Every time I show someone how to use Encore, I stress how important it is to properly place the windows according to what you are doing. Workspace clutter slows down the process and contributes to frustration. If you are creating a menu, you should have the Menu Editor as large as you can get it, with the toolbar, Library palette, Layer’s Palette, and Character Palette ready for quick access. (See screenshot.) Anything you aren’t using should be closed or minimized. Unfortunately, you could have the best Button linking workspace but no way to preserve it. That is until 1.5’s customizable workspaces. Now you can save several different window set ups, and pull them up at will. However it takes a little getting used to. It doesn’t close windows or open them. So if you don’t have a menu in the Menu Editor, and you select a workspace that uses the Editor, it’s not going to open an arbitrary menu just to show the Menu Editor.
 Of course there are several other additions and tweaks to the Encore interface, many of these might go unnoticed by most users. Adobe definitely has improved Encore more than a “little bit.” As I mentioned before, it’s all about what you think you need. Could you get by with 1.0 until 2.0 comes out? If you say yes, then by all means keep your money and know that it will be worth the wait. I personally think the upgrade is significant enough for me and my needs I wouldn’t want to be without it.
In the next article we are going to get to the meat of Encore, by showing how it plays well with her most popular sister, Adobe Photoshop. As I said before, if you aren’t using Photoshop in your menu creation, that’s like trying to fingerpaint the Mona Lisa. It’s all about taking your still menus to the next level.
-Graham Shanks
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