nickles

IGOR: I noticed something when I created the silly PotatoHead demo. From the original photo I cut out all the individual facial parts and saved as .pngs. When I brought the .pngs in as overlays to the original photo, the required zoom factors were all over the place in order to achieve proper alignment. I would have thought they would all be 100 as they were cutout from the original with the exact same scale. Maybe this is a property of .png files? Made it a challenge to get the precise overlay effect. Do you have any thoughts? Ken

Andrew: 1.) I promoted the original photo to a layer. 2.) I then cut out me(?) 3.) I flattened the result and filled the cut out with green. 4.) I pasted the cut out of me(?) as a new image. 5.) I then began to cut out various parts of me, pasted as new images and saved as ".png" 6.) This resulted in 10 parts, 2 eyes, 1 mouth, 1 nose, 2 ears, 2 cheeks, 1 chin, 1 shirt that were all saved as .png. These 10 parts, the original, and the cut out of me(?) filled with green went to PTE 5. 7. I placed the starting filled green jpg in the slide list. 8.) In object editor I brought in the original photo. I individually brought in all the body parts and precisely panned and zoomed them to the precise overlay location. 9.) I then diddled around with timed points, rotate, transparency, and zoom factors to achieve my rather crude result. Hope this makes sense. "Ken there is a white section at the bottom that stays on during show not like your flash Andrew ken" Ken Cox: Sorry...I wasn't real precise with my cutout of the shirt and left a little of it at the bottom of the filled green cutout. What the heck...I was just playing around...about 1 1/2 hours of well spent time(Ha). nickles

Hi, Just playing with .png files and PTE 5. Mr. PotatoHead can be downloaded here: http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sknickles@sb...ic+Data&.view=l You may have to depress your browser refresh several times to access the show. Ken

Hello: I've uploaded a more perfected set of Gaussian Blur PTE files here: http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sknickles@sb...ic+Data&.view=l Remember: You may have to hit your browser refresh button several times to access them. 1. Gaussian3_EXE.zip includes the .exe file along with the included PTE files. 2. Gaussian3.zip will require you to create the .exe with PTE Beta 5.0 from the included PTE files I get real bored with slideshows that have no music...so I included some nice sounds. nickles

Hello Davegee: I use Paint Shop Pro for most of my photo editing, although I ocasionally use Photoshop 7. PSP has a very nice filter called Soft Focus which is superb for creating the halo effects you speak of. Among several settings it permits you also to adjust the extent of the halo. PS 7 doesn't have that feature but newer versions may? "I'd like to request that you post the revision - many thanks - Nettleton" Hello Nettleton: I will post the revison this evening and advise in this thread. Ken

I did another little test. The sharp photo should always travel below the Gaussian Blur photo and always be set to 100 opacity. The blurred photo should always ride above the sharp photo and only it's transparency varied from 0 to 100. That gets rid of the semi-transparency that occurs about midway into the transition. In my original demo show when the sharp photo was at 100 opacity I set the blurred to 0 opacity. Conversely, when the sharp photo was at 0 opacity I set the blurred photo to 100 opacity. If anyone expresses an interest I will post the revison. Ken

Contaxman: I recently purchased an ACER laptop for my wife, Model AS5672WLMi-120GB from CompUSA on sale for $1299 and have been quite pleased with it's performance. It came with a 120 GB HD + 2g Ram, an ATI Radeon X1400 graphics card with 128 mb onboard memory + 384 mb hyper-memory(I think this is shared memory if it needs it?). You can find details here: http://us.acer.com/acereuro/page4.do?dau22...&crc=1163154511 Detailed specs. here: http://us.acer.com/acereuro/page9.do?dau34...&crc=1293932712 and all kind of user commentary at the following forum: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread...Aspire+5672WLMi It's performance with PTE 5 seems very good and smooth. The only show that may make it perspire so far is Lumenlux's large Spirit in the Sky...I think it may occasionaly pause for a msec but not absolutely sure...you really have to study hard to notice anything but smoothness. I've tested with every show that has been posted. My company Laptop is the highest end Dell Latitude D810 configured to the maximum but only a 64mb Ati Radeon. It jerks a lot with most of the PTE 5 shows. It's built much better than the ACER but cost twice as much. To me the ACER was an exceptional bargain and reasonably well built, although my wife very rarely moves it from her desktop. ACER is third in laptop sales as I understand, just behind Dell, who is just behind HP. Hope this helps, Ken

Stephanie, I agree with Ken Cox. The possible exception might be if you used a lot of chapters and menus. I have had those create problems in the player but run ok on a PC. You might try without any menus or chapters...and I would use a DVD+RW or DVD-RW for testing. nickles

Stephanie: I just found the site: http://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers.php You might see if your DVD payer is listed and view the user's comments. Ken

Stephanie: I dont't have an answer for you yet. Are you using Nero 6? I'm familiar with that version but not Nero 7. I've got four fairly recent DVD players but for some reason two of them will consistently play DVD+R but consistently not play DVD-R. The opposite is true for the other two DVD players. All four will play DVD+RW but only two will play DVD-RW. There is a web site that keeps a database of player model numbers and there compatibility according to actual owners. I can't locate the site at the moment but KEN COX might know it. If Ken doesn't respond I'll keep looking and post. As all my DVD players recognize DVD+RW, I always make a dry run with that format to verify the DVD is made correctly before burning a DVD-R. You might try a DVD+RW disk and see what happens. Are you creating lot's of chapters and/or menus? Do you know what bit rate Nero used for encoding,i.e., 4800 kbits/sec? Sincerely, Ken

Lumenlux: "Is your method currently to use two photos, one at "sharp" and one at "full blur" and then use PTE "fade" transition and O/A opacity to evolve as desired?" Yes. That is one of the reasons I asked Igor if it was feasible for PTE to do the Gaussian Blur. As the video cards evidently don't support this function...the only method I could devise was the two photo technique. Unfortunately for a moving object it takes quite a bit of synchronization to keep two objects moving in synch with each other. I haven't got the technique perfected yet as I get to much transparency in the middle of blur transition process. It might work best if the sharp image is kept at 100 transparency and the blurred image is varied from 0 to 100. "And if no gradual "evolvement" is wanted, what benefits do you like using the O/A window vs. your past (PS) method?" The only benefits would be for objects you desire to move (pan or zoom) within the slide. For a still slide with overlays and no movement the PTE 4 method is much simpler and can be used to do an excellent job. I really created the demo slideshow for two reasons. One was to satisfy my curiosity of doing the blurred movement if Igor was unable to easily do it....I thought he might just have some magic to pull out of his hat of tricks. The second reason was to demonstrate the use of Gaussian Blur for those in the forum that might not be familiar with the technique. I doubt that I would use this technique very often in O/A but it is now in my bag of tools. I do use the technique quite often in the basic PTE 4 slideshow...especially when I create a simple image overlay on a previous slide. Oh, by the way I've noticed many women tend to appreciate a very slight amount of Gaussian Blur applied to photos of themselves? It does have a nice softening effect if used in moderation. Sincerely, Ken

Welcome to the Forum Stephanie: If you look at the files of your DVD using Windows Explorer do they appear similar to: AUDIO_TS(empty folder) VIDEO_TS(folder) xxx.bup xxx.ifo xxx.vob yyy.ifo yyy.vob zzz.ifo zzz.vob . . etc. I'm interested in the mix of file extensions ".vob", ".ifo", ".vob" and not the specific name. Ken

Hello Ron, A very neat idea. Sort of along the lines of Lin Evans 3D demonstration. A bit of effort in Photoshop, I bet. The music caused me to stand and salute. Thanks for sharing.... Ken

Thanks for the assist Al, Maybe Ligia got through. Yahoo Briefcase is better than it used to be. At least it seems that if your are persistent with the refresh button I think you can normally get through. It typically takes me 3-6 times. Yahoo admits to a problem but haven't offered a solution. I don't think the problem is unique to my Briefcase? Unfortunately, at present, this is the only means I have of sharing large files. nickles

Igor: Thanks for your reply. As I know little about the workings of video cards...I thought there might be a chance they could do that function...so forget I suggested it. Since I started this thread and question I've played around a bit with PTE 5 and this effect. With your great tools, I've learned that "If there is a will there is a way". I created a second version of the effect for download. It's not real pretty but demonstrates the effect. I zoom two photos in and out as overlays. As the last photo exits I attempted to simulate a zooming out "sharp to blur" effect. Thought I'd post for those that might be interested...but remember it's pretty crude...just for my own learning. It can be downloaded here: http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sknickles@sb...ic+Data&.view=l Sincerely, Ken

I created a simulated demo show of this effect here: http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=4425 Ken

Hello: When creating slideshows I very often use a Gaussian Blur effect, especially when super-imposing one image or images on top of another. When used with layering in Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, it can be used very effectively to simulate a small depth of field such as a wide-open lens. I created a short demo with PTE 5 beta in a crude attempt to demonstrate this effect. I've included the original PTE files along with the .exe slideshow file for those that might be interested. I like the effect but I may well be by my lonely...just thought I would share. You can download here: http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sknickles@sb...ic+Data&.view=l It's the file called Gaussian. You may have to het the refresh button on your browser several times in order to reach the download page. nickles

Hello Igor: A suggestion for PTE 5: I believe the additon of a Gaussian Blur effect to Objects and Animation would be a highly useful feature. Similar to your Opacity feature with a means of selecting the extent of blur (1-100). An example would be in my KenBurns demo. It would have been nice to start of the show with a Gaussian Blur as the image was initially being zoomed to fullscreen...with the Gaussian Blur removed as the full zoom keypoint is achieved. I have found that Gaussian Blur can be very beneficial in removing the pixelation caused by changing a photos display size. I use it quite often when I create a DVD from a PTE show...to get rid of what some people call the "shimmering" effect. Another area I think benefits would result is when you are putting more than one image on the display in PTE 5. At times it would be very desirable to blur one or more of the images to center the viewers attention to a sharper image. I don't know how feasible this would be...but to me it would be a very nice enhancement. Maybe others will comment on this suggestion. Sincerely, nickles

Hello Brian, I recently installed this card in an older HP Pavilion, 1.5ghz, 640mb, W2k system. It works smooth as silk, so far, at every PTE 5 demo slideshow that I've thrown at it. That system is my old "bread & butter" photo editor, DVD creator and PTE creator system. Had to upgrade the power supply to 500w because of the cards power requirements. It does require at least a 4x AGP video card slot. Cost about $225(US) for card and power supply...maybe it's worth it..at least for another year or two. Although I have a laptop with XP...W2k has always been so stable for me that I'm reluctant to give it up. Ken

Hey Cèlou, Very, Very, cool demo. Some really neat concepts. Your music choice was perfect for the bouncing letters. Thanks for sharing and also including you source files. I'll definitely remember this one! Ran perfect on my geforce 6600 256mb W2k. Sincerely, Ken

Hello Michel, Very well composed demonstration of PTE 5.0....ran beautifully on my system. Thanks for sharing your show as well as your source. The source sure helps when trying to understand PTE 5.0 techniques. Sincerely, Ken

Hello IAN: Thanks for sharing your technique as well as your source files. sincerely, KEN

Hello Ian: Would you mind sharing the method you used to create the moving starfield in your intro. Ken

Replaced the ATI Radeon 9250 with a GEforce 6600 OC 256mb in-- W2k machine 1.5ghz P4 with 640mb ram. PTEShow.exe, PTEShow_H.exe and Lumenlux's cranky original 109mb "Spirity in the Sky" ran like a charm...both music and images. KEN

Hey JudyKay: We don't permit HAPPY people in this forum...just kidding. Sounds like you're enjoying yourself. Ken