Awesome trick with DVD Workshop 2 - Ulead rocks!

[sdsumike619]

Just discovered a new trick that was staring at me forever in DVD Workshop so I thought I'd tell you. With this trick, you'll be able to create your entire menu in Photoshop or any program. Here's what you do:

Create your menu including all the buttons etc (layers) in photoshop. As many layers as you want. After the menu is just the way you want it, save the file as a PNG (It will be flattened, no more layers.)

Go into DVDWS2, create your project. Go to the menu step and import your png file under "image general" and drag it to the preview window. So you should see your menu just as it was created in photoshop, just one flat image.

Next, using the text tool, just create an underline, like this __________ (doesn't have to be an underline) and click away from it so it puts it on the screen where you can move it around. Position the line you just made over one of the "buttons/options" in your flattened image, e.g. a play button or the word Play

After you do that, click on the button tab and select the Highlight Image drop down. Drag the highlight image of your choosing (I use the one that looks like a brushed underline hi48.ufo) onto that horizontal line you put. Now the highlight image is linked to that line.

Here's the trick now:

Right underneath where you pick your font, bold, etc, there is a check box that says "invisible button" I've seen this button a million times and never even thought of this till now. All you have to do is make sure that ____ is selected and check that box and the horizontal line disappears from view! (Before doing that, make sure to link that text to your movie)

So now just position your highlight image next to or under the area of the flatten image that corresponds to your button. So simple! The user of the DVD would never know. To him, he's just moving the cursor (the highlight image) from option to option even though all the options are contained in a flattened image.

This gives you the ability to create absolutely everything in photoshop, or any program for that matter. No need to save all your buttons as individual files anymore. I'm stoked I figured out the obvious. It couldn't have been too obvious though because I haven't seen anyone talk about this method in the forum. Nice to figure out something for once instead of asking =) Let me know if you have any questions..

MiKe

[Wile_E]

If I followed you correctly, all this does is put a line underneath the button. The button itself does not highlight. I've seen this done on some DVD's. It is very basic, and even TMPGENC DVD Author can just show a line. I would rather want the whole button to highlight.

[sdsumike619]

Most hollywood DVDs I rent from the store use an underline or some other highlight image to indicate an option is selected. Doesn't have to be an underline. You can use whatever image you want and not have to worry about naming layers and all that other stuff. Design a great looking flattened menu and use the highlight image as your selector. Super fast way to produce a professional DVD.

[canadateck]

or you can just save your menu and all your buttons in one PSP file and import that into DVD Workshop, there is no need to Save every image/Layer as a separate file.

[sdsumike619]

What is a PSP image?

[canadateck]

Paint Shop Pro or psd Photoshop

[canadateck]

If you use PSP I think you would have to Convert to Psd.

[sdsumike619]

I have paint shop pro. Never tried to import a PSP file directly.. But if you try to import a PSD file, it only halfway works. if you do any kind of effects to text, when you try to import into DVDWS2, it will import the various layers but you lose ALL effects - everything is converted to plain white text. If you have a way of importing PSD files that doesn't lose any information like effects, please share.

[canadateck]

Plain Text is just that "Plain" anything other then Plain is a Layer/Image. like this http://www.tellerhousehotel.com/Welcome-Text.jpg \\Its text on an image.

[sdsumike619]

Well exactly - That's what I'm saying. There's no sense trying to create and import a PSD file into DVD Workshop if it's just going to import the layers as plain white text. The whole point of using a program like photoshop is to make the menu look nice with text effects, glows, shadow, emboss, etc.. (The text effect capabilities of DVDWS2 exist but they're very limited.)

Importing a PSD with layers into DVDWS2 would be the same as creating those text elements in DVDWS2, picking the same font and making the text white because that's what happens to PSDs when you try to import them.

With the trick I just learned, you can create the entire menu (background image, buttons/text) and flatten the image into a PNG, thus preserving everything you used photoshp for. Then make invisible buttons and use a highlight image such as a star, a checkmark, an underline, or anything you want as your selection tools.

Simple for the user to know where he is on the menu (I've seen plenty of DVDs in which it's hard to tell which item is selected), and you get a great looking menu, FAST (well as fast as you can produce it in photoshop/paint shop pro, etc)

[canadateck]

Yes DVDWS2 is fine for Plain Text, DVDWS2 is limited with what you can do with text,you couldnt do this. http://www.springfield.k12.oh.us/zach/cooltext.jpg

[sdsumike619]

exactly. But say you have that image and others like it on a menu. Take your 720x480 menu with all the stuff on it just the way you like and drop it in DVDWS2 as a PNG. This is what you can use the invisible button feature coupled with the highlight image for in DVDWS2.

[guns1inger]

In PS7, you can right-click on the layer styles icon on a layer, and select Create Layers from the drop down menu. This will convert most of the style effects to seperate raster layers. You can then merge these to preserve them as raster effects without the layer styles. These can then be imported into DVDWS2 or DLP2 without losing their visual appeal. This should hold true for later version of PS as well, although I don't have CS2 in front of me at the moment, so I don't know if it has an easier method.

[sdsumike619]

well before I discovered the invisible button trick, I was trying to do something like what you describe. I'd have a text layer with layer styles applied to it. Then I tried to use "duplicate layer" to a new file. then I had to crop that new file down to the size of the text. and then save it as an image. Problem was, the image didn't look quite the same as it did in the psd file. Why, I don't know, I'm not a photoshop expert. I'll give what you said a try but as far as less number of steps, the invisible button trick is super fast once you've created the menu exactly how you like it.

One question I do have. What frame size do you use for NTSC to bring into DVDWS2? All their built in files are 768x576 with a 10% safe area (by default) So I created a 768x576 menu with a 10% safe area in photoshop, however, when I brought it into DVDWS2, I noticed that stuff I had at the very edge of the safe area in photoshop was now in quite a bit farther (meaning I had quite a bit more room to move out farther towards the safe area boundary) Have you experienced this?

[guns1inger]

768 x 576 is PAL adjusted for non-square pixels.

I usually use CS2, which allows for working in a 720 x 576 space with non-square pixel adjustment, so it is a bit more WYSIWYG. However you have top remember that there are two safe areas. 10% sounds more like the Action Safe area, whereas Title Safe (where your menus need to be) would be closer to 15%

[sdsumike619]

Well I'm on NTSC actually.. just saying the menu images that come with DVDWS2 are all 768x576.. But what you said about the safe area makes even less sense now because if the safe area was 15%, the titles I have would be even more towards the center.. The problem I'm seeing is that when I drop the image into DVDWS2, the titles aren't right up against the safe area as they are in photoshop, yet I have both photoshop and DVDWS2 using a safe area of 10%....Weirdness

[guns1inger]

If the menus are all 768 x 576 then they are built for PAL, but resized for NTSC. If you are using the same starting size, then your graphics will also be resized down, and hence pushed further to toward the centre. try using 720 x 540 for NTSC

[sdsumike619]

thanks for the tip, will give that a try!