I have Easy DVD Creator by Roxio and DVDLab Pro on my computer. I have captured a video from my camcorder (family Christmas), so that's not a problem. However, with Easy DVD Creator, I feel like the options for the menus are relatively limited. I don't mean limited in customizing as much as limited in backgrounds, animations, music, etc. DVDLab Pro offers a ton of customizing, but it's also a bit confusing. Probably a bit more powerful than I need. I'm probably just missing something, so correct me if I'm just lost. My real question is this... is there anywhere I can download more animations/music/etc. to use as menus? Or is there a relatively easy way to create my own? I want to customize the final DVD to look quasi-professional without spending weeks making the thing. Cheers!
Just download any graphic you want for backgrounds. Resize it to fit. You can use looping video too, there's a few free ones on the mainconcept website. You can use any music you like as well, just make sure you convert it to the same format as your dvd audio (mp2 or ac3), as MP3's won't work. Ffmpeggui is a free tool that will do it for you. Don't forget to look at the FX and D-FX buttons for lots of strange things you can do to menus. I have tutorials on using dvdlab, making motion menus, switched menus, etc., at videohelp.com
Excellent! Thank you very much for the help. I tried looking at the mainconcept page, and there were a few decent motion backgrounds. I would prefer something "Christmas" oriented though, since I'm making a family Christmas DVD. Easy DVD Creator came with an okay one, but I was hoping for something a wee bit better. Does anyone know anywhere else I could find motion DVD backgrounds? Preferably free, but I could live with spending a little money for a bunch. Cheers!
DVDLab allows you to make your own motion menus, using any video clip. Encode it as you would for any video, demux, and set it as background in your menu. Add your buttons, links, etc., then render it as a motion menu. You can fine tune the start and end points of the motion easily.
you can also create your own menus with roxio . you could even take a chunk or a highlight of the actuale dvd itself and use that for your menu background and thit the add background menu music tab in roxio and use whatever music you have on your harddrive or import off a cd if u like. with roxio it will auto loop your chunk of video for you i think the loop time is about 30 seconds or so . so when you add your music try and grab about 30 seconds of the main part of the song and use your roxio sound editor to fade in and fade out your 30 second loop so that it doesnt just cut off when it loops . all the tabs are right there on the video wave screen for creating your menus . you could even freeze a favorite frame of the video you created from your camcorder and use that as a background . myself i think a animated background is the way to go really makes the intro very awsome . this is just my opinion though , as im sure the dvdlab app is just as easy or may be even easier to use . i have never used it ,sounds like a very detailed app with lots of goodies . anyway i thought i would give my two cents in because i have produced some very awsome home flics with the easy media creator software . i have been sold on since version 5 and i just upgraded to version 8 about 3weeks ago . and the new roxio smokes the older versions by far . as even 7.5 took a heck of alot of time rendoring my movies and now the new version just cruises right through the rendoring process . for a newbie such as myself i think roxio is a very straight foward easy to use and will have you burning your home movies within the first day of using the app .
