On Thursday 03 January 2008 13:36, Stefan Hundhammer wrote:
I was not referring to the language of the audio track, but to the user interface language. I have a number of DVDs at home that let the user select that, too. And they ALL only show a list of languages.
I went through my DVD collection for samples. This is what I came up with:
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/
This style is what I had meant in previous posts:
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Beavis-and-Butthead-01.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Indecent-Proposal-01.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Sum-of-all-Fears-01.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Truman-Show.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Untouchables-01.jpg
Some publishers are using a nice background image from the movie:
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Barton-Fink-01.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Calendar-Girls.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Ladykillers-01.jpg
Some of those language menus double as the main menu of the respective movie
or offer more initial settings:
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Bugs-3D.jpg
http://www.suse.de/~sh/dvd-lang-menus/Big-Lebowski-01.jpg
Many DVDs that are made specifically for the German market and don't have
languages other than German (for the target audiences) and the original
soundtrack (most often English) don't bother with language selection. It
makes sense for them; the original soundtrack is meant as an add-on feature
for those Germans who'd like to watch the movie in the original version, but
are native German speakers, so the German main menu is not an obstacle for
them.
Most DVDs that come with more audio tracks (French, Spanish, Italian) OTOH do
have an initial language menu. This is the most similar case to our
installation: Our target audience is also international. We can't make very
many safe assumptions what language they will understand.
BTW many DVD publishers seem to be sloppy or simply don't give a damn about
their target audience: Even DVDs that are clearly targeted at the German
market (German DVD case and print and all) and also many that do have a
language menu simply have an English main menu. They do know, of course, how
to translate their force-displayed (no way to skip on a whitebook compatible
DVD player) legalese. This kind of user neglect is something we should not
try to emulate.
CU
--
Stefan Hundhammer