Sensible-cinema (also known to us as "paranoid cinema" [inside joke ha ha] ) is a program that allows you to apply programmed delete lists (i.e. Edit Decision Lists [2]) to DVD's you already own. I.e. you can edit a DVD to "mute out" or skip certain scenes. It is essentially a linear editor [1] that applies Edit Decision Lists [2] to videos, by wrapping a few freely available open source programs [3] to accomplish the editing for you. Then you can sit back and relax as you watch the "sensible" version of your DVD. To use it, basically install it, insert an original DVD that you want to see edited, then run sensible cinema. It will pop up some windows where you choose what to do for that DVD, hopefully easily. Note that the whole process can at times take hours, so budget some time for it. Also note that just because a video lacks profanity...does not immediately make it an inspiring experience. I'd suggest carefully evaluating your motives, and going with those. Sensible cinema does not a clean movie make of a dirty one. Don't watch it if it's not wholesome! Be nice to yourself! dove.org is a good reference for discovering the "uplifting" level of movies [4]. And of course sensible cinema does help a little bit. Also note that even if you have an edited copy of a DVD floating around, if you have kids, chances are they will eventually find (and watch) the unedited originals, so be careful there, and do what is needful. Enjoy your movies! [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_video_editing [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edit_decision_list [3] mostly GPL programs, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/ VLC Media Player, Mplayer/mencoder, ffmpeg, etc. [4] http://lds.org/library/display/0,4945,161-1-11-1,00.html search for the word "wholesome" == Installation == To install, download the latest .zip versioned file from: http://rogerdpack.t28.net/sensible-cinema/ then unzip it (right click -> Extract all) then "click into it" and search for and run the file "run sensible cinema.bat" == Creating Your Own Delete Lists, or modifying previously existing ones == See the accompanied how_to_create.txt file. == FAQ == Q. How do I watch these on my TV, not just on my computer? A. You could burn a new DVD with it. First create it on your hard drive. Then use some burning utility. Dvd Flick is a good one for windows. There's a screencast of using it within: http://rogerdpack.t28.net/sensible-cinema DeVeDe almost might work for windows users: http://www.majorsilence.com/devede though it looks less user friendly. For OS X : iDVD might work well. You might be able to move your laptop over to near your TV and hook it in from there. Or buy a very long cord and plug it in as an extra monitor from your desktop. If you're interested in also being able to "beam" it from your computer to your game console (ex: PS3) ping me--I might have something in mind that could help, though hasn't been created yet. Q. I want to give an edited DVD to a friend, how do I do that? A. Probably give them the original DVD and a link to sensible-cinema :) You may want to loan them a DVD burner if they don't have one. == Caveats == NB that "someone" has to create a delete list, per DVD. If one doesn't yet exist for the DVD you want edited, you could employ somebody to create it, or create it yourself. Make sure to submit it back to us when you're done, so that everyone can benefit from it. Fortunately only one person has to do it, once, for everybody to benefit, and the editing process is fairly easy. Also note that if your DVD has scratches that cause it to skip, the time signatures will be off, so clean your discs! == Motivation == The initial motivation for the project was that I dislike deity profanity in movies. And reall any profanity is jarring, if you're not used to it in real life, and can make you a bit on edge when you watch a movie. Also sometimes only certain scenes in movies offend, and don't contribute to the overall plot, and I'd rather not watch a movie that has them. But I still want to be able to watch movies at all :) I tried Clearplay (a realtime filtering DVD player) but (for me) it didn't seem to cut it. It costs money (I'm too cheap to pay--and many many other people don't/can't use it...). Their filters sometimes don't cut out all unwanted content (ex: Saints and Soldiers left profanity in its filtered version...which wasn't what I had anticipated. Others have noted that sometimes the edit timings are slightly off so that it will mute out sections just previous to profanity, while leaving the profanity itself in, etc.). Clearplay apparently also runs a rather confusing subscription policy, as well, I'm told [1]. Clearplay also has little community collaboration/review (though they do have some feedback). They don't even have a "request a filter" option anymore, like they used to. They also don't have filters for all the movies that I want to see edited (Condorman and Tron lacked last time I checked were lacking...probably because they are too obscure.) Also I watch movies only on computer, and they have no computer filter player, only DVD players. They also don't edit streamed online movies either (last time I checked, anyway). So overall I wanted to build my own that overcame some of these hurdles and was also more accessible/open. I also wanted to get a prototype out there of some of my ideas so that others can't patent them and pretend that they were inventors :) So originally the project started off as a prototype that could "watch hulu (online) and netflix instant movies edited" (it uses screen tracking and OCR's the on-screen timestamp, monitors it for specific times, and reacts appropriately). However, this functionality, though working, is disabled for patent reasons (clearplay has a patent on realtime tracking). Some older released versions had it enabled, but not anymore. Then I realized I could basically create the same effect using (more patent friendly) pre-processing and deletion lists (basically Edit Decision Lists enforced using playlists for VLC, like play from second x to y, then from x to mu, etc.). I just pass in a playlist, it does all the work for me. There are a few released versions that do this exactly. Then it occurred to me that you could grab the several clean segments off a DVD, and piece them together to create an edited copy. This avoids realtime tracking. This seems reasonably patent friendly, so it is what I release here. See also the LICENSE.TXT file. [1] http://www.amazon.com/review/R27VK5BR9NDHBD/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt#R27VK5BR9NDHBD amazon review of clearplay product == License == See the included LICENSE file for licensing and usage terms (basically it's under gplv3 for all the source). Some other programs are (distributed separately and) used by this one, typically they are under the gplv2 license. All files (c) 2010 Roger Pack == Related == The concept isn't too novel. Some other previously existing examples: Edited "airplane edit" style movies. Commercial TV (ABC, NBC) show their own (edited) movies. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_video_editing http://imdb.com tends to have reasonably good lists of what occurs in movies (find a movie, click on "parent's guide" on the left). Sometimes it even lists the time signatures for events (ex: "Labyrinth" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091369/parentalguide) which you could use to translate into a sensible-cinema compatible list. Normal movies versus "directors cut" versions of movies (one is at times preferable, profanity wise) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edit_decision_list (it's a linear editing tool, after all--so see the vast list of those) Clean Flicks (used to) sell edited movies http://www.mplayerhq.hu/DOCS/HTML/en/edl.html http://www.oreillynet.com/sysadmin/blog/2005/06/make_your_own_phantom_edit_wit.html (mplayer has had this ability for awhile, with no complaints). http://clearplay.com a commercial editing player (tracks DVD's while they play--closed source, costs money, no user contribution possible), and only for DVD's. It does offer a few features that sensible cinema disables, for patent reasons, like automatic (user flexible) content decisions. Ours are manual. Theirs is also a DVD "instant" player, which this is not, except on computer, though you must use theirs, etc (see motivation section, above). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RiffTrax has an interesting idea of "overlaying" audio over the original video, and synchronizing between the two (their re-player does, anyway). http://forum.bsplayer.com/feature-requests-feedback-suggestions/7157-chapter-playlist-scene-cut-3.html http://www.inmatrix.com "scene cut editor" of the zoom player http://wiki.xbmc.org/?title=EDL_(commercial_skipping)_and_SceneMarker_support (XBMC's scene cut support--also contains links to some other editors) http://dvdshrink.info "Re-author" mode: to make "movie-only" backups, compilations, combine "flippers",.... DvdShrink has the ability to "crop or cut parts of a title" etc. The VCR with its record button, coupled with the stop+rewind button. http://code.google.com/p/movie-content-editor (written in Python, controls VLC based on captions and edit decision lists, in realtime) http://forums.gbpvr.com/showthread.php?10606-Automated-Cutting-and-Transcoding-Guide-Using-Mencoder/page45 http://www.imdb.com/swiki/special?ParentalGuideHelp (search for "scene description") http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Removing_Commercials Using the remote control with the pause, mute, stop, fast forward, and play buttons, along with previous knowledge of scene locations The scissors and old VHS tapes (Clean Flicks' origin, if I remember correctly). Windows Movie Maker. Allows for users to cut and copy scenes of movies to their heart's content. http://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=56998 VLC Media Player using EDL's via playlists Corel WinDVD has "Quick Clip" settings for capturing from DVD. http://superuser.com/questions/85278/how-can-i-cut-scenes-out-of-a-dvd http://blog.josephhall.com/2008/09/command-line-dvd-authoring-part-1.html == Troubleshooting == Note that you'll need java previously installed for this to work. You probably already do though. If you run into a snag, it might have failed in "grabbing" the DVD, and only got part of it. Try cleaning your DVD and starting over (delete all files, start again). Baking soda toothpaste might help with cleaning it. If it still errs, report it, along with a screen snapshot and steps of how to reproduce the problem, preferably. See feedback section. It can fail also because a deletion is past end of DVD, or Also note that if your DVD has scratches that cause it to skip, the time signatures will be off after that point, so clean your discs and try again! Also make sure you aren't out of disk space. Also you could try a different computer (desktop computers' DVD drives seem to work better at times than laptops') Too slow? One big speedup would be getting a faster hard drive (SSD perhaps, though sensible cinema mostly reads large files, so a speedy spinning disk might help, too). A second might be to get a faster DVD drive. I'm not certain but I don't believe that a faster cpu (or even dual core, etc.), will help much, though it might like 3% or something. Also ping me if you think it's too slow and I'll see what I can do. == Feedback == Feedback, including feature requests, comments, etc. welcome. Mailing List: http://groups.google.com/group/sensible-cinema If you're a developer and want to help out with programmming it, please do! Source code: http://github.com/rdp/sensible-cinema (create an issue for any feature requests/bugs) or e-mail rogerdpack@gmail.com