Easiest way to make non-square buttons in DVD Studio Pro?

[Eug]

It seems easy enough to make menus in DVD Studio Pro with rectangular buttons.

However, my superficial knowledge suggests it's much harder to make buttons of different shapes. Before I waste too much time experimenting, what's the easiest approach?

P.S. I'd previously had problems using Photoshop files. The menus seem to hang on them. My menus have all been with PICT files.

[Eug]

I'd previously had problems using Photoshop files. The menus seem to hang on them. My menus have all been with PICT files.

Hmmm... I had audio playing the background for the menu. I'm told you can't use .psd files with that. I'll have to look into this further.

[Macnewbie]

Have you checked the DVDSP pdf manual? If it doesn't mention it, then I doubt it. I'm not at my mac right now so I can't check for you. BTW: I'm assuming you are referring to the actual rectangular button border that DVDSP creates when you add a button. You can, of course, create any shape you want with Photoshop or some other graphic program. I'm just not sure if you can define custom, non-rectangular button borders with DVDSP.

[tgpo]

At work, where I use DVDSP, none of our menus have square buttons, but the program references them as rectangles. This just shows the program where to change the layers in the menu. We create 3 Photoshop layers per button. Each button is a triangle, but in DVDSP we must place the rectangle button around where we want the triangle to change. We then change the active, normal, and selected states(I'm not in front of it so those may be different) to the desired layer. Once we create the menu it appears as only the triangles are changing...thus a triange button.

[Macnewbie]

At work, where I use DVDSP, none of our menus have square buttons, but the program references them as rectangles. This just shows the program where to change the layers in the menu. We create 3 Photoshop layers per button. Each button is a triangle, but in DVDSP we must place the rectangle button around where we want the triangle to change. We then change the active, normal, and selected states(I'm not in front of it so those may be different) to the desired layer. Once we create the menu it appears as only the triangles are changing...thus a triange button.

Do your buttons have transparent backgrounds? I thought that anything inside the rectangle defined by DVDSP will change. I'm assuming a transparent background would get around this so that only the actual button changes when selected. I'm new to DVDSP, so I'm still learning.

[tgpo]

Yes the buttons are transparent except for the triangle area.

[leebo]

P.S. I'd previously had problems using Photoshop files. The menus seem to hang on them. My menus have all been with PICT files.

Eug,

I just read something about this in the latest DV Magazine. Their resident DVD expert (Ralph LeBarge) mentions something about the delay being inherent in the DVD spec when using PSD files with layers.
Something about how it allows using more colors in the buttons and highlights, but the downside was a lag after clicking the button.
PICT files resulted in no lag but only 4 colors available.

I didn't completely understand it, but it suggests the problem is with the file type and not the audio.