Thursday, March 8, 2007
Friday, February 23, 2007
(Don't) change the region of your DVD drive
Recently someone I work with had to change the region of the DVD drive in a laptop in order to get a professor's DVD to play for a screening.
This was OK for a one-time-only situation, but based on the warning reproduced below (highlighted in red) I'd say anyone who uses a laptop computer DVD player needs to be aware of how dangerous it could be to do this.
(click on image to make it a little bigger if you need to)
What this says to me is that the DVD drive itself has firmware that registers region code changes and will lock the drive when the change counter reaches zero.
If you need to do something out of the ordinary with a disc - like sync a separate subtitle file with it (one that you created yourself or downloaded from a sub site like this one) - then you should really take the time to rip the files (or re-capture the movie) from the disc and re-author in a program like DVD Studio Pro with the subtitle file added into the package. That's all potentially illegal, but what can you do? Sometimes you want to show a movie that's in another language to people who only speak English. If you do all that then you'll have a disc that can play in a standalone player or your laptop.
This is one of those "there's no free lunch" things. Or maybe it's one of those DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) things.
PS. I don't know why, but it still freaks me out a little bit when people watch DVDs on their laptops. Call me old fashioned, but in my day we watched DVDs on a TV set (LOL).
This was OK for a one-time-only situation, but based on the warning reproduced below (highlighted in red) I'd say anyone who uses a laptop computer DVD player needs to be aware of how dangerous it could be to do this.
(click on image to make it a little bigger if you need to)What this says to me is that the DVD drive itself has firmware that registers region code changes and will lock the drive when the change counter reaches zero.
If you need to do something out of the ordinary with a disc - like sync a separate subtitle file with it (one that you created yourself or downloaded from a sub site like this one) - then you should really take the time to rip the files (or re-capture the movie) from the disc and re-author in a program like DVD Studio Pro with the subtitle file added into the package. That's all potentially illegal, but what can you do? Sometimes you want to show a movie that's in another language to people who only speak English. If you do all that then you'll have a disc that can play in a standalone player or your laptop.
This is one of those "there's no free lunch" things. Or maybe it's one of those DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) things.
PS. I don't know why, but it still freaks me out a little bit when people watch DVDs on their laptops. Call me old fashioned, but in my day we watched DVDs on a TV set (LOL).
In case you need something in black
Philips DVP 5140
At Amazon.
To make it region code free follow these instruction:
1. Turn on the unit
2. Open the loading tray
3. Press the "Setup" button on the remote
4. Navigate to the "Preferences" page using the right arrow key
6. Press the down arrow once to enter the Preference page
5. Enter 138931 on the remote
6. You will now see the current region code displayed
7. Use the Up/Down arrow keys to select the region required or "0" for all regions
8. Press the "Play" button on the remote
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
The best region-free DVD player I know of
Philips DVP642 is the model, and we use them as region free players in almost every projection booth on campus.
It also plays DIVX and other .avi files with a variable, but acceptable success rate. I download fansubbed anime, and on more than one occasion I've been able to fit an entire series (anywhere from 13-26 episodes) onto one DVD+R without recompressing anything.
They're under $50 on Amazon
And I found the region code adjustment right in the discussion forums on Amazon:
"1. Turn on the player.
2. Open the tray.
3. Press the following sequence on the remote:
7 8 9 OK 0
4. The number 0 will appear on the lower left side of your screen.
5. Your player is now region free! Put in a DVD and enjoy! :)
NOTE: The 0 in the sequence above represents the region code. 0 = region free. If you want to change your player to just a specific region code, replace the 0 with the region number you want.
worked for me immediately, fast and simple. good luck!"
I really like this player and recommend it to people again and again.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Copied images that self-destruct
No this isn't going to be about Mission Impossible.
The other day I copied some images from a website to a folder on my desktop and then re-uploaded them onto a blog post. (I did credit the source and even linked to the original page, and the pix had a watermark on the besides.)
The next day I looked at my blog and the images were blank with little red Xs in their upper left hand corners.
Dang, they had an anti-copying timed self-destruct code in them.
Couldn't let that one stand. I wasn't claiming them for my own, after all. I was actually using them to entice people to buy something from the original owner of the pics themselves.
I tried something, and two days later it seems to have worked. The pics are still there.
So here's what I did.
Go back to the original web page and re-save the images.
Open Photoshop.
Drag first image into Photoshop.
Duplicate layer in Layer menu (as a background copy).
Select Background layer (the original image), in the layers tab (probably in the lower right of your screen). It's probably locked, but that won't stop you from...
Delete-ing that layer in the Layer menu.
Now you're done, you've eliminated the data the had the self-destruct code.
Before you can re-save as something other than a .psd (the file type native to Photoshop) you'll have to flatten image in the Layers menu. I know this seems silly since the image only has one layer, but just do it.
Then do a save as and you're ready to re-upload without fear of self-destructing images.
Remember to give credit where credit is due.
The other day I copied some images from a website to a folder on my desktop and then re-uploaded them onto a blog post. (I did credit the source and even linked to the original page, and the pix had a watermark on the besides.)
The next day I looked at my blog and the images were blank with little red Xs in their upper left hand corners.
Dang, they had an anti-copying timed self-destruct code in them.
Couldn't let that one stand. I wasn't claiming them for my own, after all. I was actually using them to entice people to buy something from the original owner of the pics themselves.
I tried something, and two days later it seems to have worked. The pics are still there.
So here's what I did.
Go back to the original web page and re-save the images.
Open Photoshop.
Drag first image into Photoshop.
Duplicate layer in Layer menu (as a background copy).
Select Background layer (the original image), in the layers tab (probably in the lower right of your screen). It's probably locked, but that won't stop you from...
Delete-ing that layer in the Layer menu.
Now you're done, you've eliminated the data the had the self-destruct code.
Before you can re-save as something other than a .psd (the file type native to Photoshop) you'll have to flatten image in the Layers menu. I know this seems silly since the image only has one layer, but just do it.
Then do a save as and you're ready to re-upload without fear of self-destructing images.
Remember to give credit where credit is due.
Friday, February 16, 2007
Hold onto that flash drive!
When you use your a flash drive to carry presentation files to the site of your presentation, plug it into the onsite machine and transfer your files or folders to that machine's desktop immediately.
Then get that flash drive back into your pocket or purse!
Two reasons for this:
1. Your presentation will run faster from the hard drive of the on site computer, especially if it's graphics intensive, and
2. Losing your flash drive is to be avoided.
If you're nervous about copyright and intellectual property and all that, just delete the files after you're done (and remember to empty the trash too).
Then get that flash drive back into your pocket or purse!
Two reasons for this:
1. Your presentation will run faster from the hard drive of the on site computer, especially if it's graphics intensive, and
2. Losing your flash drive is to be avoided.
If you're nervous about copyright and intellectual property and all that, just delete the files after you're done (and remember to empty the trash too).
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