How to author Blu-ray discs with the new Final Cut Studio

PVC by Richard Harrington

There’s a good chance that HD has become a major player (or even the only format) in your work. With the latest incarnation of Final Cut Studio, Apple offers several ways to deliver HD. You can of course go back to tape or create downloadable and streaming H.264 files. Most requested though, is the ability to create Blu-ray discs.

While Blu-ray did not appear in DVD Studio Pro, it has made its way into Final Cut Studio. There are three locations you can access within Final Cut Studio to create a Blu-ray disc. You can choose File > Share in Final Cut Pro to export a sequence or selected items from the Browser. You can use the Share command in Motion to export the current project. You can also add one or more items to Compressor and create a disc using the batch template feature.

NOTE: Pay to Play
In order to create Blu-ray discs, you’ll need to equip your Mac with a third-party Blu-ray burner. (Check out our BDR-205 Mega Bundle with External enclosure $299.95)

Creating a Blu-ray Disc with Compressor

With the addition of batch templates in Compressor 3.5, it is now possible to easily create and burn a simple Blu-ray disc (or a standard DVD) right from Compressor. You’ll find Apple-designed HD templates that you can use for your disc. In order to start the process of creating a Blu-ray disc, you need to configure Compressor to process an HD video file and then create the disc. To do this you’ll use a batch template to simplify and accelerate your workflow. read more...