Mac OS X users, if you have a recent copy of Toast, you have an iMovie plugin for making Video CDs. If not, MMT-EZ may be just the thing for you. It saved me a lot of trouble today.

I have an older copy of Toast that I purchased while still using MacOS 9. Until today, when I wanted to make a Video CD, I'd do my editing under Mac OS X, export the movies in DV format, reboot in MacOS 9, import the DV file, export in Video CD format, reboot in MacOS X (I could have finished up in 9, but I wanted to get back to X anyway, so did it then), and burned the CD. What a pain!

A friend of mine is getting married tomorrow, and needed some help putting together a Video CD slideshow of photos of her and her husband to be. She brought her iBook over with all the photos ready in order, we imported them, added some music, and exported to start the process outlined above. Fortunately, before rebooting, I tried to import the video once again (to adjust the length of the video to match the audio), and discovered that iMovie refused to import a file that would result in over 2GB in DV format.

First things first--we came up with a different solution for adjusting the video length--delete all the pictures and import them again with the during of each picture pre-adjusted to the right length. Then the conundrum--how was I going to convert to Video CD? I went online and found MMT-EZ.

It did the job nicely, but there is one thing I want to point out--it takes a LONG time to convert the video to MPEG-1 (...I'm pretty sure it's MPEG-1), and the program doesn't give you any feedback on its progress. Just trust that it's working. Eventually you'll see motion again.

All in all, a great program. It sure saved me some trouble.