Web DVD: What had been an add-an feature for Hollywood movies is now being incorporated into b2b applications

Post, Feb, 2002 by Christine Bunish

Web DVDs offer the promise of combining DVD-ROM's large capacity and interactivity DVD-Videos superb image quality and the Webs ability to provide up-to-the-minute information and instant inquiry or ordering capabilities. They are essentially DVD-ROM discs on which reside DVD-Video, ROM and Web applications. Most are created for PC platforms only since there are less Apple Macintoshes on the market.

VISION WISE: CORPORATE IS AN EARLY ADOPTER

"WebDVDs can be highly effective communications tools," says Tim Capper president of Dallas-based Vision Wise, Inc. (www.visionwise.com), an interactive communications firm. "They offer the best of both worlds: high-end, high-impact video and instant connections to the client, his customers or his employees." Capper reminds us that "the innovators in DVD-Video were a the movie companies who initially put bonus material on their DVDs that linked to the films' Web sites." But since most DVD-Video entertainment titles play on set-top boxes, moviemakers haven't been willing to pump money into greater Web integration, "unless it's an A-list title with a major site and merchandising opportunities," he notes.

It's been corporate clients who have discovered the advantages of tighter Web integration. "The Web is now more of a tool than an add on," Capper reports. "Businesses marketing products can use the DVD as a large collection of high-quality video, then link to the Web for descriptions and current price lists, which would be hard to keep updated on the disc. They can do database work on the Web."

But Capper believes prospective customers for WebDVDs, which are more expensive to create than DVD-Videos, should consider what they stand to gain above simple connectivity to a Web site. "There's got to be a measurable advantage. You've got to get a real return on investment from integrating product and database information or online commerce."

Vision Wise has seen a variety of applications for WebDVD. A bankimage.com project features a corporate overview and testimonials on DVD-Video and product information online. Episodes of the animated TV show Dragonball Z from Funimation has Web links to information on the characters. A WebDVD for popular Bishop T.D. Jakes of Potters House, who draws 90,000 people to his appearances, has his sermons on DVD-Video and scriptures online. A music video for new band Carsello has extra behind-the-scenes clips on DVD-Video and links to the Web for more information about the group and ordering its CD. A DVD-Video training project for the US Navy is likely to be a WebDVD in its next incarnation with the Internet acting as a testing station.

To gear up for WebDVD creation, Vision Wise has invested time in R&D for writing custom code that enables the platforms to talk to each other. Macromedia Director is used to program the DVD, and Flash and HTML to program the Web components. The DVD authoring software is Sonic Solutions' Scenarist.

Because WebDVDs tend to be costly and may require a longer development schedule, especially during the testing period, Capper suggests that people seeking simple Web connectivity consider business-card size CD-ROMs. "They can be a cost-effective marketing tool," he notes. "They can even have MPEG-I video if you want. Where DVD comes into play is when a project is video intensive. But if you just want to drive people to a Web site, business card size CD-ROMs cost 50 cents each."

BLINK DIGITAL: SUPPLEMENTING DVD-VIDEO

"Using Web and ROM enhancements can be a very cost-effective way of supplementing and extending DVD-Video titles," says Jeff Stabenau, managing director of Blink Digital (www.blinkdigital.com), which opened in New York City in December. "Almost all titles can benefit from it. We put Web links in some form on 90 percent of the discs we do, even if it's just a link to the home page of the client."

When Stabenau was president of NYC's Crush Digital, the company created a DVD boxed set of the first season of Showtime's original series Queer As Folk, which contained a password key enabling buyers to link to the Showtime Web site where they could view clips from the show's upcoming season.

Now, Blink Digital is preparing several Web-DVD titles on Tibetan Buddhism for Wellspring Entertainment on which some of expert Robert Thurman's academic papers will reside on the ROM side of the disc. "Sometimes material is better served by being local to the disc," Stabenau notes. Although he doesn't yet have a sense of the growth curve for WebDVD, Stabenau believes the format will play "a fairly small supplementary role in entertainment products but a larger role in corporate training and education if and when those markets develop."

Being able to create Web DVDs is "more a matter of personnel and expertise than equipment," Stabenau points out. "You need people with a background in Web and ROM development."

In addition to a WebDVD-savvy staff, the new Blink Digital has a Sonic Solutions Scenarist DVD authoring system and uses Macromedia Director to craft products that can play on both PCs and Macs. "Where we can, we try to make titles accessible to both platforms," Stabenau says. Blink Digital also taps Interactual's PC Friendly software, a superset of instructions that allows video to be played back by a PC from the ROM side of the disc. "It's very disappointing that Apple hasn't developed functionality in QuickTime to allow it to do this," Stabenau adds.