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When you launch DVDSanta, you will see five main buttons, Video Files to DVD, Photo Slide-Show to DVD, Digital Camcorder direct to DVD, Disc Image or DVD folder to DVD and Buy Now. As you probably figured out, you need to click the Photo Slide-Show to DVD button.
When the next window loads you will see that you need to click the Add photo button first of all.
When the file browser loads, go to a folder than contains images that you want to add to your slide-show. You can select images simply by clicking on them and clicking open, but if you have multiple images in one folder that you want on your Slideshow, then it's quicker to hold down the CTRL button while selecting clicking images, this way you can select multiple images without deselecting ones you've already selected. If you accidentally select an image that you don't want on your DVD, make sure you keep your CTRL button held down and click it again and it will deselect but all previous selected images will remain.
If you select a photo, and click the Photo setting button, you will see a new little window pop up. There will be three main things you can do with this window which is set timing (display and transition timing), set effects that will be on the selected photo and record a voice recording as a kind of narration on the picture. First we are looking at the timing, so as you can see you can set in seconds the time the photo will be displayed and the transition time (transition between images).
When DVDSanta is displaying a picture, it can show a kind of effect. For example, you can set it to Zoom into the picture while its being displayed. You can even set it to Zoom to the right, left or center of the picture, depending on what you would like most displayed. You can also select the transition effect that will be displayed as the photo changes to another. Or you can leave it on Auto and of course there is also the option of selecting None. You can preview these too with the program.
One of my favorite features of DVDSanta is the ability to add Voice Narration to each and every picture you want. Don't worry, Voice Narration and background audio can co-exist on these slideshows and usually the background audio is less volume than the voice. It's quite simple really but you will need some form of microphone to record. Click the Record button and it will begin to record, the record button is displayed as Stop during recording. The Play button can play back the recording so you can check if you said it clear enough. Erase can be used to simply remove the audio if it sounds terrible like mine does.
This is something I definitely wouldn't do but it's entirely up to you but if you are in a rush you can simply check this option so that all settings will be applied to all photos. I would recommend in this case that you do not use voice narration, but it's up to you.
If you have a lot of pictures on your Hard Disc Drive that you wish to put on DVD, then it's not surprising that you might not have the time to do it all at once, this is no problem, you can simply click the Save Project button to save a ZSH file that you can load later on. However, you must remember not to rename pictures or move pictures or audio that you use, as this will cause problems for you when you try to load later on.
You can add audio that will be played for the duration of the slideshow. Once the slideshow is over however, this audio will just stop, it won't continue to play with a black screen or anything. Even if you have voice narration, background audio is quite nice to have and really shouldn't interfere with your voice recordings. To Add audio, click the Add music button. When the file browser comes up locate you audio, select it and click Open. It should now add it to the background music list. To delete a file from the list, select it and click Remove, or you can also click Play it.
You will have noticed the Auto-Sync Photos with Music button. Now you should think before you decide that this is a good option. Clicking this button will change the photo settings for individual photo's. Like for example, if you only had four files and a four minute audio track it would make the images display for a minute each usually. That's not very good for a slideshow. It's also worth mentioning too that in some cases where you have set some individual photo settings yourself, DVDSanta doesn't seem to change them, which means they may display correctly but the other files will then be adjusted. Just make sure that the length of your picture slideshow would be around the same length as audio before you click this button.
You can now select the Output folder for your DVD Video files. To change the default folder simply click the Change button.
Click the Advanced Settings button. There will be more than likely nothing here that you have to change. Compress LPCM audio should be ticked. Audio Delay and Video Delay let you set start-up delays in milliseconds for the audio and video streams. This can help with "some" sync issues. Quantize Matrix settings should not be touched. Choose a Target disc size then, for this guide, we are using 4.7G DVD+-R/RW. When you are done here, click OK.
As you can see you will have to change some simple settings here. Video Standard just lets you choose between an NTSC or PAL DVD, NTSC is used in the United States, whereas PAL is used mainly in Europe and Australia. Video Resolution should be left on high for best quality. Aspect Ratio lets you choose between whether the DVD will specify the movie as 16:9 or 4:3 on playback, select whichever option depending on what kind of TV you will be viewing on.
Click the Create DVD button and the encoding will begin. You will then be prompted with a question about whether you want to burn your DVD now or not.