So you want to create your own website and DVD….

DMiP – iWeb / iDVD When looking at the standard Apple program suite, you will notice two applications – iWeb and iDVD. Both of these use templates to help you to create your own content in an interactive website or DVD. Both programs are designed to be … Continue reading →

DMiP – iWeb / iDVD

When looking at the standard Apple program suite, you will notice two applications – iWeb and iDVD. Both of these use templates to help you to create your own content in an interactive website or DVD. Both programs are designed to be very user-friendly and provide a good alternative to paying for a professional service.

Being a Film & Media student, it is very helpful for me to be familiar with these platforms. They will enable me to produce high quality formats, with which I can present my projects and work in the future.

iWeb

When you launch the program, you will presented with a choice of themes. I chose the Road Trip theme for the purpose of this example. You will then have a choice of pages to customize, creating as many as you require. Now you can begin to fill your template site with personalised text and content… 

A Template for a Homepage in iWeb.

There are many pre-allocated fields for you to type in your own text and plenty of Drop Zones to place photographs and video content into. The entire platform is very flexible and allows you to adjust each detail of your website individually.

You can customise each page to suit your needs and create a rather impressive and professional looking website, with very little effort. iWeb will allow you to embed Object movies (which I spoke about in my previous post), something that WordPress does not let you do.

Having done a little bit of website work in the past and having an appreciation for the time and effort that goes in to coding in HTML, CSS and PHP (not to mention Flash and the other super heroes of mark-up language). I was very impressed with iWeb, its templates are various and look good. You can download new themes from Apple on a regular basis too. It is very user-friendly and ideal for someone who isn’t experienced enough to build their own site, or can’t afford to pay someone to build one for them.

iDVD

Similar to its relative iWeb, iDVD is a DVD creation program that allows you to produce an interactive and professional looking menu for your film projects. It is ideal for student filmmakers like myself, or home movie enthusiasts, wishing to give their treasured footage the big budget treatment.

As before with iDVD, you have the choice of various themes to use on your menu screen, text fields with which to title your buttons and films and drop-zones to literally drop your movie files into.

The attractive looking iDVD menu templates.

To show how these two programs work well together, I have selected the Road Trip theme again (above), to give you an idea of the similar aesthetic the two programs share. This can be very useful when trying to maintain a sense of consistency in your themes and projects.

You can set special features menus and everything else you might come to expect from a professional DVD, including production notes and fact files etc. There is also an option for slide shows should you wish to include some still shots. Again, this is an extremely user-friendly platform that I would recommend to anyone wishing to create their own blockbuster movie, no matter how amateur.