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Question about custom PS menus in Encore CS6 for Bluray project
Project is for Blu-ray. I can’t seem to find the answer to this anywhere.
Basically, I have a documentary about a group of friends taking a roadtrip around the country. The film is broken down by days, which coincide with different cities they stop in.
For example:
– Day 1 they were in Atlanta, GA.
– Day 2 they were in Tallahassee, FL.
– Day 3 they were in Jacksonville, FL
– EtcThe problem I’m having is with the Chapter menu.
The Chapter menu it’s a map of the region with the cities they stopped in and a graphic of their route with a line to each city.
Across the bottom of the menu are the Days to select, ie Day 1, Day 2, Day 3. These are the buttons to select and are not part of the map.
When the Days are selected with the bottom buttons I also want the cities in the map to be highlighted as well. But I can’t figure out how to do this? When I bring the menu into Encore it gets all screwed up with selections all overlapping each other, because it thinks both the bottom Day buttons and the map city highlights are both buttons.
I only want the lower Day buttons to be selectable, and when they are chosen the city lights up as a separate informational graphic (which is not meant to be selectable as part of the button, just to provide the viewer additional information, in this case a reference on the map of where they are on each Day).
If anyone can shed some light on how to do this I’d be most appreciative.
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14 Replies
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Adam,
this is possible but a bit of work.could you please upload your menu with open layers (typo flatted or fonts included for mac) and post a download-link.
I could show you how to do this.
cheers
danny
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[Daniel Ludwig] “Adam,
this is possible but a bit of work.could you please upload your menu with open layers (typo flatted or fonts included for mac) and post a download-link.
I could show you how to do this.
cheers
danny”
Danny, thanks so much! Here’s a link to the PSD and the font.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ccuq22rkit1r3fi/map.zip -
Hi Adam,
short note for you – still working on your menu. not finished yet, but nearly.the main issue is a limitation of the number of the (sub-)pages within encore. with a “real” spec-authoring-application you could turn on/off buttons, which you can do within encore, which got a limit of 5 sub-pages alltogether.
keep you posted – I guess will be finished within the next two days.
cheers
danny
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[Daniel Ludwig] “Hi Adam,
short note for you – still working on your menu. not finished yet, but nearly.the main issue is a limitation of the number of the (sub-)pages within encore. with a “real” spec-authoring-application you could turn on/off buttons, which you can do within encore, which got a limit of 5 sub-pages alltogether.
keep you posted – I guess will be finished within the next two days.
cheers
danny”
Danny, thanks for the update. Anxious to see how you do this. So you’re saying I can only have up to 5 of the cities light up?
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Hi Adam,
I´ve uploaded the menu to my ftp. you can download it here: https://www.moviedesign.de//files/130410_encore_map_demo.ziphere are some additional infos about the project:
1. I needed to split and re-arrage your menu-PSDs to take care of the function you would like to have.
2. as encore could only handle 5 (!!) menu-subpages I needed to split the menu into 2 PSD-files – I called them part1 + 2. this is a stupid limitation or maybe a bug of encore which is not necessary by the way.
now to the logical structure of the project:
– as you could see within the encore-project there are a lot auto-activated buttons on every page (hope I don´t forgot one).
so on page 0 of menu part one (wich is the page for day1+2) the button 1+2 are NON auto-activated and needed to be linked to your feature of these days. all other buttons of the menu (exepted credits and back-button) are auto-activated and they are linking to the same button on another sub-page.
for example on page 0 of part1 button 3 is linking to page (day 3) to button 3. button 4 is linking to page (day 4) to button 4 – etc.
so you make clear that there are a lot sub-pages where the map will change to the right city(s).
as we have 2 pages/PSDs within different titles there will be a short interruption when you switch from one to another! you need to be aware of this.
the map with the cities on the top right is a so called dummy-button – it will change all time you jump from one sub-page to the next.
the project is created as 1080p23.98. you need to import the PSD-files into your project and start working on them as well – as I told you, it´s a bit of work. 😉
accoring to button-routing:
you need to deactivate the automatic button-routing and do it yourself – especially to take care that NO button is linked to button 13 which is the map-dummy-button.
also you need to check the map-color-settings and the color-highlight-groups, that they are the same for both PSDs and buttons.
I hope you understand what I´ve programmed so far – if you have further questions, please let me know.
cheers
danny
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Hi Danny, thank you. I’ve downloaded the files and have examined what you did.
I think this has become overly confusing because in addition to the red city dot lighting up, you are having the city names be stroked when a day is selected, which is adding a lot of unnecessary layers.
I only want the red dot to light up by the city name when the appropriate day is chosen. The cities should already all be stroked by default be and part of the flattened background. In other words, the look of the city names do not ever change when anything is selected. Only the red dots light up by each city.
I’m not sure if it was clear that’s the way it’s supposed to work?
So, I’m wondering how to make it so it works that way.
I greatly appreciate your help with this.
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Adam,
to make this menu more easy (and within one menu-page) you need anather blu-ray authoring-application. all these layers and sub-pages are necessary to make sure your menu(s) is/are working you would like to. I know the structure is a bit confusing, but that´s the only way it would work within encore.sorry – but it wasn´t really clear, that you only want to have highlighted dots, but to do this it´s not a lot work.
as you coud see within the PSD-files I created a smart object for the (=1)-layer. which is a nested layer-composition.
all you have to do is double-klick on it and turn off the layer which contains the city-name.
here you are – city name wont be vissible and only your red dot will be highlighted.
cheers
danny
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Danny, I think I got he red dot figured out.
Where exactly to I link the day buttons to my chapter markers?
What other authoring program would you recommend that would be step up from Encore that would do what I want?
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Hi Adam,
you need to link frommap part1.PSD
page0 button day1+2 to chaper 1+2
page (day3) button day3 to chapter 3
page (day4) button day4 to chapter 4
page (day5) button day5 to chapter 5
page (day6) button day6 to chapter 6map part2.PSD
page0 button day7 to chaper 7
page (day8+9) button day8+9 to chapter 8+9
page (day10) button day10 to chapter 10that´s the way it should work.
if you would like to start authoring better created BDs you should look at DVD Logics EasyBD Suite (that´s with IG-Editor which you need for the menu-creation) – it could create all you want, but there´s a learning curve, too.
https://www.dvd-logic.com/easybd/
cheers
danny
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Hi Danny, thanks for all your help with this. This menu map issue is becoming very frustrating. I wish Encore could just do it the way I want, but it doesn’t. The menu example I gave you is only 1 of 20 I have to do (project is for a box set of 20 films, each one has its own map (eek). The thought of making those complicated and confusing sub-page PSD menus for 20 titles is enough to make me want to break down into tears haha.
You were right about Easy BD and there being a learning curve. Being a Mac user I have Parallels and have installed the demos of EasyBD Studio. Coming from Encore with it’s nice and understandable UI, EasyBD is like a nightmare working with. There are no tutorials and I am completely lost on how to make my menus with their menu app IGEditor. I can’t even figure out the first thing about it, more less how to import the PSD menus and get everything to work.
I saw you have posted in the the DVDLogic forum, so I assume you’re experienced in EasyBD Studio? And you say it can do what I need with the menus and the city dots lighting up?
I am wondering how much you might charge to make the menus for me (into I guess .ies files?), and then I can assemble them in EasyBD and link up all the media to everything. I have all the PSDs ready for each menu that I could upload for you. Since all the maps are the same concept but just different locations around the country, perhaps if you created one for me I could study the layers and make the rest myself?
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