Final Cut Express HD Clickable Onscreen Menu Options
 

Does FCE HD have the ability to provide clickable onscreen menu options, i.e. the capability to set icons on screen which one can click on via one's DVD remote control so that you can access other parts of the DVD?

Or is this more the province of DVD authoring?

Thanks,
GVDV

You create the chapters in FCE

Software like iDVD or DVD Studio Pro do the acutal DVD authoring; that is, make those chapters "useable" on the DVD menu

For chapter creation in FCE (briefly):

Create the Chapters in your Timeline. Make sure nothing is selected. Put the Playhead at the point where you want to make the chapter. Double click the "M" key to bring up the the chapter box. Type in a title for the chapter if you want and click Chapter Number, type in a number (do NOT delete the <Chapter> label, it will not show up on your DVD) Continue along thusly

Export as Quicktime Movie and select Chapters (again, before exporting, make sure nothing is selected in the Timeline)

Now you can drop the resulting movie into iDVD or DVD Studio Pro. Both of them automatically create a chapter at the very head of your movie which can either re-name or delete later

That's a really brief over view. Consult your manuals for more info, but basically those chapters you created will show up in your DVD authoring program where you will have more options about buttons, etc

hi Victor,
Many apologies for not having replied to you sooner with thanks for your message - so, thanks.

And your explanation of DVD authoring programs making chapters useable is very clear so thanks for that.

I still have a couple of questions about this topic, so I hope that it's O.K. to ask you.

How much flexibility do the DVD authoring programs that you mention allow in terms of the physical presentation of icons for chapters. For example if I designed a graphic (vector, .jpg whatever) would I be able to import it into the program to use as a clickable icon to use as access to a chapter.

Thanks
GVDV

What you are talking about is customizing a chapter "button" and you certainly can do that with DVD Studio Pro. For that matter, I think you could do it with iDVD as well.


What the best graphic formats would be (jpg, tiff, etc) and sizing, etc would be up to the program but their documentation would give you the details.

DVD Studio Pro is incredibly fexible and is designed to be customizable (is that a word?). iDVD is a little more limited but much can be done with that

You should check out Ken Stone's website; he has a lot of great arcticles and the kinds of thing you are curious about. I believe its Ken Stone.net