Lin Evans

Hi Dave, LOL - you're repeating yourself all over again! I'm not holding my breath - any longer - waiting to exhale .... Best regards, Lin

Hi Frans, That issue was never resolved and is still present in 7.5. I updated the link which Xaver pointed to and what it demonstrates is that in certain conditions, the video will perform correctly while the exe file is quite jerky. In older versions, the "preview" would play my animation smoothly while the exe would not. In 7.5 neither the preview nor the exe plays smoothly but a video plays fine. I think there is still a problem resolving quick animations under a mask and even when there is no mask under certain conditions. In my fire simulation, each frame is a very quick time (.11 sec) with no transition. The exe simply can't handle it smoothly. In the much older versions of PTE (4.0 and earlier) it was not a problem at all, but with version 5 and above there are issues with anything faster than about 100 ms. Best regards, Lin

Hi Jose, I suspect they will get around to 64 bit support in 8.0. There are several things on my "wishlist" such as support for chroma key extraction and Alpha channel in video. It's difficult to please everyone so they worked very hard on audio this time around, but PTE "does" have a new graphics engine and 64 bit support is probably just around the corner. Best regards, Lin

Hi Colin, Yes, there are definite advantages to using more sophisticated programs for image manipulation and sound manipulation - but sometimes the differences are not really worth the extra effort (and possible expense for those who don't have sophisticated software) for quick effects. Of course, if one were trying to create an excellent black and white, simple desaturation would be much less effective than emulating various black and white film results. On the other hand, when the image is only there for a very brief time to create a transition to color, it's nice to be able to just drop the image in twice, press a couple keys and set a few keyframes as opposed to going to another editing program and manipulating the image with care, then renaming and entering it back into PTE along with the original color image. It's always difficult to decide where to draw the lines between a "display program" and an "editing program." Many years ago I discussed with Igor the possibility of merging features from PixBuilder with PTE when and "if" if became necessary because of pressures from competitors. One must be cognizant of the competition and what the general purchasing market wants in order to maintain or reach marketing goals and stay in business. For we "purists," PTE already has nearly everything we need, but for the general market where "whiz-bang" and "bells and whistles" sometimes rule, certain concessions must be made to stay on top of things, I suppose. Best regards, Lin

Hi Colin, Actually, for PTE. Igor had a keystroke combination of Ctrl Shift P which first desaturated, then on second press changed color image to sepia and on third press back to normal. This was an undocumented feature in Version 7, but apparently not carried over to 7.5 - but may be added later or in 8.0. It was very handy to do B&W to color transitions with and not have to get out of PTE. Best regards, Lin

Thanks! I missed those posts... Too bad - it was a very nice feature, hopefully it will come back soon... Best regards, Lin

Desaturate image - keystrokes anyone? Best regards, Lin

Thanks Davy, It was nice to get away for a few days with my dog and enjoy the beautiful country... Best regards, Lin

Thanks! Mark, It was a fun trip... Best regards, Lin

I think we can all agree that there is some difference in the behavior between 7 (or earlier) and 7.5. Which is "correct" is the question to be addressed. Obviously, it's not a serious issue and one can always choose the slide ahead if we don't like the response of the selected one. It has no bearing on the show itself so let's wait for Igor to have his well earned holiday and he can address our concerns when he returns... Best regards, Lin

I'm not sure that this isn't the way it is supposed to work. It's been like this since version 7 as well. The "transition" into the selected slide is included in the "start preview" sequence so it chooses the slide before to perform the lead-in transition to your selected slide. Best regards, Lin

Thanks! Nice way to prototype the show then provide the details! Best regards, LIn

Hi Xaver, At least one "professional" uses PTE - he has just posted his reasons and a couple samples.... I'm not certain that what Wings offers is all that much more important for all "professionals" than a number of the things which can be done quicker, easier and often with fewer "bugs" in PTE than with Wings. In witness to that are a number of former Wings users in RV competitions who now prefer PTE. Best regards, Lin

Hi Barry, I can think of several reasons. First, you can't get the entire image on screen at one time. As with a panorama scrolling horizontally, closeup detail of some significant features such as a closeup of an interesting geological formation, tree, etc., may be desired and our screens simply are not tall enough to get it all in a single display vertically. What if you wanted to display a magnificent redwood tree, but the tree is 400 feet tall? One "could" say, I suppose, that it wasn't suitable for inclusion in a show, but there are many people who disagree and really want to see the detail in the bark - leaves, etc. What about a very tall building which had some significant architectural interest? There are times when a vertical pan might be used effectively. Recently, I wanted to show some amazing detail in a dead Bristlecone Pine. The only way I could effectively do so was a vertical pan. What if we had a super high resolution image of a crowd of people and wanted to show both the entire frame and also closeups of people located in the lower as well as the upper quadrant? Just some thoughts.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Steven, Unless you particularly want to show less than the full copy, you would crop the same way you would for a print. 1920 high by 1080 wide. Best regards, Lin

Cool stuff, Davy - loved the ending! Best regards, Lin

Hi, It looks like PTE has a useful place in the pre-production phase of your operation. I'm curious about the animation phase done in Flash. Was it the cloud movement, aircraft motion, propeller motion or all of the above which was Flash generated? All these are also possible to achieve fairly easily within PTE along with perhaps some additional realistic motion along the pitch, roll and yaw axis. Not knowing the eventual realism required this may or may not be relevant as pertains to costing. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dom, I'm not certain whether there is any plans to make changes in future versions. This is how it will be in Version 7.5 because Igor added the "Video" as an option to enter into the audio track. Before, one could change the appearance of only audio files by using the DOS *.* rather than accepting the mp3, etc., defaults and then navigate to the video file to insert, but Igor added the "Video" as an option on the drop-down so I'm pretty certain that at this stage of 7.5 it is hard coded. Maybe there will be changes in 8.0? Best regards, Lin

Hi Dom, The way that is handled is that you first "mute" the video (Properties Tab in O& A - Mute Audio) then insert it (the video) into the Sound Track. If you click on the right side of the "Files of Type" in Project Options - Audio, you will see "Video" as a choice. Navigate to your video and insert it as if it were an audio selection. PTE will seamlessly extract the audio and you can use all the Envelope tools, etc. just as if the audio had been extracted by a 3rd party software. You may fade-in, fade-out, adjust volume, etc. Works perfectly. Of course you will have to position the audio to correspond to the position of your video clip assuming it's not at the beginning of the slide. Best regards, Lin

Congratulations Dom - nice job with the video too!! Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, Give Eric a quick tutorial on KFSD and how that will help with what he is trying to do. I'll point him to one of my tutorials from years ago on keyframing and together we will drag him kicking and screaming into the present so 7.5 will not be such a mystery... Best regards, Lin

Hi Eric, O.K. - let's start with Example one. Set the display time for the still slide to the video run time of 13 seconds (or whatever it actually is). In Objects and Animations - Animations Tab, with the start keyframe of the still slide highlighted, set the opacity of the still slide to zero. At four seconds, place a second keyframe for the still slide also set to zero opacity. At five seconds place a third keyframe set to 100 percent opacity. At seven seconds place a fourth keyframe set to 100 percent opacity. At eight seconds place a fifth keyframe set to zero opacity. The purpose of the key frames are to quickly fade-in the still slide beginning at four seconds so that at five seconds it is 100 percent opaque and visible, keep it visible at 100 percent opacity for four two seconds and fade it out in a duration of one second so that it disappears. You can adjust the duration timing of the keyframes to suit. The essence of keyframing in the relevant sense is to control the opacity (visibility) of the still slide while the video continues to run. Keep this in mind: keyframes are not difficult at all to understand but the part which may seem at first a bit unusual is that you must use a keyframe to "keep" a condition which you have created. Once you set into motion a "change" in a condition, it will continue to change unless you place an additional keyframe to "hold" that condition. So to change from invisible (the condition of zero opacity set at the beginning of the slide) you used another keyframe set to 100 percent opacity. But - and this is very important - to properly time the change, you need a third keyframe. You don't want the image to immediately begin fading in - you want it to begin fading in just before the three second point on your timeline. So that second keyframe also set to zero opacity tells PTE to not begin fading in until "now" (now being the time you used the second keyframe). Likewise with the fade out. You don't want the still slide to immediately begin fading out as soon as it faded in. So to achieve this, you need the second keyframe also with 100 percent opacity to "hold" that condition of full opacity for that period of time between the two keyframes. Now let's look at the second example: In the second example, set the still frame with a time of 20 seconds. On the Properties Tab in the Objects and Animations screen, set the "Offset" for the video to five seconds. Set the opening keyframe for the video to zero opacity. At four seconds place a second keyframe also set to zero opacity. At five seconds place a third keyframe set to 100 percent opacity. At 10 seconds place a fourth keyframe set to 100 percent opacity, At 11 seconds place a fifth keyframe set to zero opacity. The above will take care of the appearance and disappearance of the "picture" part of the video, but what about the audio part? If you have not muted the audio on the video, it will continue to run even though you have keyframed out the "appearance" of the video. So to deal with killing the audio, you must set the "duration" for your video to correspond to the length of time you want it to be on screen. In this case you would set the duration to five seconds. You might have to fine tune the position of the keyframes to suit exactly what you want to achieve - but the essence is that you use the "Offset" to control the actual time the video starts "playing" and the keyframes to key it from showing up as a still image at the beginning of your slide and to make it disappear. You control the sound either by separating the sound from the video and playing it simultaneously then use the envelope or sound controls - or, as in my suggestion, just kill it via the "duration" of play of the video. It sounds more complex than it really is. Once you are comfortable with the above, then we can discuss the feature Keep Full Slide Duration (KFSD) and how that affects the relationship between video and transitions, etc. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, But it really depends on precisely what Eric is trying to achieve. As far as preventing freeze frame yes, but only when the timing of the video and slide are to be synchronized for the transition and really not too useful to introduce additional complexity until we fully understand what he is trying to achieve. Eric will still have to understand (not necessarily master) simple keyframing to cause the video to appear, disappear, etc., while a still slide is to remain... Best regards, Lin

Hi Eric, Give me a specific scenario including how long you want the video to run and how long you want the background slide to run and I'll help you sort it out. If you are dealing with it as a single slide, the run times can be adjusted for the video via the Properties Tab and the "duration," however, the video will freeze frame at the end of the duration and remain on-screen so you will also have to keyframe it to zero opacity at that time. On the other hand, if you change the time for the slide display via the "Customize Slide" to less than the video duration, they will both end. In this sense the display time for the "image" takes precedence over the video display time. The way to make the slide disappear while the video continues to run is leave the display time identical to the video then to use a keyframe and fade it out to zero opacity at the time you wish it to disappear. In such case the video will continue on a black background until it's display time has expired. If you want to cycle or sequence still frames behind a running video, then you need to set the video clip to "master" on the first slide and follow the instructions on my previous post. Again - give me the specifics including times that you want and I'll help you set it up. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, Yes, still in excellent shape .... Even with all its rock climbing experience - LOL Best regards, Lin