Lin Evans

Etienne, Masterfully crafted and with beautiful music - a whole new world unfolds as you guide us through this journey. I'm so very sorry that I did not see your show and comment before you made your journey to that world beyond. Best regards, Lin

That is really strange - try looking at each slide and be certain that there is no "audio comment" inserted - especially in the fist slide. In fact, try removing the first slide and see if it will work then. Something in your show is interfering with the audio and it "could" be an accidental audio comment. Best regards, Lin

Have you changed your audio editor or any of the audio parameters? Try downloading a new MP3 and do nothing to it except add it to a single slide and see if it plays. Sometimes users have had issues with certain audio editors outputting mp3's with issues. Sound has always worked fine for me, and nobody else has mentioned a problem, so I suspect it's something with your system or the files rather than with PTE. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dan, It's part of a set of tutorials I used to sell but now give away along with all the others. It was written long ago when version 5.0 was released, but the basic principles are still quite relevant even if some of the screens have changed. It's available via the tutorials section of the forum, or you can download it directly from this site: http://www.learnpicturestoexe.com The entire set comes in a single installation file. First click on the "Tutorials Link," then scroll down to #26 and click the link. The file is about 360 megabytes and upon installation, will create a "menu" from which you can choose the desired files. There is also a link to a VCL media player so you can be certain to have the proper codec on your system to see the AVI files. However, I would suggest that instead of VCL Media Player, you download and install Kantaris Media Player which works even better. It's available here: http://kantaris.org/ Best regards, Lin

Hi Dan, It's part of a set of tutorials I used to sell but now give away along with all the others. It was written long ago when version 5.0 was released, but the basic principles are still quite relevant even if some of the screens have changed. It's available via the tutorials section of the forum, or you can download it directly from this site: http://www.learnpicturestoexe.com The entire set comes in a single installation file. First click on the "Tutorials Link," then scroll down to #26 and click the link. The file is about 360 megabytes and will create a "menu" from which you can choose the desired files. There is also a link to a VCL media player so you can be certain to have the proper codec on your system to see the AVI files. However, I would suggest that instead of VCL Media Player, you download and install Kantaris Media Player which works even better. It's available here: http://kantaris.org/ Best regards, Lin

Hi Pete, I guess I just missed that - it must have been on one of the Betas and have been removed. The developer is on holiday so probably won't know for a while... Best regards, Lin

Hi Dan, That's a beautiful area. I'm about a 4.5 hour drive from Colorado National Monument. It's been a couple years since I visited - I might make a trip there one of these days soon! Thanks for posting the picture and for reminding me! Best regards, Lin

Hi Dan, Thanks! I think maybe you did luck into a slow day! Either that or the Navajo have considerably stepped-up the tour trade. I did indeed go through Kanab several times, but didn't stop this time. I will have to investigate The Parry Lodge and Movie Set Museum - it sounds like a very interesting place. I only live about a day's drive from the area so have the opportunity to visit fairly frequently. One of my favorite places is Boulder, Utah - really great little lodge and restaurant there (The Devil's Backbone Grill). There are some wonderful places to visit in the area for sure. Best regards, Lin

Perhaps you are referring to the drop down "choice" between audio files such as mpg, etc., and Video Files which is found in Project Options - Add Audio File - Files of Type. On the right side where there is a small blue square with a small "down arrow" in black, if you click there you will be offered the choice of "Video Files" ?? Best regards, Lin

It doesn't work that way in PTE. The idea was to be able to keep perfect synchronization between the video and audio. Sometimes when audio is extracted from a video and then reinserted as an audio track with the audio track in the original video muted (such as you would perhaps get by extracting the audio for an audio editor) the synchronization is not perfect. The sound track may be slightly ahead or behind the video and it can become very difficult to match them properly. This can often be seen where there is speaking or singing and the movement of the lips doesn't synchronize with the words. There is no problem using third party software to extract the audio and them manipulate it in Audigy or Audacity or other sound editor if you wish - but there is always the possibility that the synchronization would be disrupted. By doing as Igor has, this doesn't happen but you still can adjust volume, use the waveform with keyframes to fade-in, fade-out and all the other audio features built-in to PTE all without disrupting the synchronization as long as you don't offset. Once the audio is truly "extracted" and made into a separate file, this synchronization can no longer be guaranteed. It's a very workable solution, in my opinion, and there is no reason why you can't proceed with other options such as extracting the audio and manipulating it in an editor then reintroducing it, but you take your chances that synchronization might be adversely affected. I believe that is why the decision was made to do it this way. Best regards. :om

Hi Eric, To "unselect" you "left click" in the area outside of the selected object whether that be a video or a still image. You want to "remove" the blue highlight before pasting the video to subsequent slides. The idea is to be certain that you do not accidentally make the still image a "child" of the video. I believe Peter's idea of just adding one additional slide is a good one until you get the hang of it. So just put the video as a master and add one still image to the first slide and get them in their proper respective positions, then add a second slide and copy and paste the video to it and arrange them in O&A with the still slide in the upper layer. Do the keyframes for these two and get them the way you want and proceed to sequentially add additional slides and paste the video, etc. Minimize the potential for confusion that way. Best regards, Lin

If you mean as an "app" to create slideshows on a tablet, probably not - at least not until tablets have operating systems which allow the same sophistication as computers. If you mean can you run PTE created shows on a tablet, you can do that now. It creates video output compatible with many tablets, phones, etc., right now. Best regards, Lin

Once you have placed the video into the audio track, you use the same audio tools you would use had you placed an MP3, etc., there. You have full control via the Envelope with keyframes and you have fade-in, fade-out, volume, offset, start time, etc., On the Properties Tab in Objects and Animations - set the Video to "Mute" then insert the video as an audio and the control panel will pop-up and give you access to the audio editing features. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dan, That's normal - there is normally no indication about the upgrade to Video Builder. The way to be certain is to just quickly create a single slide "show" and then attempt to Publish it for something like one of the iPhones, etc. If you have the new license correctly installed, the program will proceed as normal. If not, I believe you will get a message reminding you that the license for Video Builder has expired... Best regards, Lin

Hi Pete, If you were to output the slideshow to a "video" such as an mp4 h.264 the file size would increase a great deal with multiples of the same slide or video, but remember how an exe works - it is a set of instructions to your computer to perform some specific action and when that action is identical, it's not necessary to store the "instruction and source" more than one time. So no matter how many times you ask it to "run" a particular video or "display" a particular slide, the necessary components to do so are only stored once. On the other hand, when you create a video, each manifestation or incremental change is represented by a separate image. So just a pan or zoom of a slide results in each tiny change being stored so that it can be displayed on a "dumb" device such as a media player on a television, etc. Whereas on a computer with a somewhat "intelligent" (in that it can follow a broad range of instructions) operating system and processor, the device can create the incremental "slides" on the fly without having to store each one for playback. For that reason, our executable shows are usually much smaller in file size than a video show having the identical content. Best regards, Lin

Hi Pete, Xaver has already explained "how to" do the process - I will just address your question of increasing file size: PTE is rather unique in that adding the same image or video multiple times does not increase file size. Try it for yourself. Create an executable slideshow with only a single video. Look at the properties and remember the file size. Now add the identical video as separate slides multiple times and create another exe slideshow which will play the same video over and again as separate slides. Look at the properties and compare the file size. It will be identical. No matter how many times you add the same slide or video to your slideshow, it will not increase the size of the file. Best regards, Lin

Hi Ray, It appears to be working correctly for me - can you give us your operating system and version? Perhaps there is a bug somewhere. When from the customize slide screen I click, for example, on the up arrow and then on O.K., that "up" push is applied to the slide. If I click on the right arrow, and do likewise, the right "push" is applied. Something must not be working the same for us if it doesn't work like that for you... Best regards, Lin

Hi Eric, The "easiest" way to add all slides except the first slide is from the "slide view." Open your project which should now contain the single video as a master. The default view is the "slide view" so that's where you "should" be when you first open PTE 7.0. Simply drag and drop the slides one at a time or use the CTRL left mouse button to select all the slides except the first still slide and drag and drop all the other slides into the area to the right of the "video" which now occupies the place for the first slide. Drag them and drop them into their correct relative positions if they are not already arranged in the proper sequence. Once you have done this - click on the video in the slide list at the far "left" of all the slides to highlight it, then navigate to the Objects and Animations screen. When you arrive at the Objects and Animations screen, you will first click outside the area of the video in order to "unselect" it (no longer highlighted in blue) so that when you add the first still slide, it does not become a "child" of the video. Now right click in the area below the video, choose add image, find the first still slide and double click it. It should now appear above the video which is where you want it. Size and position the still slide where you want it to appear. Next, click on the video name in the Object List (same place where the video and still slide name appear - we haven't moved anywhere) then right click the mouse and choose "Copy." To this point you have added the video all still slides including the first still and are now ready to paste the video to each still slide. ***Do not leave Objects and Animations, but left click on the small far right arrow in the far upper right corner of your screen to navigate to slide number 2. Observe that on the very top left of your screen, it should now say Slide 2 of 30 (or 2 of however many slides you added). The number two slide name will be highlighted, so left click the mouse below the slide name to unselect (we unselect because we don't want to paste the video as a child object) Now right click the mouse and "paste" the video. The video will appear "above" the still slide, but we want it below the still slide. To achieve this, with the video still highlighted hold down the CTRL key and press the PG Dn key. This will move the video slide below the still slide where we want it. Now size and position the still slide. Repeat the process from the *** above for each of the 30 slides. That is, navigate to each slide deselect the slide, paste the video then move the video below the still slide in the Objects List. Once you have done this for all 30 slides, go back to slide one, click on the still slide and add keyframes as David indicated to turn on and off the opacity. The way I would do it is to add the keyframes to all your slides and only then go back to each one via the timeline and sequence the timing for turning them on and off via the Objects and Animations Opacity feature Best regards, Lin Click

HI Eric, Open PTE ver 7.5 and click on Help. Then you have a choice of downloading the PDF to your system or reading the manual online. Best regards, Lin

Hi Eric, I'll proceed as I would do it were it my own project - step by step and I'll assume Dave will do the same with his method. The first thing I would do is combine the separate video clips into one by putting them all into a PTE show then exporting a single MP4. The next step would be to open a new slideshow and add the new combined mp4. If PTE suggests "converting" it to the AVI, I would do so. Next go to Objects and Animations Screen - Property Tab and change the default of "Single Video Clip" to "Master Video Track" - just click on the down arrow to the right and choose... Next add all of your still slides as follows: Go to the first slide which has only the video and add the first still image. Put it on top of the video and size and position as desired. Next go back to the "Slide View" and add all the other still slides until you have all 30 entered. Next copy the video from the first slide by right clicking on it and "paste" it to each slide. As you do this, move the still slides and position them as you wish making sure that each is at the top layer and is not a "child" of the video. Just be certain that when you paste the video to each slide, you do not have that slide "selected" and there will be no issue with the parent/child relationship. Once you have this done for all slides, you may want to preview to determine if your positions and sizes of the still images are as you want. Now you can go into each slide and set the "time" of display and place your keyframes to turn the stills off and on in synchronization with the music. The way I would proceed is to simply place all the keyframes first, the go to the timeline view and move the keyframes to synchronize with your sound. Visually arrange them along the timeline to correspond to your video accordingly. That's about all there is to it. By making the video a "Master" - it will continue to play uninterrupted as the slides sequence. Let me know if you get into trouble. I assume David can explain how he would proceed if there is anything further he would add from what he has already discussed. Best regards, Lin

Which language version are you using? The version (English) I'm looking at is for 7.5 - if you are using one of the other language version, perhaps it has not yet been translated? Later: I just checked all language versions and only English and French have been translated on the provided links. Perhaps the German, Italian and Hungarian versions are still in process... Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, I think this was what prompted my question: " I have 30+ still images that I want to add to the clips in time to the music & fading them in & out as the video progresses" .... If this is indeed what Eric wants to do, then with the multiple video clips made into one master clip, he doesn't need to be concerned with clip transitions and such and can simply concentrate on which clip to fade in and out and when. He just has to include the video with each still frame and it will play uninterrupted to the end. Eric didn't say that he needed or wanted to end the stills and video at the same time which is why I asked for more clarification before making a recommendation. With the video as a master it will keep chugging along regardless of what he does with the stills - how long the duration, etc., as long as the total duration time of the stills doesn't exceed the run time of the video. Maybe we can get some more input from Eric on exactly what he is planning and then it will be much easier to determine the best way to proceed? Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, How does this work to add stills "in time with the music?" Best regards, Lin

Hi Eric, I'm a bit unclear on what you are trying to achieve. Do you want the still slides to sequence "behind" the video for the duration of your show? If so, the way I would proceed would be to first bring all of your video clips into PTE and create a single MP4. Then insert the single mp4 as the video for your slides. The reason for this is that you are going to have to designate the video as a "master" then insert it into each slide. This will keep the video playing smoothly without interruption as the slides advance. If this isn't what you want, let me know exactly what you wish to achieve and I'll try to help you sort it. Best regards, Lin

O.K. - the forum is double posting again - I'm going to delete the extra posts. We can have Igor check it out when he returns refreshed and rejuvenated from his sojourn on foreign soil. Best regards, Lin