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JRibb
Participant
June 1, 2019
Question

What are you using instead of Encore?

  • June 1, 2019
  • 8 replies
  • 11450 views

Just noticed that Encore/CS6 is no longer available for download. This really sucks because I have used it for many years and have some custom templates for quick turn-arounds.

The old help page: How to download and install Adobe Encore CS6

What are you using to create your menus and ISO's?

[moved to Encore forum, mod]

This topic has been closed for replies.

8 replies

Participant
February 24, 2023

Does anyone know anything about: Pinnacle Studio 26 Ultimate (https://www.pinnaclesys.com/en/products/studio/ultimate/) Price is $100.

My clients want Blu Rays with chapters & menus for in house presentations and archice storage.They want to have menus that are custom. They are requesting stuff I used to do using Adobe Encore and I want to make the right choice for these projects. I have looks at Scenarist but have not contacted them, looks like an annual licensing and I have no idea yet on their fees. Thanks All!

Community Expert
February 24, 2023

stay as far away as possible from Scenarist.  Ridiculously expensive, documentation is nearly non-existant and where it exists, it's incomplete or just plain wrong and the interface is totally unintuitive.  And the support is terrible.  They're hoping you'll pay extra for training...   We were paying for DVD authoring by the month...

Here's a very basic example:  I'd been building menus using layered photoshop files as layed out in their "documentation."

Worked fine for about half the photoshop files and then started crashing the program when importing them about 75% of the time.  They asked for a file that caused the crashing...  I sent it to them.  They said they could see the problem happening but didn't know why and would get back to me when they figured out what was causing the issue.  That was maybe last January.  They did ask why I was using the workflow that I used instead of an alternate that they said did not cause the problem.  I explained and pointed them to their documentation...  Still no word.  Disgusting way to run a business...  We finally hired someone who was something of an expert with Scenarist...  After a couple of months, he finally threw up his hands trying to make the clients wishes come true...  Granted the client was a little out of control, but wasn't asking for anything beyond what Scenarist should have been able deliver...  He said, let's just move the project to DVDSP.  He still had access to it, and so did I...

 

As I probably said earlier in this thread.  I did a fair amount of research and as far as I can tell Scenarist is the only professional solution for DVD and Blu-Ray authoring still being supported.   There are some solutions out there that do allow you to build custom menus, but they didn't seem "professional."  Also, fwiw, Encore did not author "legit" Blu-Ray disks.  Probably just an issue with licensing, but I don't think you're allowed to use the official Blu-Ray logo on the disks...   And unfortunately DVDSP doesn't do Blu-Rays.   

 

Sorry for the venting, but I still feel the pain...

 

 

Community Expert
February 24, 2023

Michael, THANK YOU for saving me the headaches. I had heard about SCENARIST back in the days when we were using Encore nearly daily and have always wanted a solution that was as good or better than Encore was.  Nice motion menus, slick interfaces all created from a .PSD. I have to make a decision soon on whicxh SW can do this.  Even better if it will handle Premiere Pro (Cloud) and 4K UHD as well.  Any suggestions are really welcomed.


I'd really consider purchasing Encore 6.  My understanding is that that was the latest and best version.  You might be able to find a copy on ebay...  as far as I know you can still authorize it if you own the license.   

Participant
November 22, 2021

Just an update that after firing up my old Mac Pro I'm happy to report that my Encore does still work.

 

Mac OS 10.6.8

Adobe Encore CS5.5

 

So break out those old macs if ya got em and save yourself the headache of searching around.

 

Up to this point I've looked into or tried the demos for the following and none of them offered what Encore does.  Or I couldn't figure out more about just how much they could do with authoring:

 

Cyberlink PowerProducer

Corel VideoStudio

DVD Fab

Leawo

TPMGENC Authoring

DVD Styler

Open DVD Producer

DVD Lab

And some Roxio product

Participant
November 20, 2021

I've been searching for a week.  Which is how I ended up on this forum.  Being that it's now the end of 2021, are there any new contenders?

 

So far I've downloaded trial versions of:

Cyberlink Power Producer 6

Corel VideoStudio

DVDFab

Leawo Blu-Ray Creator

 

All of them restrict you from building entirely custom menu systems.  So the menus I worked in photosohop can't really be used with em.  The templates they provide give everything this really "cute", "made-at-home" look that I don't like.

 

Stan Jones
Community Expert
Community Expert
November 20, 2021

They don't post pricing, but Scenarist now has a subscription:

https://www.scenarist.com/scenarist-live/

 

Stan

 

Averdahl
Community Expert
Community Expert
November 20, 2021
quote

They don't post pricing, but Scenarist now has a subscription:

https://www.scenarist.com/scenarist-live/

 

By @Stan Jones

 

No pricing on homepage+Web form with only requirements=Very expensive and individual users will not be accepted.

 

It´s free to see if they answer though. 🙂

Peru Bob
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 2, 2019

I use DVD Architect Studio.

Legend
June 2, 2019

As someone else stated, DVD Architect (any edition) will not accept H.264 files unless it's from Sony/Magix Vegas. It also does not produce H.264 Blu-ray discs or images that are fully Blu-ray compliant. So, if one has to export a Blu-ray, the only format that's deemed acceptable from DVD Architect is MPEG-2, which we all know produces lower-quality videos at larger file sizes (bit rates) than H.264.

June 2, 2019

Encore is still there but in Adobe CS 6 Premiere (Which id still better than the latest versions due to stability)

Community Expert
June 2, 2019

Only if you have CS6 on discs, it is not available for download anymore.

Stan Jones
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 2, 2019

https://forums.adobe.com/people/Richard+M+Knight  wrote

Only if you have CS6 on discs, it is not available for download anymore.

No guarantees, but I believe that support will eventually provide a link to download if you have a purchased serial number registered with them.

Community Expert
June 2, 2019

DVD Studio Pro, but that’s what I’ve always used instead of Encore.

John T Smith
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 2, 2019
Averdahl
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 1, 2019

I bought a copy of TMPGEnc Authoring Works 6 and find it in some cases better than Encore. For quick simple projects it works great. For complex projects it can be a limitation due to the template driven menu creation.

I still use Photoshop to create menu backgrounds and use them in Authoring Works. I can create ISO´s as well.

If someone mention Magix DVD Architect be ware of that you cannot use H.264 as your source footage unless it comes from Magix Vegas. Apart from that it seems good, but the development is as close to EOL as EOL is...