14 DAY TRIAL // No matter how many humans live on this planet, it's impossible to find two identical individuals, and the same is true when talking about CD/DVD covers, because no matter how many templates for creating your own cover designs may be available, there is always going to be someone to say "I want it my way", and so the story begins...
First, there was Yamaha's T@2, then NEC's Labelflash, now it's Lightscribe for more and more hardware producers and, of course, consumers, but this takes care of personalizing the looks of the disc. When it's about the cover, then we have to talk about programs able to create labels and covers for your discs, and this is exactly what I have for you now.
Disc Cover is the name of my target, and its latest version is 1.2.1, released last October. The shareware version can be downloaded for free, but if you have a slower connection, you have to be patient until the 25MB package finishes to download. The application is a Universal Binary that runs natively on both Intel and PowerPC platforms, and requires Mac OS X 10.3 or later to run. Now, we have to find out if Disc Cover is really worth 34.95$ or you can move on and try something else, so let's get things movin'!
First of all, you'll really have to install this program. No, I am not talking about "drag this to your Applications folder", because this time we have a setup package that requires you to read and agree with the license agreement, choose the location to install to and all the rest, just like most Windows installations... but without the "restart your computer" part, fortunately. Once you finished this process, you can fire up the application.
To be honest, I must say that Disc Cover's interface looks great. Everything is well organized, and despite the fact that this program has a lot of features, I found this application to be really easy to use. The tools are placed at hand, and all the icons and built in graphics are excellent.
Did I say "built in graphics"? It seems I did, and I guess those of you that used such programs before already know what to expect... and that is a really large amount of high quality images to use in your designs. How large? Well, the download edition has around 900, but for only 5$ extra you can get the program on CD with the full clipart library that contains over 23,000 images! Sounds much better, isn't it?
The design elements supported include CD and DVD labels, covers, tray inserts, slim cases, super jewel boxes, business card CDs and even VHS wraps, but it doesn't end here, since you can create covers for virtually any disc/cassette around.
The workflow is as simple as expected - choose your design, the cover format, customize and print, or start a new design from scratch. The images that can be inserted into your designs include many supported formats, like JPEG, TIFF, PDF, GIF, EPS and many others, while your documents can be saved as JPEG, PDF and TIFF files.
The contents of the CD to be printed on the cover can be imported from iTunes, iPhoto, iDVD or Toast Titanium, and printer calibration is possible inside the program, to achieve better results, and if you're not using perforated paper, you can choose to print cut marks.
The images include Alpha channel, and multiple levels overlays can be easily created to give your work a professional look. Shadows, advanced text effects, a wide range of shapes to include in your documents... they are all here!
I can't find enough words to say how good this program is, so I'll leave it to you. After all, I would rather taste a food instead of reading 200 books that describe how good it is, but I hope you won't leave so soon, because we have to draw the conclusions and check some screenshots with this program in action, as usual...
The Good
Disc Cover is a fast program that's full of useful tools, but manages to remain easy to use and has an excellent interface. During the period I used it, I had no problems, and the quantity of templates and cliparts available is impressive!
The Bad
Some keyboard shortcuts may be added in next versions, as well as some additional text effects, but other than these, Disc Cover is an excellent all-around performer and I have nothing bad to say about it.
The Truth
Only 35$ as a download, and 39$ with that huge images collection included? I don't have to say anything else than "run, get it, and use it well"! This program is worth more than its price, and you don't have to believe me; just give it a try and you'll know then that I was right!
Check out the screenshots here:
