Button Link Transitions with Audio?

Ive got a question on what can be used as a Button Transition. I have a 10 sec. AV in PP2, that I want to use. In general, no problems. Ive Exported the Video to DV-AVI (silent), and it works beautifully. I only have to do a blend from the Menu for the head and then a still from the Timeline at the tail. No biggie. What I am having problems with is getting an SFX Audio file into the PP2 Sequence for this Transition. So far, I am having problems. I tried to make a Timeline for this AVI with an AC3 Audio, but Encore2 would not allow a link to it, via the Pickwhip. I tried to Import several variations of muxed files, but kept getting errors with the number of channels on Import. Then, I did a muxed MPEG file, and got my first big "Crash" of Encore2. When I linked to the M2v, I got something about Abbie Normal Condition. Wasnt he the founder of the Yippies back in the 60s, along with poet, Allen Ginsberg? The error (really An Abnormal Condition... Please try to Save... ) came up and I could not even exit from Encore2. Had to finally use TaskManager to kill the Process. This was a first for me after all of these years. Lesson - do not use the M2v as a Button Transition!
Now, Im certain that there are possibilities that I have not tried, but before I beat what could be a dead horse, I wanted to find out one thing: can I even have Audio in a Button Transition?
I have total control over my Asset, so I can engage in any workaround necessary. If anyone has any info (Help/Manual do not go deeply into specifics on Button Transitions, and even Jeffs Book, Focal Easy Guide... doesnt mention them, as I can find.), Id greatly appreciate it. Same for any ideas on using Audio for these. In my case, its a bit of an electronic whoosh with a long gong tone, and moves left to right and rear to front to rear (in the 5.1 version). I do not need to do 5.1, as stereo, panned left to right would work fine too.
Appreciate the direction, thoughts and ideas,
Hunt

Jbowden,
Thanks for the simple little test. I just linked my existing SFX AC3 to the Main Menu's Audio and it worked fine. The pan/fade of the 5.1 was intact and worked in Preview.
I Exported the Button Transition test as a DV-AVI/PCM WAV from PP2, and Imported as a Timeline into Encore2. Tested and it played fine, but there was just the left-right pan, as expected. Linked my Button #1 to the AVI, as it would not link to the Timeline (as before), and went to Preview - "An Abnormal Condition... Save... " happened again. It is obviously not just the M2v, but the AVI, as well.
Back to square one in my tests. I've been working with a preliminary, test Project in Encore. It was used to create a DVD set for client review of most other aspects of the Project. It contained 4 Dynamic Links to AE, which were rendered out, plus 2 Menus a short lead-in AVI and some other Assets. Without any Button Transitions, it previewed and burned perfectly.
What I am going to do now is create a fresh Encore2 Project. Initially, it will only have the Play First AVI, the two Menus (Main & Scene Selection) and then I'll work with just the Button Transitions - all other Assets will not be included. I want to eliminate any other possible problem from the mix.
One thing that occurred to me was that this Project was a very full DVD. Though the Transcode is Automatic, I wonder if I am now adding too much to an already Transcoded Project. Rather than clear all Caches, and Revert to the unTranscoded state in this Project, I'll build, instead, from scratch. If that works, I'll just do the Button Transitions for the Scene Select Menu (4 Buttons/Links) and test again. If it still goes well, I'll add in the Rendered AE files and probably not use DL this time. Then, I'll Transcode and test to see if it all holds up. This method will not tell us exactly where the problem lies, if it works at all, but then when I have time, I can go back and clean Caches and Revert the Assets for a final test.
To date, the motion-only Button Transitions worked fine. It was only when I have tried (several different schemes) to add Audio, that I have encountered the problem.
Should have the preliminary test this AM, as the Project is very simple and starting over is not a big deal.
One side observation that I have made is that after I had to use TaskManager to end the Encore2 Process the other day, it now takes Encore2 a few minutes to even get the Splash Screen up. This is new behavior. I also cannot shift focus to/from Encore2 (with PP2 open), by clicking on the icon in the Taskbar. Even Rt-clicking and choosing Restore does not Maximize it. Only by going to TaskManager and clicking on the Application does it Maximize. As this was my first Encore2 "Crash," I am not sure what might be happening there. If I can get this Project done, I'll probably do a Repair Installation of Encore2, to see if the new behavior subsides.
Thanks for the input. Will be back with followups.
Hunt

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Click here for Adobe Authorized Captivate and RoboHelp HTML Training
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In what follows when I say "crash" I mean Encore quits with a standard Windows error. When I say "hang" I mean Encore does not quit but rather becomes an unresponsive process that must be killed manually using Windows Task Manager.
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I mention these specs however I am not experiencing any hardware
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footage1.avi - Dx50 XVid 1.0.3, Dolby AC3 48kHz 192kb/s, 716834 KB
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Imports fine as either a timeline or asset but no audio track comes
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upon importing into Encore CS3. I also loaded it into Camtasia
Studio and it looked fine over there. The audio was present and I
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file in Soundbooth CS3, there was no audio track or, more
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footage4.avi - XVID XviD 1.1.0 Beta2, MPEG1-Layer3 48kHz 189kb/s Two mono
channels LAME3.96r, 717436 KB.
footage5.avi - XVID XviD 1.1.0 Final, Dolby AC3 48kHz 448kb/s Six
channels (3/2 .1), 716418 KB.
footage6.avi - XVID XviD 1.1.0 Final, Dolby AC3 48kHz 448kb/s Six
channels (3/2 .1), 716418 KB.
footage7.avi - XVID XviD 1.0.3, Dolby AC3 48kHz 448kb/s 6 channels
(3/2 .1), 717502 KB
footage8.avi - XVID XviD 1.0.3, Dolby AC3 48kHz 448kb/s 6 channels
(3/2 .1), 717180 KB
footage9.avi - XVID XviD 1.1.2 Final, Dolby AC3 48kHz 448kb/s 6 channels
(3/2 .1), 2291904 KB
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Unfortunately I neglected to write down the error message I recieved
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deleted the project folder. I remember it was not a memory or
display related error and it included a timestamp where the error
was happening. I played the footage in the preview panel thru the
identified timestamp but it previewed perfectly without even a
jitter in either the video or audio. Took forever to transcode so I
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Another issue I am having is with the motion menus. I burned a DVD and it does not load correctly in one of my DVD players (a Sony rdr-gx330 recorder/player). It appears to take extra time to recognize the disk, the startup (first-play) menu does not show automatically, and I must press the Main Menu button on the remote control to make it appear. Other than that it seems to play ok in that player. Also tested it in 2 other DVD players (a Panasonic and Zenith) and it worked just fine like it's supposed to in them. Also plays perfectly in my computer's DVD player/burner using Windows Media Player v10. I tried burning to Memorex +RW single-layer single-sided disks at 6, 7, & 8Mbps project settings but got the exact same result every time.
Encore CS3 crashes fairly often during authoring, particularly during imports, and when I go to edit things like calling up a timeline in the timeline panel, dragging footage into an existing timeline, or changing button links in a menu etc.. I have also experienced seemingly random hangs even more often, probably 5 or 6 times as often as a crash. Saving the project after every little change I make, then closing and restarting Encore allows me to make progress albeit at a significantly reduced workflow rate. Accessing Photoshop from Encore appears to be working flawlessly so far aside from the slow load times. Encore hangs sometimes during video transcoding, repeat the process and it works ok. If I try to import a menu from the library after importing my footage files, Encore hangs trying to import it either at the 50% mark or the 99% mark (it varies even with the same exact menu selected from the library). If I import the menu first and the footage after, then no problems. Also trying to render motion menus after importing footage causes Encore to hang, render before footage import and everything works ok. Interestingly enough, previewing my project in Encore's monitor or preview panels works perfectly even in High quality mode -- in fact it operates quite smoothly in comparison to other apps I have tried. Although those footage files that had missing audio tracks on import obviously played silently, I have yet to experience a hang or crash during a preview or when scrubbing through a timeline in the monitor panel.
The last problem I've seen is with the project cache files. It doesn't always get rid of cache files when stuff is deleted from the project. I was working on one project and surprisingly ran out of disk space. When I tracked it down I found that there were some two dozen copies of a footage file I had repeatedly imported and deleted from the project still sitting in the cache folder. The file was an avi about 2GB so it was taking up some 40 GB of disk space for stuff that was no longer in the project. I tried shutting down Encore and manually deleting all the cache files, and that worked for most of them, but there was one 2GB file that kept reappearing in the cache folder even though it was no longer in the project. The XML file in the cache folder still had references to it in there so I can only assume that was the reason it kept showing up. I eventually had to delete and totally recreate the project from scratch to regain my lost disk space. This included having to sit thru a 6 hour long transcoding session which pissed me off to no end.
Encore CS3 appears on the surface to be a very powerful, feature rich, and approachable app with a simple easy to use interface, but it is awfully bugged in just about every area I have explored and still needs lots and lots of work for it to be really useful. Frankly for me it is pretty damn annoying that I have invested so much money in this suite only to find several of the apps in it (Encore & Premiere in particular) behaving this poorly. In my opinion every single app in the suite exhibits lousy performance whenever you must do anything at all involving the disk from the time you click to start it up until the time you click to close it down. Several of them are just as seriously bugged as Encore too, and being a long time Photoshop v5.5 user I expected much more from Adobe. Even Photoshop is two or three times as slow now (e.g. it takes about 20-30 seconds to simply create an empty 500x500 pixel image file and almost a full minute to load a 30x60 pixel single-layer gif). So far I have attempted to create 6 DVDs using Encore and after 3 weeks of effort have only succeeded in getting one of them onto a final disk -- and that one is kinda limping to work correctly in my DVD player. Three of those projects became so corrupted while working on them that I had to delete them completely and recreate them from scratch, only to find that I still couldn't get them to completion for one reason or another. Seriously disappointing.

Button Link Transitions with Audio?

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