mhwarner

A small request, but it would make life easier in using templates or copying slides. It's a bit annoying to always have to move the cursor right or hit the "End" key to see the full file name of a picture object. There seems to be enough room to maybe drop the entry box to the line below the "Picture" label and make it the full width of the Properties dialog area. Thanks, Igor, for any consideration!

Maureen, What a wonderful show! The music was most appropriate and the photography was absolutely stunning! The shot of the stag was incredible. You certainly captured some exquisite lighting as well. I wondered what you had been up to lately. Thanks for sharing another great show that goes into my folder of KEEPERS!

Colin, Nicely done and very relaxing to watch. Made me wish I lived closer to the beach! I liked the opening intro and transition. I did not, however, think that the ending frame transition added anything to the show. It looks like it was kind of thrown in as an afterthought and seemed odd because there weren't any other "frames" in the show. Maybe some sort of reverse transition similar to the one used in the beginning would have been better (from my perspective anyway). Also, there were one or two horizons near the beginning which need a bit of straightening. Your whole Turkey series was a nice travelog. Thanks for the trip!

Nicely done, Colin. The music was well chosen, as were the photographs. Very clever use of David's program. Gives me lots of ideas. Thanks for sharing!

Just to reiterate ... It doesn't work if you have two separate copies of PTE open at that same time. In that case, the "paste" command will be greyed out in the first instance of PTE (as Dave originally pointed out). The copying and pasting must take place within the same single instance of PTE.

Well, David, I can see where this program will be a huge time waster. I mean that in a good sense however. I have already spent the last hour playing with it (when I should have been working on other projects). It really does some interesting things and certainly creates unique files. I can see manipulating these files even further in Photoshop. One very useful feature I found was the ability to import and tile. For those creating albums and book projects, it's a great way to use all those downloaded web page background files to create album covers. I created a couple of interesting "papers" as well which I think would be of tremendous interest to scrapbookers. You should find a couple of scrapbook forums or sites and post the program there as well. Thanks for your efforts and for sharing this program.

Dave, Just to add my two cents ... you cannot have the two shows open during the process. You open one show, select and copy the slides, close that show, open the second show and paste (it is not necessary to close PTE down, only the individual show). I seem to remember that it might have worked with two shows (with two separate copies of PTE open at the same time back) back in some previous version, but this is no longer the case. Even if you only want a few non-contiguous slides from a different show, copy the whole string of them, paste in the new show and then delete the ones you don't want.

Gary, You have some lovely pictures of what appears to be a beautiful area! While I probably will never do the trip it, your show definitely made me want to visit. Aside from the scenery, I liked the interesting sequences of market fruits and vegetables and "shoe" closeups. The music seemed quite appropriate as well. On the negative side, the show was a bit too long for me and I confess to using the right arrow to move through it a bit more quickly. For me, I guess the issue (and one I struggle with as well) is putting together a show that is appropriate for more public audiences and one that is of more interest to family and friends. While I know the show is meant to be a memory of your trip, I would have enjoyed seeing less photos of your partner and some of the hotels/buildings where you spent the night. I would have cut the time on the opening map sequence as well and perhaps edited out a few more photos as well. But I also realize that there isn't always the time or inclination to prepare two separate shows. In any case, thank you for sharing these travelogs. I have enjoyed them.

Andrew, Your link doesn't work.

Mark, I enjoyed your show. We were just there last week and it seems you had much better weather (although I did see some patches of snow). We had clouds, mist, rain, wind and just enough sun to make a hike down and back on the Navajo Loop, although it started to rain when we were 2/3 of the way out. We did get to see some pronghorn antelope, deer and wild turkeys as well. I never cease to be fascinated by the formations. I'm working on a little show to post as well.

Greg, TheDom also has a very elegant template available for purchase which does pretty much what you are looking for and the price is reasonable. You can download a demo here: http://thedom.fr/index.php?option=com_jdownloads&Itemid=54&view=view.download&catid=14&cid=215 and you can purchase the template here: http://thedom.fr/index.php?option=com_digistore&controller=digistoreProducts&task=view&pid=37&cid=1&Itemid=58 It might save you some time and at the very least would provide a good foundation to learn from and to create exactly what you are looking for.

Nicely done. Interesting show and I really liked the way you put the "old" album together. My only negative comment is that you spelled "cronological" incorrectly on the second page. It should be "chronological" with an "h" (unless you spell it differently in the UK than we do here in the US). Anyway thanks for sharing and for the inspiration. Your show gives me some great ideas for modifications of Barry's template with some of the interesting old book graphics I have downloaded previously.

Barry, Could you elaborate a bit on what software you use. Thanks!

Gary, Wow! Thanks for sharing this. I don't believe I have ever seen Vietnam quite so personally. I have seen movies and newsreels, of course, and I know many guys who served there, but to see someone's personal slides was a unique experience. One thought I had while watching was that you were all so young. We must be about the same age. I graduated high school in '64. Anyway, the length of the show was just fine and somehow the dust and scratches actually added to the experience. The music was perfect. My only negative comment would be on the the opening titles. The mixture of different fonts and white shadows mixed with the animations were a bit too flashy for my taste, but to each his own. Thanks for sharing this and I'm glad you made it home!

Xaver, Since you asked, my primary interest in AV (as you call it), is strictly to present my photography in an interesting and pleasing manner to (1) my friends and family, (2) customers who have purchased a CD/DVD of from me of photographs of an event or activity that I have taken, or (3) others to whom I may be trying to sell one or more prints of my photographs. While I understand that they are a big deal in Europe, in the US, there are not many "AV Clubs" at least not that I know of (or maybe there are some in larger cities that I am unaware of). So I have no interest in preparing sequences to be shown at an AV club. While I can see that others may enjoy telling stories with an AV sequence or preparing a show just for the heck of it or because they have found a piece of music around which they would like to create a show, although I might enjoy doing so, my time is not unlimited and there are other activities I prefer to pursue. When I download shows from the forum, I will have to be honest that I am primarily looking for good photography, interesting locations and scenery, pleasing transitions, and well-chosen music. The "A" as you refer to it, is for the most part, a very personal choice. If I look at a show and the music seems appropriate to the show and doesn't start or end abruptly, I see no reason to comment on it. I might not necessarily have chosen that piece, but hey, it's not my show. As for spoken commentary, I personally am not a big fan of it. I'd rather see subtitles or scrolling text (or even some street signs to indicate where the photos were taken). That's not to say it shouldn't be done, of course. I guess what I am saying here is that it sounds as if you are looking for comments similar to those you would get if you showed a sequence at an AV club to a group of people who probably used to do this with multiple slide projectors and film cameras back in the day. That's not me (although I did use slide film and I owned a slide projector) and, I'd be willing to bet that I represent a whole bunch of other members here who are just trying to find fun and interesting ways to present their photography, whether it is vacation pictures, family photos, or other collections of shots. We like to learn and we certainly can benefit from the shows and comments posted here. However, you shouldn't expect to get the same kind of technical feedback from us. I feel qualified and comfortable commenting on the photography in a show, on the quality or the number of those photos or the order in which they are presented. If the music seems relevant to the show and I don't find it annoying, I'm not likely to say anything. Sorry, but that's all you're going to get from me and if it isn't enough, then I will refrain from making any further comments.

Gary, I enjoyed your show very much. I've never been to that part of the world and your photos make me want to plan a trip there. Maybe someday ... I loved the opening titles and also the aerial shots. I also liked the shot from inside the tour bus looking out. It helped to set up the story, so to speak. I would however, echo the comments of other posters that the show was a bit too long. Perhaps not too long as much as too many repetitive images. For instance, I might suggest cutting a couple of the aerials, and in the little parade or pageant through the streets, I would cut it back to one or two images. Also, some of the fish pictures could perhaps be eliminated. The music seemed quite appropriate although there was one pretty large silence between two music pieces where I began to wonder if somehow there wasn't enough music to finish the show (eventually the next piece began). I think the thing that I found most bothersome about the show, however, were the transitions between horizontals and vertical images. I know that this has been addressed previously in this forum (probably ad nauseum), but I found it very disconcerting. I am not recommending cutting out the vertical images because most of them were quite interesting and did add to the show, but I would suggest using a transition where there is a horizontal background of say a previous related image and then one or two verticals displayed on top of that. A few that come to mind were a photo of an interesting brick wall where you could then overlay a couple of vertical related street or stairway shots, some of the cat pictures and also some of the fish pictures. There are many ways to do this including having the verticals "fly" in or maybe just have them slowly appear one after the other, or at the same time (through the use of masks or just simple opacity in the object editor). There have been many examples posted here over the years and it used to be more of a hassle to set up using photoshop or an image editor, but PTE now makes it pretty easy to do within the program. I can also sympathize with your comments about having so many photos to pull from and the difficulty in editing them down to only a few. I just returned from an almost 4-month road trip from Arizona to Alaska and back and have somewhere in the neighborhood of 25,000 photos. I am trying to figure out how to best organize and present even a small portion of those photos. Anyway, I do hope you'll take these comments in the spirit of constructive criticism and I very much appreciate your sharing this show. I am looking forward to seeing the next segments.

Gary, You forgot the link to the download but I found it on Beechbrook: http://www.beechbrook.com/pte/downloadfile.asp?id=1874

Hi George, There is another free template with a slightly different version of a book effect in this thread: http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10820&view=findpost&p=70285. You can find a brief discussion on making an album, together with a small (free) template here: http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10877&st=0&p=70548entry70548 If you are doing this merely as a learning exercise and have more time than $$, these two free templates would be helpful. However, to save yourself a bit of aggravation and a whole lot of time, for minimal expenditures, you can buy one or more excellent "book with turning pages" templates from Dom's web store or from Barry Beckham's site. None are very expensive in US dollars and for me were well worth the savings in time. Any of these purchased templates allow you to modify to your heart's content. For any of these templates you can download sample shows made from the templates first to see which might suit your needs before making a purchase. Dom's Templates: http://www.thedom.fr/index.php?option=com_digistore&controller=digistoreProducts&task=view&pid=64&cid=1&Itemid=58 http://www.thedom.fr/index.php?option=com_digistore&controller=digistoreProducts&task=view&pid=6&cid=1&Itemid=58 http://www.thedom.fr/index.php?option=com_digistore&controller=digistoreProducts&task=list&cid=1&Itemid=58 (Complete list) Barry's Book Templates: http://www.beckhamdigital.co.uk/downloads/templates/wedding/wedding16_10.htm http://www.beckhamdigital.co.uk/downloads/templates/oldbook/oldbook16_10l.htm http://www.beckhamdigital.co.uk/downloads/templates/template_list.htm (Complete list)

Xaver (or whoever you are since you say Xaver doesn't exist), I very much enjoyed your Hazy Days slideshow, in spite of the fact that I didn't understand any of the German titles or narration. The pictures pretty much spoke for themselves and the voice of the narrator (yours?) was quite pleasant, even though I have no clue what was being said. I particularly liked the stork pictures and those of the narrow streets with the colorful house fronts. I'm not sure that the "disappearing" people added anything to the show, though. Some of the architectural angles were interesting and I suspect a few were caused by either the lack of a wide angle lens or the inability to move away far enough to capture the buildings regardless. I did like the vertical panorama of the one church building. Perhaps you might consider editing a few of the photos to slightly remove the "keystoning" effect. I was also impressed with the introductory slides. I liked the title animation and I thought the whole map sequence was a good addition to the show and well done. My only real negative comment was that I thought a few of the photos were a bit too heavily processed in that HDR-like (sort of metalic) manner that seems to be so popular these days. The show is definitely a keeper for me and sometime I'd love to read a brief translation of the title, location, and narrative in English. Thanks for sharing this and I hope it will bring many comments as I will be interested to hear what others think of it as well.

Thanks Ronnie! I downloaded from your site with no problems. Don't know what was happening with Mediafire as I tried again several times and never got the download to start. In any case, I enjoyed your show. It looks like the event was great fun. I especially liked the horse event photos. You have some nice shots of the jumping. With regard to the animation, I honestly cannot say that it added a great deal to the show for me. I found that seeing so much of the white background as the images "flew" away was a bit distracting but that's just my opinion, of course. Thanks for sharing the show and for adding the additional download.

Hi Ronnie, Would love to watch your show but after trying to download both versions both yesterday and today from Mediafire, I haven't had any luck. Even after clicking the various "download" buttons, it never gets to the actual point of downloading. I will have to say (and this is not only to you but others as well who use Mediafire), when I see that someone has posted a slideshow there, I typically do not even bother to try to download it as it is a PITA to do so. I guess I am wondering why folks without their own server/account capability don't just use Bill's free and always easy-to-use Beechbrook capability he so generously provides?

Thanks Barry. Great explanation and lovely photos. You've got some beautiful scenery there "down under". I especially enjoyed the beach/sunset(sunrise?) photos.

Nicely done, Ronnie! My only comment is that I personally would have preferred to see the text and pictures reversed. My eye was always initially drawn to the text page as each page turned, and I had to refocus to concentrate on the pictures. If the photo was on the right-hand page, I think my eyes would have focused on the picture first and then I would have glanced at the text to read it. I guess it all depends which item is most important in the presentation. If it is the text and the photos are more of an illustration, then your arrangement would make sense. Just personal preference, of course. Thank you for sharing this and I look forward to seeing your PDF file of instructions.

Charlie, Very imaginative and extremely well done! I never cease to be amazed by the cleverness and talent of some of the members of this forum. I have enjoyed "Jazz" as I have many of your other shows. When I watched your "Couleurs" show a few years ago, I thought perhaps it would be difficult to achieve a higher level and greater quality of animations, but you have done so with "Jazz". Thanks so much for sharing this show. I will keep it and watch it often when I need inspiration for creating my own shows. P.S. You also have a lovely website as well. Very nicely designed!

I know this can't be something widespread or somebody else would have mentioned it long ago. I have been creating a show in version 6.04. When I clicked on the Timeline button at the bottom to do some work, it never opens and I get the following two error messages "Division by Zero" and "Floating Point Division by Zero". I thought I had lost my project but I was able to save it. I closed PTE then reopened and the error message kept coming up as I moved the cursor around the screen. I finally realized I could click on the "Slides" button and the error would go away. But I cannot get the timeline to open (and the error messages are consistent whenever I click on the Timeline button. I tried reinstalling PTE but it makes no difference. I found one reference in the forum here http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10607&view=findpost&p=70278 to "Division by Zero" but it was supposedly resolved. I tried it with several different small projects where all files were present and it happens every time. Have I done something wrong? Thanks in advance for any help. I am running Win XP with an ATI Mobility Radeon X1400 graphics card. Update: I just loaded 6.5 beta 1 and I have no problem with it regarding the timeline. Strange.