New DVD Options

One of the areas seeing a number of new products this year is DVD authoring. Newcomers to the DVD authoring space include Sonic Foundry, with DVD Architect, and Adobe, with Encore DVD. Both include some unique features. For instance, Encore has close ties to Photoshop and After Effects, while DVD Architect supports 24-frame authoring as well as writing 24fps-based files to disk.





Apple's DVD Studio Pro 2 has undergone a total rewrite. In addition to a price that has been nearly cut in half, Apple totally redesigned the interface. DVD SP was one of the few mid-range applications to use a flowchart model for creating DVD navigation. This was a high-end feature similar to that used by Sonic DVD Creator. In version 2, Apple decided to drop that in favor of a timeline-based interface and numerous templates for menus, much like Sonic's DVDit.





Finally, Pinnacle has taken DVD authoring one step further. In version 5 of the Liquid.purple and Edition software, DVD authoring features have been built right into the editing application. In this manner, an editor can create a DVD without having to swap between different applications.





Oliver Peters is a post-production consultant based in Orlando, Florida and specializes in editing, project management and DVD development. You may contact him at www.OliverPeters.com.