Graphics, logos jpeg or .psd file..which is best for menues

Which version of Photoshop are you using?

From 7 on they had templates. CS2 (maybe CS1, I went from 7 to CS 2) makes it the easiest - it has the widescreen templates for PAL and NTSC with title and action safe guides. It defaults to the pixel aspect for the DVD so it is good to work with (you can turn it to square if you like, but I have gotten used to the default.)

In 7 there are also templates.

Note that these items are all default 72 DPI, and it is fine to work in that.

Flatten all effects and rasterize text. Apply video filters. Also make sure to use 20pt + text Sans Serif. Flattened Picts usually work well. Alot also depends on colors and so forth - what issues are you seeing in terms of the jaggy rough edges? Are you then using drop zones or other similar items from templates panels? That will cause recompression

Hi Allister,
My best workflow is creating a New file in Photoshop CS2 using the right preset "PAL D1/DV Widescreen..". Photoshop will manage the pixel aspect for you and you can work on the design.
You can import the PSD file right into DVDSP, no need to convert to JPG; when you do so you add extra compression artifacts to your graphic. All you have to take care is rasterize layers that have effects in Photoshop, because DVDSP will not show them. To rasterize a layer, create a new empty layer and merge that with the layer with effects. The merged layers are rasterized then. It's a good advice to save a copy of the PSD before rasterizing, to use in later modifications you could need to do.

As Drew13 said, take care of the font sizes and types.

Paste your logos roght into the background PSD in Photoshop. I don't find a reason to use drop zones if your logos are allways there in the background.

About logos resolution, forget the resolution when creating graphics for video, just take care of the size in pixels. Try allways using the graphic with the final size you'll need in your menu. Any extra pixels you leave, DVDSP will have to resize it, and it doesn't do a good job resizing images !

Good luck!

Where would I find the templates for video in photoshop that you are talking about, I looked all over for the option but no luck.

Also does anyone know if I created a cool design in Motion, such as a background w/fades, is there any way I can use it as a bacground in DVD studio by importing it.

Thanks for any help on this subject.

Where would I find the templates for video in photoshop that you are talking about, I looked all over for the option but no luck.

in Photoshop-->New there is a dialog and drop down selections (PS 7+)

PDF screen shot for you http://www.dvdstepbystep.com/ps.pdf

Also does anyone know if I created a cool design in Motion, such as a background w/fades, is there any way I can use it as a bacground in DVD studio by importing it.

Take a look at the last post in this thread from me, download the project, the background is something from Final Cut, but a Motion Project would be fine

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=602390&tstart=0

Thanks for the reply,

But just what exactly are the steps to export the motion background. I know they are images but its also a movie so if you could give me some tips that would be awesome.

Once again thanks for all your help.

In Motion export the movie and then bring the exported movie into Compressor (or other encoder) to make it an m2v. (In that project the background is an actual m2v, m2vs can come from and video file pretty much when the video file is then encoded)

The overlay menu was made in Photoshop.

The trick is to the extent that you want items in the overlay from Photoshop to also appear in the underlying movie. In the m2v in the project you will see that there is text which is bright green, then the photoshop file has Black Text which should be in the same exact spot in the event you want to highlight the Text as part of the buttons.

Take a look also here

http://dvdstepbystep.com/fasttrackover.php

It is an overview of some of the steps going through from Final Cut to DVD SP. Makes a movie in FCP and exports it and shows how to use Compressor (your Motion can be bought into Compressor) Then when the m2v is made
you assign in as the Background for the menu you want it to appear in

Take a look here http://dvdstepbystep.com/quickmenus.php which shows how to assign backgrounds and overlays in general, in your menu instead of background.pct as in that example, use yourmovieyoumadefrommotion.m2v