
657 There are two plot types: the peak level and the RMS, which can be
658 shown or hidden using the check-boxes on the right hand side of the
663 The channel check-boxes will show or hide the plot(s) for
664 the corresponding channels in the DCP.
668 The smoothing slider applies a variable degree of temporal smoothing
669 to the plots, which can make them easier to read in some cases.
673 Obviously the audio plot is no substitute for listening in an
674 auditorium, but it can be useful to get levels in the right rough area.
680 <title>The audio map</title>
683 The section at the bottom of the audio tab is the ‘audio
684 map’. This governs how sound from the content will be arranged
689 Down the left-hand side of the map is the list of audio channels in
690 the currently-selected piece of content. Along the top is each
691 channel in the DCP. A checked box means that the corresponding
692 content channel will be copied into the corresponding DCP channel.
696 Consider, for example, the case in <xref linkend="fig-audio-map-eg1"/>.
699 <figure id="fig-audio-map-eg1">
700 <title>Audio map example 1</title>
703 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/audio-map-eg1&scs;"/>
709 Here, we have two channels in the source which are mapped to left and
710 right, respectively, in the DCP. If we modify that as in <xref
711 linkend="fig-audio-map-eg2"/>
714 <figure id="fig-audio-map-eg2">
715 <title>Audio map example 2</title>
718 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/audio-map-eg2&scs;"/>
724 we now have the content's streams mapped to left and right and also
725 mixed together and placed in the DCP's centre channel.
728 <figure id="fig-audio-map-eg3">
729 <title>Audio map example 3</title>
732 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/audio-map-eg3&scs;"/>
738 As a final example, the map in <xref linkend="fig-audio-map-eg3"/>
739 shows the mapping of a 5.1 source into a 5.1 DCP.
745 <title>Other controls</title>
748 ‘Audio Gain’ is used to alter the volume of the
749 soundtrack. The specified gain (in dB) will be applied to each sound
750 channel of your content before it is written to the DCP.
754 If you use a sound processor that DCP-o-matic knows about, it can help
755 you calculate changes in gain that you should apply. Say, for
756 example, that you make a test DCP and find that you have to run it at
757 volume 5 instead of volume 7 to get a good sound level in the screen.
758 If this is the case, click the <guilabel>Calculate...</guilabel>
759 button next to the audio gain entry, and the dialogue box in <xref
760 linkend="fig-calculate-audio-gain"/> will open.
763 <figure id="fig-calculate-audio-gain">
764 <title>Calculating audio gain</title>
767 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/calculate-audio-gain&scs;"/>
773 For our example, put 5 in the first box and 7 in the second and click
774 <guilabel>OK</guilabel>. DCP-o-matic will calculate the audio gain
775 that it should apply to make this happen. Then you can re-make the
776 DCP (this will be reasonably fast, as the video data will already have
777 been done) and it should play back at the correct volume with 7 on
778 your sound-rack fader.
782 Current versions of DCP-o-matic only know about the Dolby CP750. If
783 you use a different sound processor, and know the gain curve of its
784 volume control, <ulink url="mailto:cth@carlh.net">get in
789 <guilabel>Audio Delay</guilabel> is used to adjust the synchronisation
790 between audio and video. A positive delay will move the audio later
791 with respect to the video, and a negative delay will move it earlier.
795 The <guilabel>Audio Stream</guilabel> option allows you to select the
796 audio stream to use, if the content contains more than one. There
797 might be different soundtrack languages, for example.
805 <chapter xml:id="ch-preferences" xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
806 <title>Preferences</title>
809 DCP-o-matic provides a few preferences which can be used to modify its
810 behaviour. This chapter explains those options.
814 <title>The preferences dialogue</title>
817 The preferences dialogue is opened by choosing
818 <guilabel>Preferences...</guilabel> from the <guilabel>Edit</guilabel>
819 menu. The dialogue is shown in <xref linkend="fig-prefs"/>.
822 <figure id="fig-prefs">
823 <title>Preferences</title>
826 <imagedata fileref="screenshots/prefs&scs;"/>
832 <title>TMS setup</title>
835 The first part of the dialogue gives some options for specifying
836 details about your TMS. If you do this, and your TMS accepts SSH
837 connections, you can upload DCPs directly from DCP-o-matic to the TMS.
838 This is discussed in <xref linkend="sec-tms-upload"/>.
842 <guilabel>TMS IP address</guilabel> should be set to the IP address of
843 your TMS, <guilabel>TMS target path</guilabel> to the place that DCPs
844 should be uploaded to (which will be relative to the home directory of
845 the SSH user). Finally, the user name and password are the
846 credentials required to log into the TMS via SSH.
851 <title>Threads</title>
854 When DCP-o-matic is encoding DCPs it can use multiple parallel threads
855 to speed things up. Set this value to the number of threads
856 DCP-o-matic should use. This would typically be set to the number of
857 processors (or processor cores) in your machine.
863 <title>Default directory for new films</title>
866 This is the directory (folder) which DCP-o-matic will suggest initially as a place to put new films.
872 <title>A/B options</title>
875 These options are for DCP-o-matic's special mode of making A/B
876 comparison DCPs for checking the performance of video filters. Their
877 use is described in <xref linkend="sec-ab"/>.
883 <title>Encoding servers</title>
886 If you have spare machines sitting around on your network not doing
887 much, they can be pressed into service to speed up DCP encodes. This
888 is done by running a small server program on the machine, which will
889 encode video sent to it by the ‘master’ DCP-o-matic. This
890 option is described in more detail in <xref linkend="sec-servers"/>.
891 Use these preferences to specify the encoding servers that should be
900 <chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
901 <title>Advanced topics</title>
903 <para>This chapter describes some parts of DCP-o-matic that are
904 probably not essential, but which you might find useful in some
909 <title>Scaling</title>
912 If your source material is not of the DCI-specified size, or if it
913 uses non-square pixels, DCP-o-matic will need to scale it. The
914 algorithm used to scale is set up by the <guilabel>Scaler</guilabel>
915 entry in the film setup area. We think ‘Bicubic’ is the
916 best all-round option, but tests are ongoing.
921 <section xml:id="sec-tms-upload">
922 <title>TMS upload</title>
925 If you have configured details of a TMS in the preferences dialogue
926 (<xref linkend="ch-preferences"/>) you can upload a completed DCP
927 straight to your TMS buy choosing <guilabel>Send DCP to TMS</guilabel>
928 from the <guilabel>Jobs</guilabel> menu.
934 <section xml:id="sec-ab">
935 <title>A/B comparison</title>
938 When evaluating the effects of different filters or scalers on the
939 image quality, A/B mode might be useful. In this mode, DCP-o-matic
940 will generate a DCP where the left half of the image uses some
941 ‘reference’ filtering and scaling, and the right half of
942 the image uses a different set of filters and a different scaler.
943 This DCP can then be played back on a projector and the image quality
948 To enable A/B mode, click the A/B checkbox in the setup area of the
949 DCP-o-matic window. When you generate your DCP, the left half of the
950 screen will use the filters and scaler specified in the <xref
951 linkend="ch-preferences">preferences</xref> dialogue, and the right
952 half will use the filters and scaler specified in the film setup.
957 <section xml:id="sec-servers">
958 <title>Encoding servers</title>
961 One way to increase the speed of DCP encoding is to use more
962 than one machine at the same time. An instance of DCP-o-matic can
963 offload some of the time-consuming JPEG2000 encoding to any number of
964 other machines on a network. To do this, one ‘master’
965 machine runs DCP-o-matic, and the ‘server’ machines run
966 a small program called ‘servomatic’.
970 <title>Running the servers</title>
973 There are two options for the encoding server;
974 <code>servomatic_cli</code>, which runs on the command line, and
975 <code>servomatic_gui</code>, which has a simple GUI. The command line
976 version is well-suited to headless servers, especially on Linux, and
977 the GUI version works best on Windows where it will put an icon in the
982 To run the command line version, simply enter:
990 at a command prompt. If you are running the program on a machine with
991 a multi-core processor, you can run multiple parallel encoding threads
992 by doing something like:
1000 to run 4 threads in parallel.
1004 To run the GUI version on windows, run the ‘DCP-o-matic encode
1005 server’ from the start menu. An icon will appear in the system
1006 tray; right-click it to open a menu from whence you can quit the
1007 server or open a window to show its status.
1012 <title>Setting up DCP-o-matic</title>
1015 Once your servers are running, you need to tell your master
1016 DCP-o-matic instance about them. Start DCP-o-matic and open the
1017 <guilabel>Preferences</guilabel> dialog from the
1018 <guilabel>Edit</guilabel> menu. At the bottom of this dialog is a
1019 section where you can add, edit and remove encoding servers. For each
1020 encoding server you need only specify its IP address and the number of
1021 threads that it is running, so that DCP-o-matic knows how many
1022 parallel encode jobs to send to the server.
1026 Once this is done, any encodes that you start will split the workload
1027 up between the master machine and the servers.
1032 <title>Some notes about encode servers</title>
1035 DCP-o-matic does not mind if servers come and go; if a server
1036 disappears, DCP-o-matic will stop sending work to it, and will check
1037 it every minute or so in case it has come back online.
1041 You will probably find that using a 1Gb/s or faster network will
1042 provide a significant speed-up compared to a 100Mb/s network.
1046 Making changes to the server configuration in the master DCP-o-matic
1047 will have no effect while an encode is running; the changes will only
1048 be noticed when a new encode is started.
1056 <chapter xml:id="ch-files" xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" version="5.0" xml:lang="en">
1057 <title>Generated files</title>
1060 DCP-o-matic generates a number of files as it makes a DCP. <xref
1061 linkend="fig-file-structure"/> shows the files that might be generated
1062 after you have created a DCP for a film called ‘DCP Test’.
1065 <figure id="fig-file-structure">
1066 <title>Creating a new film</title>
1069 <imagedata fileref="diagrams/file-structure&dia;"/>
1075 The <code>DCP Test</code> folder is the one that you specify when you
1076 select the <guilabel>New Film</guilabel> option from DCP-o-matic's
1077 menu. Everything is stored inside this folder.
1081 DCP-o-matic generates some working files as it goes along. These are as follows:
1084 <listitem><code>log</code> is a list of notes that DCP-o-matic makes as it goes
1085 along. This can be useful for debugging purposes if something goes
1088 <listitem><code>metadata</code> stores the settings that you have made
1089 for this film: things like cropping, output format and so on.</listitem>
1091 <listitem><code>video</code> is where DCP-o-matic writes the DCP's
1092 video data as it encodes it.</listitem>
1094 <listitem><code>analysis</code> is used to keep the results of audio analysis runs.</listitem>
1096 <listitem><code>info</code> contains details of each video frame that
1097 DCP-o-matic has written so far. This is used when an encoding
1098 operation is interrupted and DCP-o-matic must resume it.</listitem>
1103 Following this is the DCP itself:
1104 <code>DCP-TEST_EN-XX_UK-U_51_2K_CSY_20130218_CSY_OV</code>. This
1105 contains some small XML files, which describe the DCP, and two large
1106 MXF files, which contain the DCP's audio and video data. This folder
1107 (<code>DCP-TEST_EN-XX_...</code>) is what you should ingest, or pass
1108 to the cinema which is showing your DCP.
1122 The folder that you choose should have plenty of free disc space
1123 available. As a very rough guide, you will need about 25Mb per second
1124 of your DCP. This works out at 1.5Gb per minute, or 90Gb per hour.
1128 If you always create your DCPs in a particular folder, you can use
1129 DCP-o-matic's <guilabel>Preferences</guilabel> to make life a little
1130 easier by setting the default folder that DCP-o-matic will offer in this dialogue.
1131 See <xref linkend="ch-preferences"/>.
1137 <title>Subtitles tab</title>
1140 This tab contains settings related to subtitles in your content, as shown in <xref linkend="fig-subtitles-tab"/>.
1143 <figure id="fig-subtitles-tab">
1144 <title>Subtitle settings tab</title>
1153 DCP-o-matic will extract subtitles from the content, if present, and
1154 they can be ‘burnt into’ the DCP (that is, they are
1155 included in the image and not overlaid by the projector). Note that
1156 DVD and Blu-Ray subtitles are stored as bitmaps, so it is not possible
1157 (automatically) to use non-burnt-in subtitles with these sources.
1158 Select the <guilabel>With Subtitles</guilabel> checkbox to enable
1159 subtitles. The <guilabel>offset</guilabel> control moves the
1160 subtitles up and down the image, and the <guilabel>scale</guilabel>
1161 control changes their size.
1165 All being well, future versions of DCP-o-matic will include the option to
1166 use text subtitles (as is the norm with most professionally-mastered
1174 <title>Setting up the DCP</title>
1177 Now that we have set up the content that will go into our DCP, we can
1178 set things up for the DCP itself. This is done from the
1179 <guilabel>DCP</guilabel> tab which can be found at the top of the
1180 DCP-o-matic window (next to the <guilabel>Content</guilabel> tab).
1181 The DCP tab is shown in foo.
1187 The first thing here is the name. This is generally set to the title
1188 of the film that is being encoded. If <guilabel>Use DCI
1189 name</guilabel> is not ticked, the name that you specify will be used
1190 as-is for the name of the DCP. If <guilabel>Use DCI name</guilabel>
1191 is ticked, the name that you enter will be used as part of a
1192 DCI-compliant name. Set the name to something useful, like
1193 ‘Sintel’.
1197 Underneath the name field is a preview of the name that the DCP will
1198 get. To use a DCI-compliant name, tick the <guilabel>Use DCI
1199 name</guilabel> checkbox. The DCI name will be composed using details
1200 of your content's soundtrack, the current date and other things that
1201 can be specified in the DCI name details dialogue box, which you can
1202 open by clicking on the <guilabel>Details</guilabel> button.
1206 If the DCP name is long, it may not all be visible. You can see the
1207 full name by hovering the mouse pointer over the partial name.
1211 The <guilabel>Container</guilabel> option sets the ratio of the image
1212 in the DCP. If this ratio is different to the ratio used for any
1213 content, DCP-o-matic will pad the content with black. In simple cases
1214 this should be set to the same ratio as that for the the primary piece
1215 of video content. Alternatively, you might want to pillarbox a small
1216 format into a Flat container: in this case, select the small format
1217 for the content's ratio and ‘Flat’ for the DCP.
1221 Next up is the content type. This can be
1222 ‘feature’, ‘trailer’ or whatever; select the
1223 required type from the drop-down list.
1227 The <guilabel>Frame Rate</guilabel> control sets the frame rate of
1228 your DCP. This can be a little tricky to get right. Ideally, you
1229 want it to be the same as the video content that you are using. If it
1230 is not the same, DCP-o-matic must resort to some tricks to alter your
1231 content to fit the specified frame rate. Frame rates are discussed in more detail later.
1236 The <guilabel>Use best</guilabel> button sets the DCP video frame rate
1237 to what DCP-o-matic thinks is the best given the content that you have
1242 The <guilabel>Audio Channels</guilabel> control sets the number of
1243 audio channels that the DCP will have. If the DCP has any channels
1244 for which there is no content audio they will be replaced by silence.
1248 The <guilabel>3D</guilabel> button will set your DCP to 3D mode if it
1249 is checked. This is discussed later.
1254 The <guilabel>Resolution</guilabel> tab allows you to choose the
1255 resolution for your DCP. Use 2K unless you have content that is of
1256 high enough resolution to be worth presenting in 4K.
1260 The <guilabel>JPEG2000 bandwidth</guilabel>; setting changes how big the final
1261 image files used within the DCP will be. Larger numbers will give
1262 better quality, but correspondingly larger DCPs. The bandwidth can be
1263 between 50 and 250 megabits per second (MBps).
1267 Finally, the <guilabel>scaler</guilabel> is the method that will be used to scale up
1268 your content to the required size for the DCP, if required. We will
1269 discuss the options in more detail later; Bicubic is a fine choice in