Motion Menu Transition Problems

I have seen motion menus where the buttons will animate on the screen while objects are animating in the background like pics/vids and then the buttons will become clickable. I have been taught that to animate buttons I need to make an AE comp, bring it back into Encore, set it as first play, and at the end connect it to the main menu which is a psd file. I have found that this creates an interruption between the end of the AE comp and the beginning of the menu (and the motion background). I am wondering how to remove this interruption to make it a more seamless transition between the buttons animating in and the video playing. I hope I'm explaining this right an example of what i'm talking about can be found here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9_A1zBNWA0
Thanks.

You can do that:
The "menu" and button highlights are in the psd, not the background movie. You tell Encore when you want the buttons to appear.
Here's encore help:
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/encore/cs/using/WSA5513911-0AD1-440c-BDAD-2E0E806B425E.html
Here's an adobe tutorial on using AE for EN menus:
http://www.adobe.com/designcenter/video_workshop/?id=vid0258
From the After Effects help:
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/aftereffects/cs/using/WS3878526689cb91655866c1103906c6dea-7e45 a.html

Similar Messages

Using LT for motion menu background – problems

I’m trying to use a LT texture (Canvas>Sinopia) as a motion menu background. I exported 30 secs of the rendered texture direct from LT. The QT file size is 1.09 GB. Couldn’t get it to work in DVDSP. Took that file into FCP and re-exported it using custom settings. File size now 108.7 MB. Still doesn’t work in DVDSP.
Should I be putting the 30 second file through Compressor? Is it the large file size that is causing the problems?
Importing the .lpr file into DVDSP also doesn’t work (although I prefer to pre-render all assets, otherwise DVDSP slows to a crawl).
I’ve now tried the texture as a 5 sec version (20 MB file) – works fine, but there’s an annoying jump in the loop every 5 secs. If I could fix that, the menu would probably be OK.
Any advice appreciated.
Regards. Robert.

Both solutions worked. Wish I could award 2 solved stars.
Compressor produced an m2v file of 21.9 MB. I'm going with that because the workflow is quicker and simpler on my old setup.
Exporting as DV from FCP produced a file size of 103.2 MB. My DVDSP slows down with large file sizes, so I'll give it a miss. Or could still be me doing something incorrectly.
I'm working in SD PAL 16:9.
Help was much appreciated.
Regards. Robert.

For all of you who are having Motion Menu render problems - try this

Just humour me for a minute.
I have another Sonic application, and a known bug in the Motion Menu rendering applies to 29.97DF projects only.
IE, NTSC.
Often the video in a motion menu will fail to mux.
There are workarounds though.
1 - Make sure your GOP structure is 15 at most
2 - Make certain the frame length of your video file is divisible by the GOP structure. IE, it must be a multiple of 15 frames.
3 - if these both fail, reduce the bitrate of the video 500kbps at a time until it muxes. Most will work at 7,000, some need to be 6,000 and there are even times when you need to go as low as 4000.
Try it - Encore uses a Sonic Authorcore, so it's worth a look.

>Are you saying that NTSC 29.97 divided by 15 is okay?
Not really.
What I am saying is that your movie frame length should be divisible by the GOP structure with a GOP of 15.
With NTSC video, you can have GOP lengths
i up to
18, but it is not mandatory to go to 18 - 15 is a perfectly acceptable figure. You could use a GOP of 12 if you really wanted to. What this means is typically the number of frames between I-Frames.
MPEG-2 encoding (AKA "Moving Pictures by Educated Guesswork") P & B frames work something like this:
i P-frames provide more compression than I-frames because they take advantage of the data in the previous I-frame or P-frame. I-frames and P-frames are called reference frames. To generate a P-frame, the previous reference frame is reconstructed, just as it would be in a TV receiver or DVD player. The frame being compressed is divided into 16 pixel by 16 pixel macroblocks. Then, for each of those macroblocks, the reconstructed reference frame is searched to find that 16 by 16 macroblock that best matches the macroblock being compressed. The offset is encoded as a "motion vector." Frequently, the offset is zero. But, if something in the picture is moving, the offset might be something like 23 pixels to the right and 4 pixels up. The match between the two macroblocks will often not be perfect. To correct for this, the encoder computes the strings of coefficient values as described above for both macroblocks and, then, subtracts one from the other. This "residual" is appended to the motion vector and the result sent to the receiver or stored on the DVD for each macroblock being compressed. Sometimes no suitable match is found. Then, the macroblock is treated like an I-frame macroblock. The processing of B-frames is similar to that of P-frames except that B-frames use the picture in the following reference frame as well as the picture in the preceding reference frame. As a result, B-frames usually provide more compression than P-frames. B-frames are never reference frames.
In short, the I-Frame is the full description reference frame. A P frame is also a reference frame but describes the difference between the last I-Frame & itself. A good analogy is when you are on the telephone & describing what you see to a friend. The initial background description (The street, the sky, what you can see etc) would be an I-Frame. Then you describe a person walking down the street - that would be your P-Frames, as you are only describing the i changes
in the scene.
The bitrate can also affect things - I mentioned this too, and if a motion menu will not mux, first make sure that the film length is divisible by the GOP, and that the GOP is 15.
If it
i still
won't mux, drop the bitrate by factors of 500 until it will.

Motion Menu to Layered Menu transition with Music?

I have created a motion menu with video as an intro, then I want to transition (dissolve or FX) to a standard graphic menu made in photoshop as a single layer with simple buttons overlayed in DVDSP, all with a single, unbroken music track under both as it plays. Can it be done?

Can't be done. Each element (menus, transtions, tracks, ect) are all located in their own "container" within the DVD structure. Because of this, you cannot have unbroken audio.
Just make your intro and main menu one piece and adjust your loop point to have your 8bits appear when you'd like.

Flash motion menu problem

Hi,
Ive made a dvd with the first play as a motion menu containing a small video clip. Ten seconds, plays once then moves to a static menu. There is nothing else in the menu (no buttons etc) and all it contains is the locked background layer that encore generates plus the movie linked through the motion tab.
I used a menu to do this other than a time line because I was getting a weird scaling thing when it jumped to the static menu. Not a 4:3 - 16:9 issue, just a slight scaling. Both are set to 720x576 WS PAL.
Anyway, this menu shows up fine when I preview the dvd in encore but when I make a flash version for the client to preview, the motion menu is just black. Audio plays but no video. The rest of the dvd works fine in the flash version.
Any ideas?
Thanks for your time.

What is the AV format of the Motion Menu Asset?
Can you post a screen-cap of the Layers of your Motion Menu?
When one has a Scaling issue, and the pixel x pixel size matches, it is often a mis-match in PAR (Pixel Aspect Ratio), and is often square pixels in one case, and non-square pixels in the other. IIRC, with PAL, that would be 1.0 vs 1.4 for the PAR's. To correct that Scaling, I would carefully check the PAR of all Assets in that Menu.
Good luck,
Hunt

Problem with text in Brush Stroke motion menu

Hi, I am using the Brush Stroke motion menu, which is designed to have the text within the brushstoke appear gradually as the brushstroke moves across the screen. That worked fine, until I went to change the color of the fonts. Something happened, and I ended up re-typing in the text, but now the text appears in complete form before the brush stroke even starts. Not nearly as nice looking. Is there a way to get back to having the text appear as the brushstroke moves?
Thanks, Bob

Just guessing!
I would suspecty a race condition. Most likely the signaling event gets triggered before the other locals receive their respective values.
Use a "one frame flat sequence" around all the locals, then feed the wire containing the "Position: X-axis" out the right edge and wire it to the signaling property outside of the sequence. This ensures proper order.
LabVIEW Champion . Do more with less code and in less time .

Drop zone (transparent) over motion menu problem

Hello.
I've created a semi-transparent photoshop file that I would like to use as a dropzone. When I import the psd file, DVDSP lists it as a "quicktime picture". When I drag the asset over my motion menu the part that is supposed to be transparent is white and covers up the entire motion background. Any ideas of what I'm doing wrong here?
Has anyone had success using transparent graphics in DVDSP 4?
Thanks.

i dont believe you can mix photoshop files the way you are intending with motion menus. I know you can create custom drop zones and patches using photoshop, but this is a more involved process than just dropping a psd over motion. I have exported tga that maintains transparency information and used them to success as drop zones. you could try that.
It would be better to bring you psd into a compositing program like motion, after effects, or even final cut, and create the motion for your menu there. Export it, compress it to m2v and bring that into dvd sp.

Motion menu not working

I'm frustrated. In the menu, under Properties/Motion tab, I select the video that I want to set up as my motion menu and it's not working. All I see is a static image of the video clip. The audio works but not the video clip set for motion. Please help.

But what I remembered is using part of a clip in Encore and I had a hell of a job to, anyway, unsuccessfully work the sound out ok. This is when I made the exact clip I needed in PP and imported it in Encore. Then I set the loop for ever. This way you can have this clip playing till someone chose what to wathch. I guess it's nice to have some movie starting automatically when there are not to many choices from them.
When doing both a Motion Menu and also adding Audio to it, you will probably be best served to Export these as elemental streams from PrPro, and Import those into Encore.
I will create a new Sequence in the Project, and create the Video part to the intended Duration for the Motion Menu. Same for my Audio, and often do this in yet another Sequence. I will chose Audio source files with quite a bit of repetition during the Duration, and a fade-in/fade-out to it. I've marked a half-dozen SmartSound pieces, that work very well for this.
The Video is Exported as DV-AVI Type II, with NO Audio, and multiplexing is turned off.
The Audio is Exported as either PCM/WAV 48KHz 16-bit, or AC3 DD 5.1 SS through the SurCode encoder (plug-in that costs ~US$250) for Surround Sound, NO Video and no multiplexing, obviously.
Doing it this way solves a lot of potential problems. Muxed files can cause issues with En, though not always.
One caveat that I learned the hard way - if you have Audio on your Menu and also Button Transitions with Audio, you will want the Audio for each to match perfectly in format and CODEC. Otherwise you will probably loose the Audio in one, or the other. Last caveat - stay as far away from MP3's as you can. Some work, some just do not and the quality will already have suffered greatly. I only use these for some of my SFX in PrPro and never, never for anything else.
Good luck and don't forget to Render those Motion Menus... [Grin]
Hunt

Issues with interlacing (I think), menu transitions, and video quality

Please see this set of images (note: large image, may need to stretch browser window to see it without scaling artifacts):
http://www.karma-lab.com/images-pub/apple-q/interlacedmenu.jpg
I'm having issues that I think are related to interlacing in some way, but I'm at a loss as to what do about it.
This relates mainly to using Apple's DVDPlayer software for testing my build, but I also just tested it by burning a disc and using Apple's DVDPlayer, and the results are the same.
The problem is, that my menu transitions play back nicely in Apple's DVDPlayer when Video > Deinterlace is set to On, but the video footage looks crappy. If I turn Video > Deinterlace off, then the menu transitions look crappy, but the video footage looks clean. And when I test the disc on a DVD Set top box, it looks the same as the bottom set of pictures - the menus look good, but the video suffers.
My project is SD 4:3, 720 x 480.
The original video was mainly screen-capture footage, progressive, and the FCP sequence settings are Field Dominance: None.
The video was exported from FCP as QuickTime movies. They look great.
The video was brought into Compressor, and the "DVD Best Quality 120 minutes 4:3" preset was use to make m2v video for import into DVDSP4. In these presets, the field order is set to "auto" - which when applied to the clips sets itself to Progressive.
The finished m2v video looks great in QuickTime, and also in DVDSP in the simulator. But once the disc is built, it has the problems mentioned above.
The menus use a Motion background. I tried running it through Compressor and making sure that the field dominance was set to Progressive, just to see if that had any effect, but it didn't... I'm at a complete loss as to what to try next.
Is this just what happens with progressive video on a DVD? Do I need to somehow "interlace" my video before bringing it into DVDSP?

Trai_Forrester wrote:
Yes, you've probably edited and / or encoded your video incorrectly - easy to do. First of all, did you let your main source footage set the sequence settings (by dropping a clip in a freshly created new Sequence)?
I don't believe this works that way in FCP 5.14, which is what I'm still using for various reasons I won't bore anyone with.
However, if I control click on one of my video clips in a timeline in FCP, and choose "Item Properties > Format", it shows me that it is 29.97 fps, pixel aspect Square, Field Dominance none, and 822 x 622. This "strange size" is because it's all screen capture video, of a piece of computer software being demonstrated, and that is the size of the software's "window" - we captured at the native resolution of the software screen, so it is 1 pixel:1 pixel.
The sequence itself is then set to be 830 x 622 (4:3), Field Dominance None (among other settings).
Once exported, it is a QuickTime movie at 830 x 622, progressive.
From there, it is encoded using Compressor's "DVD Best Quality 120 Minutes - 4:3" preset, with Field Dominance in the MPEG-2 setting set to "Progressive", where it becomes the correct frame size and m2v format.
So yes...I don't see how I can do anything more to keep it Progressive...
What codec did you edit your motion menus in? Probably different than you source material - so the sequence settings shouldn't be the same.
The motion menus were part of a purchased set of templates. It comes as a QT movie asset. I encoded it to m2v myself using the same Compressor preset, which got rid of at least a weird color shift that was happening on transitions due to allowing DVDSP to create the m2v during the build - but I don't really know how to make sure that the motion menus are "progressive" - although if I import the m2v version of the clip into FCP and do Item Properties > Format, it tells me that it is Field Dominance: None - so perhaps they are.
Does anyone know if DVDSP's menu transitions are always interlaced?

Just how on earth do you get menu transitions with sound to work???

I've tried importing them as DVD compliant MPEG-2s (audio and video multiplexed) made with Main Concept and also tried importing them as AVIs.
Encore seems incapable of transcoding either. Yes, it does try to transcode the MPEG-2s even though I've asked it not to. It seems that even DVD compliant files must be transcoded when used as transitions. It doesn't try to transcode motion menu or timeline MPEG-2s created in exactly the same way.
Can someone tell me exactly what Encore requires me to import to get working transitions with sound? Exact format, sound resolution, number of channels, bitrate, file type, etc. Is there a minimum length for transitions? Mine are 1 second long - they're just the transition flipping from page to page in a notebook.
Is there something else I'm missing or is Encore just not capable of doing this?
I think I'm going to have to just scrap the transitions otherwise :(
Thanks

One second is awfully short for an MPEG video clip. You're really challenging the MPEG decoder on the playback device. And if you're using .ac3 audio, it can take up to 2 seconds for the AC3 decoder on a hardware or software DVD player to lock on to the audio stream. Dolby themselves recommend 2 seconds of audio "black" at the beginning of an .ac3 soundtrack.
So - try lengthening the transition; or use PCM audio in your project instead of .ac3. Unfortunately, the PCM audio route leads to less space on the disc for your video.

DVD Burn Error: too much motion menu content yet not much.

hi
Keep getting this when i try to burn my DVD, can anyone advise?
+- The following warnings and errors were found during the validation of the current project:+
+- There seems to be too much motion menu content in your project. Correct this problem before you continue burning this project.+
Message was edited by: Logic Pro

Perhaps you can elaborate a bit more. How many menus do you have in the project? In the scenes menus how many motion buttons do you have? How many differen audio files are you using in the menus? Of the files you dropped into motion menus/buttons, how long are those clips? How long are the various audio files you are using? ? ? ? ?? ????? ???????????
I can't see your project so I have no idea what you are already using and if what you have is clearly excessive or not.
Patrick

CS5 Encore Animated Menu Rendering Problem

Anybody who could help! I am still experimenting but haven't find the solution (either very simple, or a serious bug ). Here is the problem: If I do any edit on the menu after setting the poster frames and/or inserting a motion (avi) or still (wav) background and re-render the menu, it plays the audio but shows the highlights only on a black background. Before rendering, all the (non-moving) background and/or the button pictures can be seen. For a simple experiment, I use the "NTSC Blank Menu" from the "General" Set in the Library panel with the "Drive-in Video Button". My only solution at this point is to start from the beginning with the Blank Menu and copy everything from the non-functioning menu, and insert the background and/or the button pictures (via the poster frame selection), but do not touch anything at this point, and render it, it works as it supposed to. I checked the layers in Photoshop and there is no difference between the functioning and non-functioning menu layer sets. (It points to the animation part as a possible culprit in Encore.) Also, I couldn't find any way to just remove/reinsert the background/button pictures and make it work. This might even be a quirk only with this menu? I would greatly appreciate any suggestion. - Laci.

Hi LaciG,
I just encountered the same problem tonight. So I knew exactly what you were refering to. I tried several approaches to work around this issue including erasing the motion menu background source file and re-importing in and starting the menu from scratch again and neither worked. Eventually I did find a work around here it goes: First I erased the buggy menu and motion menu source file (AVI). Next I copied the whole Encore project file and renamed it. Then I copied and renamed the avi file I used as the motion menu. After this I went in and used the template menu I originally used but renamed it in the asset list. Like you said when ever you mess with the menu like changing the chapter timeline poster or such, it messes up the render. So I made sure everything was the way it needed to be then added the AVI to the motion menu. I re-rendered and it worked. I know this is convoluted but it works, I guess this a good start but I may work on finding out what specific step it was in the process that did it. I had a similar problem in CS4 but could never figure out how to fix it and now that I have Windows 7 using CS4 Encore was a nightmare so I switched to CS5 and ran into the same bug as you. Well I hope this helps

Motion Menue transcoded in Encore is jittering even if framerate is correct

Dear users,
do you experience the same? I have a motion menue encoded in Encore and burnt onto Bluray. I used a quicktime 23.976p file on import as all footage is in 23.976fps as well. Fusion automatically transcoded the file to an m2ts. When I play the Bluray on a hardware player, the motion menue seems to jitter (judder). I check the corresponding m2ts-file in after effects and I see that the framerate seems to be correct, 23.976, but on some frames the video doesn't move, but repeats a frame. How can this be? When source files have all the same framerate?
I am using Encore 5.0 on Windows 7 64bit.
Is this a bug?
Thank you much.

I seem to be having a similar problem, but mine is on DVD with a motion menu. The video, despite the frame rate and conversion method, is rendered as interlaced instead of progressive in Encore. I found this article on Creative Cow that describes my exact issue, and it seems like the issue you are having as well.
http://forums.creativecow.net/thread/145/870084

Help Customizing Motion Menu

Hello:
I am trying to customize one of the motion menus that came with Encore CS2. Its called Television Menu.em   This is the first time I've tried customizing a motion menu. I've had no problems customizing the non-motion menus, even animating them in After Effects. The first problem here is that I need a widescreen version which of course isn't included. So I took the 4x3 menu and edited in Photoshop by creating an NTCS DV Widescreen 720 x 480 canvas, and then copying and pasting everything from the original .psd file into it. And then put in a nice background that blends with the color scheme. So haven't really changed anything from the original menu .psd file. Saved that out, brought it into Encore, and connected it to the .wmv file that comes with this particular motion menu. Rendered it out as a motion menu. Preview. Nothing!!! No snow on the TV! I haven't even gotten to the steps where I move all this into After Effects to animate stuff in and out, because I can't get the thing to work right in Encore even without doing any After Effects work. Best I can tell, it must have something to do with the fact that I made the .psd part of the menu into widescreen and for some reason, it won't play the connected video file. Sure would be nice if I could find this particular menu in widescreen, but since I can't, I just thought I'd make it myself. Hmmm. I am stumped as to why I can't get past this seemingly simple step. Must be something I don't understand.
Any ideas or suggestions cheerfully accepted!
Thanks,
Dave

Hi Addison,
Here is a sample which renames customers and search entries from crm menu:
"menu-customers-manage":
      "title": "Site Members List",
      "parent": "menu-customers",
      "weight": 1
"menu-customers-search":
      "title": "Site Member Search",
      "parent": "menu-customers",
      "weight": 10
You have to specify parent attribute for children menus which you rename.I hope it helps.
Regards,
Radu

Creating motion menu in AE removes the motion button?

Hi all,
I created a project in Encore and moved it to After Effects to create a motion menu, worked like a beauty. Only problem is that the motion button I made in Encore (30 seconds of the video playing inside the button box) just stays as a single frame after I import back into Encore. I pre-rendered the menu just to make sure and all the animations I made work great but the button video just shows one frame.
Did I miss something in AE?
Thanks

I am using the menu -> create after effects compostition in encore. Then I can work on the menu in After Effects. Given the amount of things I have, I can't really take a snapshot.
I retried it using the NTSC Blank Menu, the Sunset Video button, and a small mp4. Results are the same: works perfectly in Encore. Then when I go to Menu -> create after effects composition, it opens After Effects and all the layers are good, but the video in the button has become a static image. All button functions are still good, but I don't get the 30 second looping vid inside. Just the first frame of the poster image...

Motion Menu Transition Problems

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for