DVDit Pro has been available for several months. The latest version, DVDit Pro HD adds Blu-ray support making it currently the only decent DVD writing program that can make Blu-ray discs - Encore will probably get Blu-ray writing about the middle of the year when the next version of the Adobe Production Studio is launched, and Ulead DVD Workshop may never be upgraded.

The Blu-ray writing added to DVDit Pro HD does not use any of the advanced play back facilities of Blu-ray - for example with Blu-ray you can have menus that float over the video whilst playing. Also Blu-ray supports different video formats - not just MPEG2 like standard DVDs. Currently DVDit Pro HD only supports MPEG2 on DVDs.

What it does give you is the ability to make Blu-ray discs with all the functionality of normal DVDs. We tested discs made with our first Blu-ray burner and only ones made with DVDit actually played back in the currently available set top box from Panasonic.

What is DVDit like for DVD authoring?

Actually very good. The program has a similar feature set to Encore DVD, so:

• Control over practically every aspect of the DVD, where you can specify exactly how links behave, to what video clips they go, and what happens afterwards. 8 audio tracks, 32 subtitle tracks.Playlists where you can string together various titles and make video play in different orders without having to include the video on the DVD more than one.
• Slideshow editor - practically the same as the Encore one without the automatic pan and scan.
• Encoding into Dolby Digital audio and also encoding into MPEG2 (you can specify the settings for both SD and HD material.
• Inclusion of normal data on DVD as well as video information.
• Open DVD - make a DVD and edit the contents after authoring (Encore does not do this).
• Create layer files in Photoshop and import them as menus - Encore obvious integrates better with Photoshop because both hale from Adobe.
• Writing to Blu-ray or DLT master.

The main screen of Sonic DVDit Pro.

1. The project window. This has a convenient “tree view” which helps you to easily organise your DVD
2. The layout window - see and configure menus and your videos play here
3. The assets - pre-made buttons, menus, backgrounds and any that you have imported as well.
4. Timeline - add audio and subtitle tracks or scrub through your video.
5. The properties tab - here you gain control over your assets and links.