With that in mind I think you're ready to create any kind of basic menu. But DVD-lab doesn't stop here. In the Menu menu, you'll find the Effects submenu which has some interesting entries:
I won't go into detail here but feel free to experiment with those functions.
If you've created a nice looking menu that you might want to use for later on, the Export menu might come in handy.
Here you can export a menu in a format that Mediachance's menu creator can process. Alternatively, you can export a menu as a template and add it to DVD-lab. Similarly, you can import menus using the import menu and load an exported menu using the Load Menu... function
Merge to background will merge all menu items you have added to the background (thus removing any button programming).
External S-Picture allows you to import a subtitle overlay image defining the buttons. You'd then have to create buttons using the group hotspot feature (draw a hotspot around the area that you want a button to be, then link it as any regular button).
Here is my 2nd menu. Now let's link one of those buttons to an
To link a button to another menu page, or a position in the movie, select the button, right click and select the appropriate element from the menu. Shown below is how I linked the play movie button:
A linked button will be shown with a orange rectangle around it, and the name of the item it links to just below in red. In addition, all linked buttons get a number (shown in yellow). The number indicates how the buttons can be navigated (you'll jump from button 1 to button 2 to button 3 etc.).
Something rather essential is the First Button. On each page, one button has to be selected by default: the first button. You can set a button to be the first button by selecting it, then right clicking in the preview area and selecting Set as First Button.
Besides the colors, there's yet another button property you can configure. Click on the Link tab in the properties to access it:
If the selected button had a link defined, the dropdown list would not show a NOP (NOP means the button isn't linked). Alternatively to the right click menu, you could select a button and assign a link to it using this menu.
Button Visibility is interesting. You could define buttons that are invisible by default, but become visible if they are selected. A good example of that is text underlines that are often used on commercial DVDs. To create a text underline, draw a rectangle below a text item, then set its visibility to Invisible Normal so that it will only become visible when selected. Invisible Selected means the element would be invisible when selected, and Invisible All creates an item that is always invisible (but can still be selected - that's how you create hidden extras ;).
Finally, if you want to prevent accidental moving of the button, check Lock Position.
In the PBC options, you can configure even more:
Every menu can have a Timeout. This means that after a certain amount of time, an action automatically happens. You might have noted that many commercial DVDs start playing the main movie without you doing anything - all you have to do is wait for a minute or so. If you set a timeout, you can create the same effect.
Force-Select Btn: selects the button that is active by default (this is where you use the numbers assigned to buttons when you link them), and Force Activate Btn: is the button that is activated after the menu time-outs.
If you want to add an audio track to the menu, you can simply drag & drop it from the assets to the menu window. And in here, you could delete it again. The same goes for a video background. If you've added a background audio / video, the following two tracks are shown below the menu preview:
Clicking on the x will also remove the track.
Now there's one last thing to be done: Be default DVD-lab auto routes the buttons. Every menu needs programming that tells the player how the user can get from one button to the next. By default, Auto-Route is selected, and it creates useful navigation (when buttons are ordered vertically, you can use the up and down buttons to navigate, when buttons are ordered horizontally, you can use the left and right buttons to switch between them). If you prefer to link buttons on your own, uncheck this option, and the 4 link buttons become active.
In order to link buttons on your own, you'll first have to make the links visible. You do this by clicking on the navigation button, then selecting one of the options:
Show from Selected Object only shows the links from the currently selected menu item, or you can show them for all items on a menu page.
Here's an example how one of my menus was automatically linked by DVD-lab:
Links using the up button are red, down is green, left would be blue and right would be yellow.
Last but not least, the group hotspot feature. Look at the following image containing a regular text button, and a rectangular area that is set to be invisible by default.
Then you can group those two items together by drawing a group hotspot area around them (the currently active area). Now, if the button is selected, both elements become active in the color that you have selected. While not selected, Chapters is not underlined but still visible. When selected, Chapters will be underlined.
Now you are perfectly capable to create a complex menu system. At some point you'll want to verify if your menus really work. That's where the simulator comes in. On top of every menu page, you have three buttons. A blue one with a play sign, a red one (currently gray as it's inactive) to stop the simulation, and finally one to activate menu links. You can start the simulation pressing the play button. DVD-lab will then show you the regular navigational buttons you have on your DVD player remote:
By default, the simulator only works for one page and links are not active. However, if you press the Follow Links button, you can jump in between menus.
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