Creating CDROMS Using Camtasia Menumaker

Camtasia Menumaker allows you to create menus for content which is to be distributed using CD’s. In addition to creating a menu and autorun file, it provides Camtasia Player to play the AVI files. Use of AVI files recorded using Camtasia Recorder produce high quality videos with little or no compression. It should be noted, however, that the file sizes can become very large especially when capturing the whole screen. Testing has shown that for a full screen capture the file size will be around 10 megabytes for each minute of video. This can be compared with capturing ½ of the screen area which produces file sizes of around 3 megabytes for each minute of video. Other video types can be used, assuming the user has the proper software to view the given media type. In addition to your Camtasia video files, you may also add PowerPoint presentations, Word documents, PDF files, Web pages, and Text files just to name a few. The only limitation is whether the user has the proper software installed to view a particular file type.

Using Camtasia Menumaker

1. Menumaker can be accessed through the Windows Start menu or the Tools menu in Camtasia Studio.
2. When Menumaker is first opened, the screen below appears.

   

   From this menu you have the option to create a menu by using the wizard, from scratch, or to edit an existing or recent menu. If you create a menu using the wizard, you must choose from an existing template to use as your background. If you choose the Create New Menu option you may use any JPG, GIF, or BMP file as the background for the menu. If you choose to use the wizard, it is likely you will have to perform most of the steps found in the Create New Menu option to get the menu to look right and perform properly. Therefore, it is recommended that you do not use the Wizard to create your menu. It will save time in the long run as you won’t be repeating steps to get proper item names, etc.

The steps to create a CDROM are as follows:

1. Select the Create New Menu option on the opening welcome box.
2. The blank menu page and menu box are opened.
3. In the Edit Menu click on the General Properties.
4. The Menu Properties dialog box opens as shown below.



5. Enter the title for your menu in the textbox labeled Menu title.
6. Make sure the options in the Preferences section are both checked. Checking the “Start Menu automatically when CD-Rom is inserted” tells the program to build an autorun file when the menu is created. This file will cause the Menu to appear automatically when the disk is inserted. If you don’t do this the users will have to find the menu initialization file by themselves. The other option “Always use Camtasia Player on AVI files” places the player in the folder to be published to the CD. This will give the highest quality playback for the users because it uses the TSCC codec native to Camtasia. For a more complete explanation of the why Camtasia Player should be used click here.
7. In the background textbox you may browse in the picture you would like to use as a background for the disc menu. Be sure the picture you choose is in the JPG, GIF, or BMP format.
• Make sure the radio button labeled Center is checked in the options found beneath the text box.
8. In the Display Mode section of the General Tab you may choose to have the video played as a window, or choose to have the player open to a full screen view. If the video being played is not full screen and the full screen option is chosen, the remainder of the desktop will be filled with the color chosen in the desktop color option.
9. Click on the List Tab.
10. In the Text section choose the colors for normal text, visited links, and highlighted. Then choose how the text will be aligned in the menu box.
11. In the Frame section choose a background color for the menu box and then how transparent/opaque you want the color to appear. The more opaque, the less you will be able to see through to the background image.
12. Click on the content tab.
13. Click on the Add files button in the upper left hand corner of the dialog box. It is shown highlighted in the image below. The Add File Items dialog box opens and allows you to browse to your AVI files.



14. In the Name textbox enter the name of the item as you want it to appear in the menu.
15. If desired enter a tool tip for the item. A tool tip is text that appears when the mouse cursor is over the item name in the menu.
16. Continue steps 13-15 until all desired files are selected.
17. If you wish to change the order of the menu items, highlight the item and use the up and down arrow keys in the toolbar to move the file to its desired location.
18. Click on the resources tab.
19. In the resources section you can add .WAV files for certain menu events such as a mouse click, mouse hover, Menu startup, or menu exit.
20. Click on OK and the menu will be built and displayed in Menumaker.
21. The Menu Box may be moved to any location. To select the box click on the outside edge. Resizing handles and hatching appear as shown below.



22. To move the menu move the cursor over one of the edges until the 4 headed arrow appears. Click and hold down the left mouse button and drag the Menu Box to the desired location.
23. If the Menu Box is too small or too large, it can be resized by moving the cursor over one of the handles. The cursor changes to a 2 headed arrow. Click and hold down the left mouse button and drag the resize handle to obtain the desired size.
24. You may view the menu using the Test Menu button which is located on the toolbar and is highlighted below. The menu now appears as it will when you put the CD into a drive. To close the preview, close the window.



25. A dialog box will pop up with the question “Create Folder”. Click on Yes and the menu and all related files are saved to the designated directory. You should get a dialog box congratulating you on the completion of the menu as shown below. Click finish and a new window will open allowing you to see the files created as well as the folder and file structure.
26. A dialog box will pop up with the question “Create Folder”. Click on Yes and the menu and all related files are saved to the designated directory. You should get a dialog box congratulating you on the completion of the menu as shown below. Click finish and Windows Explorer is opened allowing you to see the files created as well as the folder and file structure.



27. You may copy these files to a CD using your favorite CD burning software. Make certain the autorun.inf and menu.exe files are in the root directory when you burn the files to the CD.

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