dagrace

Hi Ron. Congratulations. This is a great application and really quite friendly once you understand it. Nice job!

I'm having a senior moment. For the life of me, I cannot find the little checkbox that says "use transition from desktop to first slide" or something similar. I know I've used it, but I couldn't find it today on v5b3. Is it missing there temporarily, or can someone help? I just know i'm going to slap my forehead on this. Thanks! Ah! I found it! I swear I looked 4 or 5 times at every screen in Project Options. For those who don't know, it's on the "Screen" tab, but you have to scroll down to see it. Now, it doesn't seem to be working. Is it temporarily disabled in beta 3? Or can others get it to work? Thanks.

Hi "thedom" (short for Dominique?) I tried your download again and was successful. Wow! You did a much better job than I did! I can see a little jerkiness, but it's very good. Congrats! Are you going to write a tutorial on it?

And I thought I had an original idea! I guess "nothing is new under the sun". By the way, I had an error trying to run your earth.exe. Maybe it was on my end. I'll try again later. I have made a version 2, by the way, replacing version 1 on the same web page. Version 2. Ken was complaining about no music, so I added some! Also fixed the transitions and registration some, but it's still got a way to go to be really smooth.

No sound "YET" by design... this was just proof of concept. As noted in other threads, if you're going to zoom, you need a fairly robust image to start with. Hence the size for 6 or 7 slides. And I also didn't do a very good job (yet) of registration. But thanks for looking.

I don't know how many of you are familiar with Google Earth. It's a great program for exploring our planet. One technique they use is a HUGE zooming effect (like from outer space to your driveway!). That inspired me to try something in PTE 5.0 beta 3. Disclaimers: I just went outside and shot a few pics. I realize now that for this to work, you have to be much more precise in registration. I also realized you can't zoom OUT to have the technique work very well. So this is very sloppy, but I'll post it here so that someone can improve on it. As always, comments and criticisms are welcome. Google Earth Technique

Thanks. I'll try that. I think back in the "Days of Olde" Al had an excel spreadsheet and macros that managed all the timing info. I'm sure it's doable, but the best answer is probably "Do it right the first time!"

Ah yes. I remember now reading about the "mystery button." I shall try it as soon as I get home. Thanks! Yes, what I call the "mini-viewer" is the small window in the upper right of the timeline window. I wasn't sure what to call it. As I mentioned, I am keen on synching slide events (fades, or now object animation) to specific places in the music. So it would be VERY handy for me to see the object animation in the timeline window. But I imagine that is a huge feat. I'll be patient and glad for what we get!

(See another thread with similar title for the other situation) Situation #2 This is solely a v5 issue as it has to do with PZR. I love the features and I think I have found some useful, tasteful transitions that add a lot. In my show, I have the “base” image, which may or may not move, and then I add some objects that appear at different times, fade in, move, etc. So the total duration of the base slide is, say, 20 seconds. When I go to the timeline and watch the preview (using the “Play” button), all I see is the base slide, with none of the sub-objects’ movement (or the base, for that matter). It just looks like a 20-second slide. 3 questions: 1) Will we ever be able to see the PZR stuff from the mini-viewer window? (I know this is asking a lot!) 2) When I’m in the Object Animation window, is there any way to preview just this slide? It seems when I click on Preview, it starts at the beginning of the show. Last night I wanted to see the effects in context of the music, and I had to run the show over and over. It was only a 4-minute show, but what I wanted to see was 3 minutes in! I think on the main slide list there is a “start preview with current slide.” Does that but that invokes the mini-viewer, doesn’t it? 3) Even though I’ve enabled on-screen menus, I don’t see them, nor do the arrow keys work. I’m assuming this is a beta-not-implemented-yet issue? I’ll wait for it. Bottom line: I used Beta #3 “seriously” for the first time and I’m very pleased with the results, but I need some training/coaching/re-mindsetting. Thanks for any help. By the way, I made a show for a friend last week. Very simple, no music, default transitions, etc. Just an automated show of 90 pictures. She was so impressed that she bought PTE the same day! This is a great tool, Igor!

I made a real show with Beta #3 yesterday and ran into a couple things. If they’re “not implemented yet”, that’s just fine. If I need education and experience, that’s fine too. But I’m not satisfied that this is the way it should be forever. I’ll try to simplify. Situation #1 Defaults are 1.5 sec transition and 4 sec duration. I have 6 slides. Using music and timeline, I adjust #3 so that duration is 2 seconds and transition is .5 seconds. I adjust #4 so that duration is 1 second and transition is immediate (0 time and the bottom check mark on the effects). Let’s also say that I’ve manually adjusted each slide on the timeline (I tend to do that to synch up exactly with the downbeat of the music or a symbol crash, etc.) So my timeline looks like this (just the durations, not showing transitions): |-- 4 --|-- 4 --|-- 2 --|-- 1 --|-- 4 --|-- 4 --| So on the timeline, slide #5 starts at T=12, and #6 is at T=16. Total show is 19 seconds long. (Say the music is 30 seconds long.) Now, I notice a flaw in the image in slide #4. I always make copies of the images for PTE, so I go back to the “original” and fix it. Now I save it as PTE_4b.jpg (instead of PTE_4.jpg). I want to put it 4b right where 4 was. A. If I remove 4 from the show and drag 4b into its spot, it has the default timings, and slides #5 and #6 are now moved out by 3 seconds. Unless I did something wrong, when I change the duration and transition times, it does NOT pull #5 and #6 back. I had to move them back manually. B. I was thinking I could (outside of PTE) rename “4” to “old4” and “4b” to “4”. Now when I re-open PTE, will it grab the “new” #4 and keep the same timings? C. Any other way to keep the timings of all the others intact, or at least have them restored when I change the newly inserted slide? If I had used the defaults for everything and let PTE synch to the music, it would be fine. But as I mentioned, I usually end up touching each slide on the timeline and moving it (not necessarily changing the duration or the transition) a bit. I have to admit I have not tried to duplicate this in 4.x, so it may work the same. This seems like a “technique” or “workflow” issue that Al or Ken or some of the other Masters can lick (or already have!) This is so long, I will post the other situation in a separate thread.

This thread sort of got me interested, so I looked around a bit. Note that I do not have any actual experience. However, iPower and Brinkster mentioned above both look like good sites, with offerings in the $4-5 US / month range. One that caught my eye was Dot 5 Hosting at Dot5Hosting If someone has some energy to talk me out of this one, I'd be interested. Hmmm.... I'm not sure the link is going to work above. Just in case, it's http://www.dot5hosting.com/index.html David

Thanks to you both. If I know it's temporary, I'll be patient. Ron, my idea was to have a landscape pic, then fade into or somehow superimpose one or more portrait pics, where the long dimension of the portrait is the same as the short dimension of the landscape (or less). I agree that it's often disconcerting to have "full screen" portraits and full screen landscapes intermixed, although I've seen some where because of the transitions, they pull it off brilliantly. David

Me too. David

First off, I just started playing with V5 beta #3, after being away from PTE for way too long. Igor, it's brilliant! My mind is racing with all the ideas I have and how to implement them. Spectacular! I've noticed something that may not even be related to PTE at all. It might be a "system" thing. I have a Canon digital camera which has the "auto-rotation" feature enabled, so that when I rotate the camera 90 to take a "vertical" pic (portrait vs landscape) the pic shows up in Photoshop as vertical, not layed on its side. When I grab it off the thumbnail page and drag it or "add" it to the slide list, it looks correct. But when I run the slide show, it's horizontal (landscape). As an experiment, I opened the original in Photoshop (where it looked portrait) and did a "save as" with no other modification. When I look at them in the PTE thumbnail view, they both look the same. But when I drag them both into the show, the original is landscape and the copy is portrait. I've taken plenty of portrait (vertical) shots before, and don't remember having this problem. But I can also admit I've probably never taken the original image into a slide show without resizing it, (or sharpening, color balancing, etc.) so that's always been a "save as" copy. It makes me think that perhaps Photoshop is recognizes the EXIF data that says the image is rotated, but other programs do not. I almost always work with copies anyway, but that's another step in the workflow to say "save all vertical shots, regardless of any other modifications." Is there a setting in PTE that I'm not recognizing? Thanks again for a great product and a wonderful forum with very clever folks. David

Brilliant! Thanks for sharing.

There used to be a Pinned Topic that included the most recent version of PTE. It seems to have gone away. What is the most recent? Can I get it here somewhere or should I just go to the website? Thanks.

Thanks all, especially Al.

I've been away for a while, but hope to be back more regularly now. I had a dozen slides or so that I wanted to put together without music. But being a visual person, I really like the synchronization (or synchronisation, for my British and Canadian friends ) screen and the ability to drag slides and transitions around. So I created 6 sec of silence in an mp3 and included that as the music. But the then-current slide seemed to "hang" when I got to the end of the 6 sec. even though I checked the "repeat" box. So I added enough of these 6 sec mp3s in the play list to get me to the end of the slides, and things seemed to work OK. My question: Is there an easier way to do this? I guess my statement of objective is: "Be able to use the synch functionality without music, and without creating a Silent mp3 of the correct length to cover the slide show length." OK Al (or anyone else) set me straight. Thanks.

alrobin, If / when you do write up a procedure / workflow / standard work that explains some or all of the options connected with managing transitions, will you share? Thanks!

I've been "away" for a while, but just took a look at the page turn effect. Astounding! In reading what's new in 4.40, I see some things I asked for in previous releases. Thanks so much! You've re-kindled my desire to spend more time on this avocation. Bravo!

I have a friend who asked me about video editing software. I don't know anything about it, but I said I knew a place where I could float a question and get good answers! He wants to pull a file (.vob or .voc?) off a dvd-r and import it into his computer, then edit, etc. He said he's having trouble finding a reasonably priced package that will import. Ultimately he wants to turn it into an .mpeg. This is not a professional venture. Just home video recorder stuff. Panasonic DVD camcorder. Any advice? Thanks.

One way to accomplish that with current technology would be to break your slide show into sub-shows, the break coming where you want each video. Then use Granot's utility to play the video at the beginning of each "show", and use another utility (or the linking feature of PTE) to string them all together. Not very elegant, but it may do the job. Thinking just a bit more about it, the sound file(s) may be a bit of a bear with that solution. Just thinking out loud.

Stunning photos and a brilliant slide show! I was taken with many aspects of it. The nearly constant background noise of various aircraft, the sweetness of the children, the wonderful colors juxtaposed with the blandness of the buildings. Excellent work. Just out of curiosity, there were a couple of shots of quite a few men on horseback in very close proximity. I'm showing my cultural ignorance, but was that a game (like polo or something) or some sort of conflict? Thanks for sharing this.

Granot, I have read this topic with considerable interest. While I have no immediate need for this utility, it loks quite handy and when you get it "perfected", I will download a copy. I'm sorry I cannot spend the time at this point in my life to help debug or suggest enhancements. As a matter of fact, I don't understand how you can spend all the time you do. In any case, please accept my encouragement and thanks for your efforts and willingness to help out the rest of us. Please post here when you think you have a "final" version.

CSchmittie, Welcome. I've not tried others slide show programs, but I've seen plenty of comments on this forum of those who have and "come back". I'm delighted with PTE too! To your question: Anything is possible. When Igor posts a topic about the next release, be sure to mention it. In the mean time, after reading much of this forum from top to bottom over the months I've been a member, I can say that the general wisdom is to create one large "track" of music outside PTE and only load one "song". In an external editor (Audacity seems to be a favorite here, and I've found it quite adequate for my needs) you can overlay multiple cuts quite easily and change the overlap for each one. Then you save it all as one mp3 or whatever and away you go. I guess if you want to change it after you've placed the slides, it's a little more hassle than having the setup you yearn for. But this is a resonable fix for the time being.