Adobe Photoshop is an application without peer and the undisputed king of the digital image programs. I am sure there are a few people out there still very loyal to their non-Photoshop image editors, and just because they are wrong doesn’t mean they aren’t good people. (I can imagine I am going to get a few emails about that one.) Truth is you can argue about image editors all day long, but when it comes to Encore if you are using anything other than Photoshop, you are wasting your time.

Yeah you can use another image editor, but unless it fully supports the Photoshop layer conventions, you might as well be using Microsoft Paint to do your menus. Try as you may to use any other editor, you will always run into an indisputable truth: Encore’s Menus Are Photoshop (.psd) Files.

It is possible to make a good still menu with a few graphics and Encore’s Menu Editor. With Encore 1.5’s new library items, it’s a even greater possibility you could use nothing else but Encore and get good results. Encore’s Menu Editor is really an ultra basic Photoshop with tools for DVD. So why use Photoshop if you can get by with Encore?

The answer is: do you just want to “get by?” Or would your rather make your own buttons and backgrounds? Wouldn’t it be better to use the best tools on the market? Look at many Professional DVD menus, and the majority were created in or edited with Photoshop. It’s pro software.

Wes covers a few really great ways to use Photoshop integration in his book. And the new DVD tutorials offered on this site give additional ways to push Photoshop integration to the max. But far be it from me to leave you empty handed with an ad stuffed in your pocket.

A lot of people have learned how to import pictures into Encore and use them as buttons in menus. It’s pretty easy. Just import the picture into the Project Window, then drag and drop the picture into the Menu Editor or the Library Palette for future use. Then you convert the picture to a button. But if you click on the Show subpicture highlight icons at the bottom of the Menu Editor, you’ll see that Encore has put the subpicture highlight over the entire area of the picture. Encore just stamps out the subpicture hightlight based on the shape of the button. It works in a pinch, but it really isn’t the best you can do. If you are using Encore 1.5, you can apply some beveling to the picture using the styles palette. Or you can really customize it by clicking on Edit in Photoshop.


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