Adobe Encore Lab

1. Planning your DVD
2. Importing files
3. Creating a timeline
4. Adding chapter points
5. Importing a layered Photoshop file as a menu
6. Setting start and end behaviors
7. Setting behaviors for remote control buttons
8. Preview the project
9. Burn the DVD (we will save the output file)

I'm just going to touch on each one of these elements to give you a "how to" and "what's capable" starting point.

1. Planing your DVD - You will have to plan your timeline. Decide what will play when the DVD starts. Plan on what is in your menu, two buttons, three buttons, etc. Next what will play when each button is pushed, and where they should go once they finish, back to the menu, or automatically play the next buttons video.
2. Importing files - After opening Encore you will want to start a new project. Once the new project is created the project window will appear. If your right click in the project window you can import in your video files. Import them as assets.
3. Creating a timeline - select Timeline->New Timeline. Go to the properties palette and give it a name like "Introduction". Select one of your videos and drag it to the video track similar to Premier. You can now view the timeline in the Monitor window.
4. Adding chapter points - Select a video in the Project window and Create a New Timeline button at the bottom of the Project window. A initial chapter point is automatically generated at the beginning of a timeline. Move the current-time indicator to the right a ways and Choose Timeline->Add Chapter Point, or right click on teh current-time indicator and select Add Chapter Point. In the properties window you can rename your chapter (probably a good idea).
5. Importing a layered Photoshop file as a menu - You can create your own menu, but the Encore software has several examples in the library. Select F8 and the library window will appear. Choose a menu such as the Entertainment Menu. The bottom right three buttons on the library screen allow you to turn off buttons, backgrounds and only show the menus if you push the right buttons. Select a menu and drag it to your projects window.
   1. Adding Video to a Button- Next select the menu tab behind projects and double click on your menu. It should open up in an editor that will allow you to click on words and edit them, etc. etc. Once the Menu editor is open you can select a button on the menu (most of the words are buttons). If the word is a button it will show as a button in the properties window. After selecting a button choose the arrow next to the link drop down in the properties window. There you will see your project timelines. Choose a timeline, or a chapter on the timeline to link that button to that part of the video.
   2. Previewing the video - Back in the menu window right click on your menu and choose "Set as first play". Go to file->preview and view your video. On playback your menu should first show up and then when you click the button your video should start playing at the point where you told it to play.
   3. . You can add music to your menus. Import the audio as an asset. Open up the menu in the editor window and from the project window drag the audio over to the menu and drop it. In the menus properties window the audio box will have the name of your menu's background music, sound, whatever.
6. Setting start and end behaviors- In the properties window you will set the actions for all your buttons in the menu, or any submens. You can set your buttons to open another menu. For each timeline you can set the ending action once the timeline is completed.
7. Setting behaviors for remote control buttons - In the project window click on an empty space so nothing is selected. This will make the disc attributes show up in the properties pallette. The Title Button is what is played if the viewer clicks the Title button on the remote. Usually this would be a menu that will play.
   • Next select a timeline and in the properties window set the Menu Remote to whatever you want to show up when the menu button is pushed while this timeline is playing.
8. Previewing the project - Select file->preview. The buttons, videos, chapter points should all work in the preview window.
9. To Burn a DVD - In the projects window select the disc tab. Then you would fill out the rest of this stuff to burn to a DVD if you had a DVD burner attached to the machine you are using. You can create a disc image that you can later burn.

Make a project. Put in some chapter points, menus, submenus, audio on your menus, etc. etc. etc.