dvd menu
 

I am writing an essay about dvd menues, and dvd menu design. i was wondering if enyone something to say on this matter. examples on good or bad menu desig. what should it consist. anything at all about the subject.

I don't know anything about DVD menus really, but I know a great deal about essay writing. Proper spelling, grammar, and punctuation are very important, especially if you are being graded.

I'm one that would prefer going straight to the movie without the menu first. Nice menus can be cool the first time, but once viewed, people really just want to get to the movie. Gettysburg has a really cool menu with the cannon shots, but is a good example of too lengthy to get to the choices.

thank you!
but if you are danish, in a hurry, and people understand what you write in this forum, i do not think that my spelling or gramar shoud be a problem at this state.....

thank you Jim :)

The Lion King (PE) has the worst menu of all time. I would have rather had a black text button on a black screen that was impossible to find and click than to have that CGI thing flying around for two minutes.

1) no preceeding crap (FBI warnings, forced previews, studio logos, studio commentary disclaimer, MPAA ratings graphic, etc). The Godfather discs are the only ones I remember that don't do this crap.

2) menu options immediately selectable with no preceeding animated crap (ie, The Last Samurai)

3) I prefer animated menus over static

4) fast transitions. this usually plagues scene selection menus. for anyone who has the panic room 3-disc or from hell 2-disc know how godawful long it takes for the scene selection options to complete their animations. these annoyances aren't even interesting the first time around.

5) clear, non-cluttered menus that don't require jumping through hoops. the mememto disc is an example of such nonsense.

6) if the dvd is stupidly formatted in such a way that i can't change subtitle or audio options while the disc is playing, I should be able to go to the language menu, make my changes and have the film "resume" where it left off, when I choose play again. Most recent discs support this, but there are still some that don't.

Gotta love Home Theater PCs. I run this program called DVDIdle Pro that removes all restrictions from DVDs, (FBI Warnings, Forced Trailers, etc....) and will either drop you right to the menu or to the very beginning of the movie when you put the dvd in.
It also makes all dvds region free and removes the CSS Encryption and Macrovision on the fly. All this hooked up to my X1 projector makes movie watching a real treat.

Static menus...best design ever.

Any menu that has video and/or animation that doesn't last longer than 3-5 secs is good. If it takes longer than that to get to the menu options, then it's considered too long.

I can't imagine why. menus should be menus, animation should be animation.

I don't like animated menus either. I just want to get to the selection list ASAP. I would even go so far as to say I don't need a background image or proportional font.

-AC

I actually design (among other things) DVD menus for a living... if you would like to talk in depth about menu design I would be happy to help you out, however I do not wish to post my address in a public forum (I get enough spam already) I hope you understand.

Thank you lono. It would be very beneficial and helpful if we can talk a bit further! Maybe I can come up with some more detailed question than this one here on the forum. My email is tassaladd at hotmail.com so if you are still keen on helping you can get in touch.
Thank you all of answering my question!

I wish there was a "Play all" function for the menu extras. Sometimes there is that option for example to play all the deleted scenes instead of selecting each one, but I wish you could do it to play all the chapters. titles, etc, on the DVD without needing to select .
Sometimes I'd like to be lazy and let the features just play from start to finish. It would be cool if there was a way to do that, even running each angle of a multi camera angle function in series without stopping. I wouldn't care much about what order the stuff plays in, can always skip a section if it's boring.

i think someone wants us to do their homework for them. as a teacher myself, i regard this as cheating. shame shame.

Hi Scott.
As this being a research project and getting in contact with people about my topic is quite important, I do not want to call this cheating. To ask someone for opinions and views does not make them my own… and you as a teacher should know this…

If the disc has a lot of options - multiple soundtracks (DTS, DD, Commentary) or a lot of extras, I'd like a fast loading menu with the options to get to them, make my selection and start the film. If it is a bare bones release, then I want to put the disc in and have it start playing.

This article sums up my views fairly nicely.

hi mtucker.
is it you that have written the article?

No, I did not write the article. I just happen to agree with most of the points given.

Ideally, a DVD's menus should have no animation before the selections are available, and all transitions should be instant. Aside from that, I don't care whether the menus are animated or not - as long as the animation doesn't mean I have to wait, it doesn't matter either way.

Other than that, I just want everything to be laid out clearly and accessible, with as few screens required as possible to get to the option I'm looking for. (For example, there shouldn't be a "Settings" menu which then lets you go to the "Audio" and "Subtitles" menus - all those options should be on one screen.)