alrobin

JC, That is so cool!! Thanks for providing this very useful utility!

Sorry, Mike, I thought you were referring to the compiled version (.exe) of a PTE slideshow. No, these do not translate for DVD - it's a different "ball-game" with it's own rules and characteristics. A show cannot be divided up in a DVD like it can in the "EXE" version without creating separate "shows".

Carol, There is a button there now, by default, which starts the play at the first selection. However, the play will stop at the end of this selection unless one has unselected "return to menu after each selection" in Video / Project Ops. It might be handy to have all selections play through whenever this play button is selected. There was a post here recently with instructions on how to add more frames, but I don't remember offhand where it was.

Mike, Yes, you can add a button to any slide and program it to take the viewer to another specific slide. It may help to also select the option "Stop at the end of this slide" in Customize Slide. Re the music, if you want the same music to play at precisely the same point for each slide, then you will have to select "synchronize music and slides" in Proj Ops. Or, if you want the music to start and then play through continuously regardless of whether the slide pauses, or one jumps to another slide, then leave "synchronize ... " unselected.

I agree - this is something I suggested to Igor way back in the days of v.3 or 4. The digital controls for some analogue systems have it, and I also built the capability into the 4-projector system I once designed. This capability is useful. In this digital age it should be quite possible to fade out at a different rate than the fade-in for the next slide. The only "difficulty" in a single-projector system would be to come up with an algorithm that calculates the "brightness" for each image and displays it asymmetrically during the dissolve. However, it is possible now to accomplish this effect now using the opacity control in O&A, and displaying the two images as "objects" on a single slide. I also wanted the capability to overlap images and have them display independently, without having to set them up first in Photoshop - this too can be accomplished now using objects in O&A.

Alain, It's not a bug - this is the way v.5 is designed - to show objects remaining in one image during the transition to the next. If you don't want this, move the "opacity 0" keypoint back to the start of the transition.

Lin, The problem is that there is no global option for "original mode" in Project Options. Jeff Evans and others have been pushing for one, and Igor has promised to add it in a future version of PTE. However, I've discovered that it is possible to do a "search and replace" on the project file in a text editor as follows, and I am in the process of trying to add a button to do the same in my Adjustor model: -- replace "FitMode=PlaceInto" with "FitMode=None".

Alain, I noticed a slight hesitation on slide 2 at the end of the fade transition out of the previous slide and into the 2nd slide, but only the first time I played it. After that it was fine. It is normal to experience a hesitation like this under the following conditions: a) if your video card doesn't have sufficient memory. I would say that 64 mb is not enough for some PZRO arrangements - only for very slow effects. a+)if your monitor is using a resolution higher than the images (i.e. higher than 1200 x 900 in your case). c) if your images are too large (900 kb may be too large for smooth effects with your video card in this example). It is still fading out when you are zooming the next slide. Try waiting until the fade out is complete before starting the zoom to see if the hesitation is still there (see attached example). d) if you are trying to zoom a car on it's side ! Project1_ar.zip

Steve, The short answer is "probably not". But, there is no definitive answer to this - so much depends on image type and size, as well as the equipment you are using. You really have to experiment yourself - plus, Igor has given us some information above as to how to maximize the efficiency of v.5 in handling fast images.

Moelwyn, You can retain the original size of your images by selecting "original" mode in O&A for each slide, or by selecting "windowed mode" in Project Options. If you are proficient in text editing, you can open your ".pte" project file in a text editor, and replace "FitMode=PlaceInto" with "FitMode=None" to set all images and objects to "original" mode. Change the name of the project file when you re-save the edited text file in case this causes unforseen and undesired effects in the new ".pte" file.

Mike, The file names of the ones selected are highlighted in "bold" letters. Of course to see them you have to have "Show text captions" toggled to the "on" state.

Andrew, That's amazing - very smooth, and focussed, too.

Lin, If you examine the "dark" area of your smaller moon view with your cursor in PS, you will still find a fair amount of texture there. Choose a black brush and go over that area to make it totally black, and then re-save, and I think you will find a significant further reduction in the file size, thus illustrating my premise that there is not much difference in file size between the two cases, even when saved at 100%. If you were to repeat this with the actual example of a doorway, which is a greater proportion of the total image area, you would find the difference in file size between the two even less.

However, due to the nature of the jpeg compression algorithm, each image would probably still be about the same file size. In fact, with an example I tested, even though the pixel dimensions are smaller, the cropped file is even larger than the version which had been blacked out. So would this method really save that much in processing time required?

OK, here's a little bigger example for those with fading eyesight: Igor's: Photoshop: There's not much difference between the two!

Ken, They're already open - that's as big as they get! (I'm trying to save space! )

The greyscale function in CS2 is pretty good too - maybe even slightly more contrasty (see comparison between Igor's example and the conversion in PS attached). Igor's: PS:

Igor, So, in other words, the maximum speed of an animation like this is similar to that achieved in the "synchronize slide" option in v. 4.48. In that case, animation speeds are somewhat less than can be achieved in the "non-sync" mode. For a good analysis of this subject, and some useful tips for adding music to an animation, see Ian Bateman's article on the Wantage Camera Club website, under "AV Group / Animation".

Igor, I noticed something else interesting. In the v 4.48 trial, if I set the slide duration to 135 ms (same as for the v 5.0 trial), the cycle slows down to about 75 sec. duration, even though it has been demonstrated that the program can handle much shorter duration times. (The same duration in v.5 is 55 sec.)

Hi, Geoff, Yes, I did downsize the monitor, and the results are as above - v 4.48 still comes out on top. And, yes, you can make v.5 display images at their 'native' size by choosing "original size" in O&A. However, I would have to adjust each of the 400 slides individually (or use "windowed" mode).

Igor, You are right on - I was using the maximum screen res of 1680x1050. I ran the trial again at the same resolution as the images (1280x768), and it ran much more smoothly - still skipping some images, but it looks much better. I think with some fine-tuning, it will be much the same as in v 4.48. Thanks for your time in getting to the bottom of this! (attached new log file). log2.zip addendum: However, at the lower resolution, my 4.48 version of the trial plays through the 400 slides in approx. 40 seconds - no way can I get version 5 to do the same, with the same smoothness.

Igor, Attached is the log file - only approximately every second slide is shown. I am using the latest pre-release from yesterday. (By the way, when I tried to attach the log file, I was told the forum would not allow uploading of that type of file.) log.zip

Well, Igor, you still haven't convinced me. I converted the gif's to small jpegs (actually smaller than the gif files), and ran the two tests again in each of v. 4.48 and 5.0. Each revolution takes 55 seconds (for 400 slides) in both trials. I can see every slide number in the v 4.48 trial, but only about every 2nd slide in v 5, so the latter is much less smooth, even with hardware acceleration disabled in Project Options. I've zipped and posted the projects on my website in case you would like to have a look at them yourself (and hopefully tell me what I'm doing wrong): TimeTrial (6.8 Mb) One thing though, the two files are now almost identical in size. I'm using this example as a sort of "title" slide. Even though I can't pan or zoom it, I can animate a 3-D object, something which I can't do in v.5. So I'll call it in from another Intro show, let it cycle for a while, and then "Esc" back to the v.5 show. It works quite well, and this way I have the best of two worlds.

Hi, Igor, You may be right - in that case, I think the main reason the GIF's were taking longer to load in my trial is the reason you gave earlier - that they are larger images in v.5, as evidenced by the larger "exe" file size. I'll do some more tests with jpegs. However, this tells me that in order to get smooth video-type animations, I have to stick to small GIF's and v 4.48. Ciao, Al

Hi, KG, How have you set up the show? Do you by any chance have the option "Stop at the end of the show" checked in "Customize slide"? If you wish you can send me your project files and I'll have a look. You can zip them up in the "File" menu ("Create backup in zip"). My email address is alrobin @ alrobinson.com (remove the spaces).