5 Replies Latest reply: Feb 24, 2011 8:20 AM by SupersoulVP RSS

    Menu Buttons and highlights

    steveprc Community Member

      I'm new to Encore, but not to most of the other applications in CS5. So I created a menu page in Illustrator, exported to Photoshop PSD so I could use it in Encore. I have buttons with some shading and gradient fills to give them a 3D look. Within each of those buttons is a "light" also given some shading and gradients to look 3D. I duplicated the text, then gave it an outer glow, and then dupicated the "light" within the button and put in a bright green color. I combined these two elements on a common layer and used Encore's (=1) syntax to identify it and the others as highlights so when any of the menu items are selected, the text will glow and the "light" turns green, but I'm not having any luck getting it to work. I don't know if I've exceed the allowable parameters, used improper syntax, or just pushed my luck using Illustrator. Any good resources that help to explain the process of creating menus thoroughly, or advice on how to properly set-up the highlights?

        • 1. Re: Menu Buttons and highlights
          Stan Jones CommunityMVP

          I don't know if I've exceed the allowable parameters


          Probably that: limited to 2 bit indexed color.  You can get some of your effects by putting them in the background layer, but others require faking the DVD specs by having an autoselect take you to another identical menu, that has the appearance you want as part of the background layer.

           

          just pushed my luck using Illustrator.

          I don't recall anyone trying that.  No reason you can't, but I would take one of the  psd menus in Encore, edit in photoshop, and make changes there till you sort out what works and what doesn't.

           

          If you've found the help files that deal with making menus in photoshop and after effects, it has most of the plain mechanics.

          • 2. Re: Menu Buttons and highlights
            SupersoulVP Community Member

            Hey Steve.  You may want to avoid using (=1) to signify a highlight layer.  I learned the hard way that using that can cause a percentage of dvd players to not see the highlight layer.  I now always use (=3) for all my dvd and blu-ray projects and have had no more problems.

            • 3. Re: Menu Buttons and highlights
              Stan Jones CommunityMVP

              Wasn't the =3 only an issue for some Macs?

              • 4. Re: Menu Buttons and highlights
                Bill Hunt CommunityMVP

                Along with Stanley's suggestion of the dupe Menus with graphics (a good one, BTW, and one that I use often), you might want to see this ARTICLE. While you cannot break the DVD laws, you can fool your viewer into thinking that you have done so.

                 

                Good luck,

                 

                Hunt

                • 5. Re: Menu Buttons and highlights
                  SupersoulVP Community Member

                  Stan.

                   

                  The disc I was referring to was made on a Mac, but I can't say if it is an authoring problem that only exists on Macs.  The dvd's highlights worked perfectly fine on a PS3, on a computer, and on a very new dvd player.  The highlights did NOT show up on a 5 year old (ish) Pioneer dvd recorder or on the $30 super low grade Colby dvd player we keep around for checking discs.

                   

                  Trying to get things done in the end, I didn't spot this error 'till I had already made the DDP files and I was just making a reference DVD-R to accompany them.  After finding the solution here in the forums, I changed all the highlights to be =3, and have not had that problem since.

                   

                  It has to be some kind of random anomaly though, otherwise basically everyone would have this problem...