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As this is my first post to the Forums, my greetings to you all. I use (and only have) VS10+. I have created a video file (MPEG-2), imported it into the authoring stage and added 20 chapters.
I would like to use a SmartScene menu, in the gallery ¡V it¡¦s one showing the happy couple, S05. After selecting it I couldn¡¦t find a way to import an image or video and add features like 'links'. SmartScenes are not mentioned in the manual, and a search in this forum produced many interesting threads and info but I couldn¡¦t find what I wanted ¡V which is a beginner¡¦s guide to creating a SmartScene menu and what can be done with one.
If there is a link to a guide or could someone enlighten me?

Thank you!
Marmion

Welcome to the forums!

If you are talking about 'importining' an image or video as background to the menu, that is easy. On the page where you selected rgw menu template, the various templates are on a tab labelled Gallery. Next to it is one labelled Edit. That Edits the properties of the template. Click on that and up in the top left corner , about a third the way down, you will see a little pane labelled 'Background image/video'. You navigate to where you have your preferred photo or video stored and select it and there you have it.

The basic menu structure in VS does not allow the addition of buttons like the one you suggested for Links. But I am afraid I am not an expert on menus. I think you would have to build a new menu from the ground up, using a graphics program called PhotoImpact, which is the only one with the template format available in it (.ufo). Hopefully Steve or someone else who knows more about building menus from scratch will jump in here.

In any case, you will find Steve's tutorial on SmartScene menus at http://forum.corel.com/EN/viewtopic.php?p=70231#70231

Hello Ken,
Many thanks for your reply.

Before I posted my question I did come across Steve's tutorial (and some of his others - all excellent) but the confusing point to me was the following quote:

[The smartmenu has ONE single thumbnail. when you select a Video chapter title (text) the thumbnail changes to display a thumbnail relating to that chapter/menu. ]

I couldn't find how to select a video chapter - the idea being to put my 'happy couple' in the place of the pair shown in the gallery.

I did try what you said about 'Background image/video' and imported an image but it appeared in the background (of course!) - what I wanted was to replace the foreground image. I assume that must be the thumbnail referred to in the quote above.

So I played around and selected another template from the gallery, this time from the Thumbnail group. Double clicking in the thumbnail border allowed me to select a frame of video. To my surprise when I reloaded the happy couple SmartScene the 'demo' couple had been replaced by the frame I had just chosen!

I still don't know how to import an image into the foreground (i.e. the thumbnail) - unless: Is it restricted to an image or frame from the video file active on the first page of the authoring section?

I shall go through the tutorials again!

Thanks again,
David

Hi

When you add a video file the thumbnail shows the first frame of that video.
You can change this to a different frame,
From the first screen, play the video for a few seconds to move from the first frame.
Right click the thumbnail in the timeline and select Change Thumbnail.

Ok what you have is one Main Menu.
Now Add Chapters then select next.

What you have now is one main menu and a sub-menu, a chapter menu.
You are looking at the Main Menu, note the drop-down box below the preview screen.
Click to select the chapter menu page. It should be the name of your video.

Each menu page contains text as the hot links, unfortunately these are limited to three.
If you have created 20 chapters then you have 7 sub-menu pages.
Navigate using the buttons below the ¡¥Currently Displayed Menu¡¦ text.
Notice the text change from Chapter001.

As you have only the one Main Menu its really of little use. You can hide this menu from the Advanced Settings¡XEdit Tab.

Now preview the menu using the remote control, as you select each chapter the thumbnail changes to reflect the chapter selected.

The main limitation is the 3 three chapters per page, other templates do allow more.
The thumbnail menu allows about 9, but you have to customise to achieve this.

Sorry but its not that easy to describe, and there¡¦s more....................

Once you grasp the concept of a Smart Scene Menu it is pretty easy.
The problem is grasping that concept.

Firstly - forget about smartscene menus (otherwise you will get confused)
Now we are left with two styles of menu.

1. Text Only Menus. Here you are presented with a list and you select "something" from that list. This "Something" could be a video (Title) or it could be another menu containing "Chapters". On a commercially created DVD you could even have things in the list such as "Special Effects / Subtitles / Different audio tracks" and so on. VideoStudio is not designed to create those extras - for that you would need DVD Workshop which is now a discontinued product.

2. Thumbnail Menus. These are those menus that have small pictures instead of text where you click on the picture. Clicking a picture either brings up another menu or plays a video. These small pictures (Thumbnails) can either be static or have motion.

To briefly describe how to get those various picture thumbnails let us create a video, we will call it "Demonstration". Firstly we start VideoStudio running, go to the [Share] tab and select [Create Disc]. On the next screen that appears we import our ready made video "Demonstration."

If we go directly to the Menu Creation Screen then we will only have ONE thumbnail - one that will play the entire video.

If however we opt to create chapters we will get a thumbnail for the Video as a whole plus additional thumbnails for each of the chapters.
Normally the thumbnail will represent the start of the video or chapter though as mentioned above by Trevor Andrew you can alter this.

Here things (hopefully) are pretty easy to understand - for each and every chapter there is a thumbnail on the chapter menu, so a video with 6 chapters has 6 thumbnails.

A smartscene menu is in effect a cross between a thumbnail menu and a text only (List) menu. A smartscene menu has only ONE thumbnail - no matter how many chapters you may have. What happens is - when you select one of the items in the list, that single thumbnail changes to represent the item chosen in the list.

Unless you are creating one from scratch with PhotoImpact, then you simply compose your menu from the available templates in the same way as a standard thumbnail menu.

Hi Trevor, Steve, Ken,

I've got it!

Or should I say: 'I have grasped the concept!'

With hindsight (a wonderful thing) I can now see that SmartScene doesn't work its magic until the preview stage (and beyond). That's where I was going wrong - I was stuck in the menu stage thinking that SmartScene was a different animal to the Thumbnails and Texts menus rather than, as Steve said, a combination of both.

Thanks again guys, I really appreciate your time and effort.

All the best,

David