best blu-ray authoring program?

blu-print (Sony), Scenarist are two of the high end programs, cost ALOT of money.

Netblender is a few thousand for the "lighter" system.

Encore (Adobe)

You may want to check of the websites for those for more overview and details.

Have you done any authoring before? If not you may want to consider having someone author this for you. Also if you do author using any of those apps, you should look at places such as dvdverification.com to run a battery of testing before delivering the master to replication...

Eric Pautsch has done blu-ray authoring AFAIK (he usually hangs in the DVD SP forum), he may be able to help on the authoring side...

On a Mac you can use Adobe Encore CS4 or Apple Compressor to make a Blu-ray. But only Adobe Encore CS4 can do multiple audio tracks. Even PopUP menus are possible.

If you need to replicate you can do it on a Mac using BluStreak Premaster:

http://blustreak.dvdafteredit.com/blustreak-premaster-overview

Your main choices on the Mac are Encore, Toast, Compressor, and Revolver.

Revolver won't do what you want - it's a quick and dirty authoring program. Toast does a fine job, will take assets encoded by other encoders and author blu-ray disks. You can add a custom menu background but the font, font size, and layout are beyond your control. Compressor's capabilities are about equal to Toast's. Adobe's Encore is the most complete suite - letting you design menus and sub-menus, put in pop-up menus, first runs, and allowable action control. I'm assuming (although I haven't tried yet) that h.264 streams encoded in the latest compressor will import to Encore without trouble. I know the previous version's h.264 streams weren't compatible.

*Compressor's capabilities are about equal to Toast's*


No they are not equal... Compressor has just 1 menu with 1 item... what a joke...

You can purchase Encore separately, it comes bundled with Encore CS4.

"...I would author with one of the above mentioned programs and then use BluStreak to output a final file with AACS for replication?"

NetBlender's DoStudio Authoring tool includes formatting for replication, so you wouldn't need BluStreak if you use it. DoStudio Authoring costs $2,995 and it comes with authoring, playback and formatting (AKA Mastering) for replication with AACS and managed copy.

Have you looked into Sonic DVDit Pro HD? http://www.roxio.com/enu/products/dvdit/dvdit.html
It can produce a CMF fileset suitable for Blu ray replication. I'm not sure if Encore can do the same - at least I hadn't heard it could.

Also, PacificDisc does authoring and replication. http://www.pacificdisc.com/PricingBluRay.html

Just take a look at all the horror stories:

http://forums.support.roxio.com/index.php?showforum=120

I played with it for a day and was disgusted. I really feel bad for the chap who delivered an image for replcation without knowing what "encyrption keys" were. Now the guy looks like a jerk. Thats why I urge you to do some research and know about the technology and the tools indepth before you go out selling this kind of work. Since People beleive they have years of HD video and DVD experience, that they are immediately ready to offer BD authoring.

Not that its hard! Things like glass blowing, puppetry and brain surgery are HARD and take years to master! It just take a little time to get yourself familar with the technology, its caveats and the tools involved. Verification is also very important. Just because a disc passes an Eclipse test doesn't mean its a spec legal disc and you will have returns if enough discs are sent out.

Start with the free trial of Do Studio (no! Im begging you)...read their Wikis and the books I told you about. Thier support is the best and you will learn alot...i assure you!

Message was edited by: Eric Pautsch1

Message was edited by: Eric Pautsch1