User Guide

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6 Introduction to Creating Menus
Menus are the backbone of your project. To ensure
a positive experience for the viewer, it’s important to
create menus that provide logical navigation and
a consistent experience.
Menus provide the buttons that the person viewing a DVD uses to configure the disc’s
playback and to choose the tracks and slideshows that supply the DVD’s content. DVD
menus are made up of a background, which can be a still image or a full-motion movie,
and buttons. For the most part, the elements that make up a menu are created outside
of DVD Studio Pro. You use DVD Studio Pro to combine these elements into a complete
menu and assign actions to the buttons. See “Preparing Menu Sources” on page 81 for
details on creating the graphics used in your menus.
DVD Studio Pro includes templates and styles that can make it easier to create menus.
You can use the supplied templates and styles to quickly create your menus, or you can
create your own templates and styles. Using templates and styles lets you apply a
standardized look to your menus for all of your projects—for example, to maintain a
corporate image. See “Using Templates, Styles, and Shapes to Create Your Menus” on
page 303 for more information.
About Menus
Before you create your menus, you need to understand the two different methods used
to create menus in DVD Studio Pro, and be aware of special considerations for menus
with a 16:9 aspect ratio. If you are authoring HD projects, you also need to be aware of
special issues when creating HD menus.