dvdcopycat.com

So you have finished all the hard work of having your CD or DVD mastered and readied for production. Finally you are ready to have copies manufactured and can’t wait to sell and distribute this project you worked so hard on.

In our business as a DVD and CD Duplication and Replication house, there are a couple of simple preparations that will make your task of getting your project manufactured easier and less costly.

1. Preparation of your artwork – Most CD/DVD manufactures have specific art requirements for the disc and insert printing for your project. Be sure to look into these requirement and follow them to the letter. Changes in artwork always slow things down and usually cost design time and money. Most duplication houses have templates available online for your specific project.

2. Use good media to burn your master disc – sometimes there can be problems with cd and dvd masters when they are burned. Particularly when you use cheap blank discs. Always get a brand name disc to avoid poor master quality.

Incomplete art and bad masters represent 90% of the delays when it comes to DVD and CD Duplication and Replication.  So, take the extra time up front to make your art and master flawless, and things will go much more smoothly. In the end you will be happy you did.

Brian G Fisher
DVD Copycat Inc.
DVD Duplication and Replication Services

1-415-929-1581

Occasionally we receive requests to burn 1-5 DVDs for some of our clients.  This is usually a pretty expensive proposition since we have to setup art and a duplicator for just a few discs.

If you would like to save some money and do the DVD Duplication yourself, there are some steps that will result in a good duplication.

Step 1: is to make sure you have a good quality DVD burner.  If you have purchased a DVD burner that is a no-name brand, you may be jeopardizing a good burn.  You do get what you pay for in burners.  A good avenue would be to locate a technical consumer review of DVD burners.  The Internet has a long list of available research on burners.

Step 2: is to make sure you use good quality media.  Inferior media will result in poor results.  Once again you get what you pay for, Sony, Verbatim, Taiyo Yuden all make a reliable burnable DVD.

Step 3: Make sure you leave your computer alone while burning your DVD.  If you are using other programs while your DVD is burning, this may cause a problem with the burn.

Step 4:  Verify your burn!  Most burning software programs have a check box that will have the DVD read after the burn and compared to the original disc image.  If they match up ok, the software will tell you that your DVD has been verified and it is a good disc.

If you need any more information on manufacturing optical media, Please contact us at:

415-929-1581

1-866-210-8768

DVD Copycat, Inc.

745 Fillmore, #101

San Francisco, CA 94117

www.dvdcopycat.com

Video and Film professionals who wish to shoot and publish their projects in Hi-Def have, to this point, been frustrated with the prohibitive costs associated with manufacturing a Blu-ray Disc.

Say an average filmmaker or video professional wants to make 1000 copies of their film and put it on Blu-ray(BD) Disc.   Unlike DVD, they will have to pay a mandatory up front AACS licensing fee.  Going rate is about $1500 to $2000 plus an ongoing royalty.

After paying this mandatory licensing fee, it will cost approximately $3.5 per unit to manufacture a Blu-ray package that is ready for distribution and sale.

For a typical standard definition DVD, there is no mandatory licensing fee for encryption and the cost would be approximately $1.49 per unit to manufacture.

Comparing these costs, a filmmaker  will have to pay an extra 266% over the cost of a standard DVD to publish on Blu-ray Disc.  Almost every client I have spoken to about these costs has declined to go Blu-ray.

As economies of scale take effect, the costs to manufacture Blu-ray Discs will likely come down and eventually be similar to DVD costs.  However, the real barrier to smaller companies adopting hi-def is the mandatory AACS licensing fee imposed by AACS Licensing Administrator, LLC.  This additional $1500-$2000 (plus per piece royalty), will likely be too expensive for most, and is just one more barrier to widespread adoption of Blu-ray Disc technology.

My hopes are that AACS Licensing Administrator, LLC. drops the mandatory licensing fee for smaller Blu-ray Disc orders.  If they do not, I suspect that an entire market of filmmakers and video professionals will be choosing DVD over Blu-ray Disc for the distribution of their projects.

For more information on Blu-ray Disc Duplication and Replication you can contact us directly:

Brian G Fisher

DVD Copycat

745 Fillmore, #101

San Francisco, CA 94117

www.dvdcopycat.com

415-929-1581

I have recently posted new definitions for CD Duplication, DVD Duplication and BD Duplication on Google Knol.

If anyone reading these has any comments or addtions to these definitions, please let me know and I will make the updates.

Often times we get the question “what is DVD Duplication, and what is the difference between DVD Duplication and DVD Replication”.

DVD Duplication is defined as the copying or burning of the contents of one DVD to multiple copies.  Depending on the blank media you use, the quality of the outcome can vary from very almost perfectly reliable to very poor results.  If you want quality results on your Duplication, it means that you have to spend the extra money to buy good blanks.  Its that simple and is the difference between happy customers and irate complainers.

The difference between Duplication and Replication is the manufacturing process.  Replication most often becomes more cost effective than Duplication at 1000 pcs.  In the DVD Replication process, a glass master is created, then a stamper is made from that master and is used to physically stamp the metallic layer on the disc.  Most of the cost is in the glass master and the setup, which can them be amortized over the cost of 1000 discs or more.  With Duplication the cost of the blank burnable media is fixed, so there is only so much cost reduction that can be achieved, which is typically only the amortized setup costs plus the blank media costs.

If you would like more info on DVD Duplication or Replication you can contact us at:

DVD Copycat

415-929-1581

Ask for Amy or Brian

Despite the fact that many Blu-Ray Disc set top players do not work with burnable Blu-Ray(BD-R) discs yet, the market is clamoring for Blu-Ray Discs(BD) in low volume.

We are receiving regular requests for BD-R(Blu-Ray Writable) Discs and have accomodated our clients by accelerating out adaptation to low volume Blu-Ray Duplication.

DVD Copycat has now released and offering of BD-R discs as a compliment to our regular line of CD DVD duplication and replication products.

DVD Copycat’s number one focus is the quality of our CD and DVD and Blu-Ray Disc products.

In this market, CDs and DVDs are perceived as a commodity, but at DVD Copycat, we strongly disagree with that perception. There are may variables that differentiate the quality and reliability of a packaged DVD, CD or Blu-Ray Disc product. Some of these variables can make the difference between making a great impression and making a flop.

At DVD Copycat, we always guarantee that we use the best media, boxes, and printing methods so you can make the best impression with flawless looking and working product every time.

We have a continuing commitment to manufacturing the best product available in this market today.

DVD Duplication, CD Duplication, Replicating DVDs and CD Replication are our passion.

According to Blu-ray.com, Walmart has just announced that they will be going to Blu-ray exclusively starting in June.

Just one more domino to fall.

As the industry solidifies around Blu-ray Disc, DVD Copycat is committed to accomodate the shift from our standard DVD Duplication in San Francisco to Blu-ray Disc Duplication and Replication.

Heres just a few more indicators that the industry is solidifying on Blu-ray Disc.  After Warner Bros. started the cascade.

It looks like netflix has just announced they will be moving to Blu Ray Disc and dropping HD DVD.

Also, the most current sales data in this article is indicating that even with aggressive pricing for HD DVD players and Discs, the figures are moving pretty conclusively to Blu-Ray.

Also, there seems to be more conclusive evidence here by a reseach group that claims the Disc War will be over by 2009.

I have been following this very closely, as many of our Bay Area clients have been using High Def cameras and equipment, and would like to know what format to choose when they want to distribute their new Hi-Def projects.

Blu-Ray Disc Replication will become a prevalent in the very near future.  Now that the disc war is coming to an end, I suspect that within the next two years enough homes and businesses will have players to make Blu-ray disc a solid and viable solution to distribute Hi-def content.  Blu-Ray Disc Replication will be reliable first, and then will come the lower volume burnable solutions probably a year later.

Until then, distribution of Hi-def content by Disc will still be on conventional NTSC DVDs by DVD Duplication and DVD Replication.

At DVD Copycat, we often receive time sensitive DVD Duplication or Replication orders. Sometimes we have to go through extraordinary efforts to make sure that our customers time requirements are met.

To make sure your DVD project is completed in a timely manner you should run down the following checklist.

1. Make sure you have your artwork for the DVD face and any packaging inserts that you may need ready. DVD Copycat has templates online here. When you use our templates we can easily integrate your artwork into our process for printing the DVD Discs and any inserts needed for your packaging. This will reduce confusion and make it easier to process your project.

2. Make sure you have a working master ready. Many times master authoring, compression and design takes longer than you would think. If you think you need to deliver your master to us on a Friday, plan to have it done on the Wednesday before. You will appreciate the extra two days of “cushion” if something goes wrong with your overnight compression, or if you find a last minute change in content.

3. Make sure we have your billing information. If we don’t have you in our card file and have some secured payment information(VISA, MC, AMEX for first time customers) then it will delay starting the job until we have that information.

4. Leave one extra day to make sure that you can see a sample or color match for your dvd duplication jobs. We can provide you with proofs so you can double check your color matching needs.

If you follow these 4 steps, I can assure you that at DVD Copycat, we will have no problem processing your order on time, reliably, and stress free.