Custom Button Highlighting

Susan Stephens wrote on 1/27/2013, 6:51 PM
I'm using DVD Architect Pro 5.0, and I would like to highlight my menu buttons by using a multi-color graphic.

Specifically, one button is labeled "First Grade" and another is "Second Grade". I have a lasso graphic that I would like to use as the button highlight. If the menu item is not selected, then I want only the text displayed. If the menu item is selected, I want my lasso graphic to enclose the text. All I have been able to do is make the lasso a solid color or multi-color with a fill color highlight. In either case, my lasso doesn't look very good.

Thanks so much.

Comments

musicvid10 wrote on 1/27/2013, 8:02 PM
"Alpha" is the term we use here for transparency. It's all in your button custom Color Sets, but I don't know if there is a real tutorial.
If you don't have some graphic arts experience, it's going to be a lot of trial and error, but it is possible to do some complex button effects in DVD Architect.
Paul Masters wrote on 1/28/2013, 10:27 AM
The main problem is that no matter which option you chose DVD has only 4 colors with highlight. The 'main' button image is 'full color' but the highlight isn't.

As musicvid said, there are a number of possibilities. Also see "How to make button invisible when not selected" post.

One thing to realize is that a button image is a reference used by the software. That image can be 'anything' you want and 'anywhere' on the screen. In fact that image may not even be the one the viewer thinks is the button. With that information, you can create all the button state 'images' in 'full color' by using a separate menu 'page' for each. That can take a lot of pages and have complicated navigation, but it is doable.

There are a lot of workarounds and I doubt that anyone knows them all.

Paul Masters
Susan Stephens wrote on 2/5/2013, 2:12 PM
Thank you, Paul,

Your suggestion about using separate menu pages is going to do what I want.

It looks like I'll need a separate menu page for each "button" with my graphic positioned in the appropriate location to indicate which title is selected. Then I will add auto-activating links for the left, right, up and down arrows which will navigate to the appropriate page.
Paul Masters wrote on 2/7/2013, 10:37 AM
Yes.

Be sure to have the page display for at least 10 seconds to allow the viewer to make a selection. Of course it can be longer depending on the length of the audio, if any. Any thing less than 10 seconds can be frustrating as the 'button(s)' 'turn off' when the playback 'loops'. In your case that won't be noticeable (that is the button highlight won't go off and then back on), but if you press a remote navigation key during that time it will be ignored.

With a lot of pages, you may need a GPRM to keep track of where you were or where you want to go to after a video / chapter plays. If things get too messy, that is too much code everywhere, there is another 'trick'. Have an empty page that runs a script at start. That script can provide a central point for returns and then with logic and the GPRM determine where you really want to navigate.

Paul Masters
Susan Stephens wrote on 5/1/2013, 4:46 PM
Update - I created my separate menu pages. It functioned the way I wanted it to. However, I have decided to abandon the approach. I ran into 2 issues:

1 - When the navigation arrows are used to change menu screens rather than to select a different button, the response time is much slower than what the viewer might expect. It was certainly slower than what I like.

2 - When someone is using a computer to watch the DVD, they will often use the mouse to navigate to the desired menu option. That does not work with this approach. They are required to use the arrow buttons to navigate (like they would with a DVD remote). This was not intuitive to my viewers.

So, in the future, I suppose I will keep it simple.