Lin Evans

Vic, Ctrl V doesn't work for me either - Shift - Insert does. Ctrl V does, however, work to copy paste slides in the slide list. Probably it would be a good idea to let Igor know when he gets back so if you don't hear from him in a week or so - remind him and we'll see if this is intentional or a bug. Best regards, Lin

Hi Vic, We're neighbors! Actually, I haven't tried keyboard shortcuts yet - I usually right click and choose paste so let me try that and see what happens. If there are changes in keyboard shortcuts I wasn't aware of it, so maybe you have uncovered a bug. We will have to confer with Igor when he returns from his holiday. I'll check and see if the normal Ctrl V works for me... Best regards, Lin

Hi Ken, That problem was a horizontal white line and turned out to be a slight numerical miscalculation with PTE when determining aspect ratio. It "could" be that this is a related issue, but seemingly only on MacIntosh which is why I wondered what the screen resolution was on Mark's Mac and his OS. AFAIK, the aspect ratio for Mac displays and for Windows displays are identical for same resolution and same displays, but it would be interesting to see if I increased the size of the video slightly, if the problem went away. We will have to wait for Mark and see what he is using before experimenting. Best regards, Lin

Hi, Could you give some details of your operating system, version, etc. I can copy and paste into either the comments or the text block from Word, Wordpad, etc., with no problems. I'm using XP Home Edition and PTE ;7.02.. Best regards, Lin

Hi Leo, First - in order for this to work, all slideshows must be "created" in the same version of PTE. So if they were created with different versions, open each with your current version of PTE then re-create the executable files - put them in a single folder for convenience. Next open the slideshow you want to start your 24 minute sequence with and go to Project Options - More Tab. Locate "Run Application/.Slideshow on Exit (2nd block down) and click on the down arrow beside "Do Not Run" and choose "Run Slideshow". Next look to the right and navigate to your next choice of slideshow. For convenience, let's call the main show "Master" and the next shows "show 1, show 2, etc.). After you have selected Show 1 - save and close. Open Show 1 and repeat the steps choosing show 2 as the one to run on exit. Continue this until you have reached the next to last show. When you get ready to present these, have them all in the same folder with the same name or put them all in the "root" of your drive. If you are running them from a USB "thumb drive" then put them all in the root folder. The essence is that the Master show calls show 1, show 1 calls show2, show 2 calls show 3, etc. The last show calls nothing. In this way, all sound tracks, etc., are preserved and the sequence will continue until the last show has played. Best regards, Lin

Hi Leo, I think the only way to do this without losing your audio track is as Xaver suggested in the first answer. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, I think he needs the sound preserved as well - I don't think that the copy paste will preserve audio? Best regards, Lin

Thanks Luc, Do you see anything like Mark does on the left side of your display? What resolution display are you using? Best regards, Lin

Hi Mark, Thanks for checking it. What resolution is your display and which OS are you using? I'll have to let Igor work this one out because I don't have a Mac and my highest resolution display right now is 1600x1200. I've checked carefully on the PC at various resolutions and can't see anything in the periphery on the left so assume it might be Mac OS or screen resolution centric. Best regards, Lin

Hi Noel, I wouldn't agree that the presentation was "gimmiky" but I think you could perhaps improve it by a bit smaller script writing in the beginning so that the viewer could see the words before the end of the display. So if the pen and text were smaller, I think the continuity would be more sound. Perhaps you could use a gradient background with the script effect reduced in size so that there is more that two letters at a time visible. You don't want the introduction to overpower the presentation. Perhaps slightly longer on each portrait might be useful unless there was some time restriction on the presentation. The only other "niggle" would be that the background music and the last image could be slightly "tweaked" because it appears that the music continued slightly beyond the end of the last slide. It was almost as if there were one "note" too much. With PTE 7 you can fine tune your background music or sound to a very fine degree. Best regards, Lin

Hi Tony, You can copy any "object" along with the associated keyframing and past to another slide, but you really can't copy the object and associated keyframes points and put them somewhere else along the timeline. You're right, you would need to duplicate the slide to do that. Best regards, Lin

Hi Andrew, There are a number of "differences" in various RAW converters. Some of the features of Capture NX2 are not duplicated in Adobe RAW and some of the features of Adobe RAW converter are not found in Capture NX2. The version which came with your camera is a "light" version - sort of like the difference in PhotoShop Elements and the full blown PhotoShop product in a relative sort of way. My prime dislike with View NX2 which came with your Nikon is that it is terribly "slow." I've tried lots of different RAW converters with my various cameras but I personally prefer DXO Optics Pro 6 for my Nikon D7000. I suspect you will be perfectly happy with the combination of ARC (Adobe - if you have the latest version) and View NX2, but since there are free trials for both Capture NX2 and DXO Optics Pro 6, you might like to try them as well. Capture NX2 is dedicated to your Nikon while DXO Optics Pro 6 actually handles a plethora of different lenses attached to different make and model camera bodies. Each of the different converters and photo manipulation products have differing specifics, but all allow you to greatly enhance the original copy. In answer to your implied question about "anti-shake" - the Nikon camera body doesn't have optical image stabilization built in. Like Canon dSLR's it then requires any stabilization to be built into the lens. Stabilization compensates for the normal "shake" when you hand-hold your camera. Two primary things other than focus issues cause image blur - camera shake and subject motion. Both can be taken care of by faster shutter speeds but this may or may not be possible depending on ambient lighting conditions. So anti-shake, optical stabilization, image stabilization (all different terms meaning the same thing) are a means of taking care of camera shake. The "normal" shutter speed compensation for hand holding is to use a shutter speed at least equal to your focal length. For example, if you are hand-holding and shooting at 100mm focal length, to minimize the probability of camera shake becoming a problem, shoot at no slower than 1/100th sec shutter speed. If you are using a 600mm lens, then 1/600th would be the "rule of thumb." However, because of the telephoto boost with so called crop factor sensors (yours is 1.5x) you need to add this into your factoring so that in this case you would need 1/150th of a second for 100mm and 1/900th second for 600mm. The "anti-shake" technology gives you a break and lets you shoot somewhere between two and four stops less than you would need without it. So essentially you can sometimes hand-hold at 600mm and shoot at 1/150 th second. It depends on how steady you can hold and how good the stabilization actually is. It varies by lens. Bottom line is that it helps you take images with less blur as long as the potential blur might be caused by camera movement. It won't help with subject movement. Best regards, Lin Best regards, Lin

Hi Ken, Fun to blow things up eh? LOL. Probably would have been better if it had been further from our solar system.... HA! Lin

Hi Colin, LOL - the end of civilization as we knew it! No doubt, PTE is a fantastic tool which lets us combine the outputs of disparate tools into a very integrated whole. It's going to become even more powerful once we have Alpha Channel capability with video. Right now, work-around's are required to get some of the effects possible by combining video and various types of still image animations, but in the future with planned features, PTE will become a tool of choice not only for the AV enthusiast, but I believe it will also become a part of many animator's tool kits. Some things are so much easier to accomplish with PTE than with Photoshop - especially dealing with layers, opacity and especially "movement." It's definitely a fun learning experience to probe the possibilities. Best regards, Lin

Hey Colin, For you! The white dwarf seen near Saturn in the field of view vaporizes and sends a pulse across the universe which forces the flaming comet into the Earth (this happens out of sight). Other celestial bodies explode and one huge explosion takes out the moon and sends pieces of moon and other debris flying toward Earth.... Of course complete with sound effects even though there would be no sound for an observer in space (he/she wouldn't last long without warp speed and Kirk at the helm to escape the destruction),,,, http://www.lin-evans.org/colin/forcolin.zip Best regards, Lin

Hi Colin, Let me think about how that might work - maybe I'll come up with something later today.... LOL Lin

Fiery comet - it's been close to the sun - hey it can in my imagination - LOL. About two comets a month collide with the sun. As they approach, they "melt" and if large enough, the explosion is quite a spectacular event.... http://www.lin-evans...comet/comet.zip (PC about 7 meg) http://www.lin-evans...et/cometmac.zip (MacIntosh Native Executable - about 7 meg) http://www.lin-evans...comet/comet.htm (video for 1024x768 resolution display) http://www.lin-evans...t1280/comet.htm (video for 1280x720 resolution display) EXPANDED 11/14/11 Here's the story - the white dwarf seen left and above Saturn implodes (vaporizes) and the pulse which resulted takes out neighboring celestial bodies and forces the flaming comet into Earth (all off screen). Explosions result destroying the moon and sending projectile pieces of asteroid size hurtling toward Earth... end of story - HA! Colin wanted an explosion at the end, so I expanded the original show and the updated version can be seen here: http://www.lin-evans...er/disaster.htm (Video for 1280x720 resolution monitor or greater) http://www.lin-evans...24/disaster.htm (video for 1024x768 resolution display http://www.lin-evans...in/forcolin.zip (Windows zipped exe version - about 17 meg) Lin

I was definitely wrong about the availability of software to convert EXE to video. That error message makes me think that the converter I linked to is designed to convert SWF EXE to AVI. Unfortunately, there are several "EXE" formats floating around. There are converters which convert Flash SWF and perhaps Flash FLV files into an executable format so that users don't have to have a Flash player in order to see them. From the error message it would appear that this converter is one designed to extract the contained AVI stream from the EXE file rather than convert a pure executable format into a video file. Sorry for pointing you to an incorrect product. I'll see if I can find anything suitable but you might do an extensive Google search but be sure to read carefully because it appears that most of these EXE to Video converters are simply reversing an SWF to EXE conversion. Later.... After a pretty extensive search, I can't find anything suitable either. It seems you may be back to your original idea of screen capture. I can help a little here because I have used "most" of the popular screen capture tools. Unfortunately, most of these are not designed to capture really good quality with fast frame rate, but designed for tasks such as education - teaching software and capturing cursor motion and static screens, etc. Here's a link to one which "might" offer some promise. You can download a free trial and try it.... http://www.solveigmm...CFZIDQAodxkqdIg Best regards, Lin

You definitely do not want to use a screen capture program, the quality will be terrible. There are numerous software tools that can do this - some of them are free. Here's one link - Google for others.... This will convert to an AVI which you can then load into PTE and export as an MP4.... http://www.freewr.co...to-avi&lid=2767 Best regards, Lin

Beautiful work and beautiful photos Andrew - First class in every way. Best regards, Lin

Thanks Ray - Had to have a little "Frosty The Snowman" on TV in case kids are watching - LOL. I still have a few Christmas decorations to put on maybe the wall above the fireplace and the hearth, but it's the essence of a Christmas Card... Good to hear that it worked well on the Mac. I sent a different show to a friend who has the latest Lion OS and he seemed to have some problems getting it to run the first time he tried, but maybe it was his understanding - he's a new Mac user. Best regards, Lin

I believe the limit is two gigabytes. Best regards, Lin

Hi Eric, The lack of RAW in Canon's newer bridge cameras is an issue, but as you say the picture quality is excellent. There is a "fix" for your problems of not being able to see very well with the EVF viewfinder. I have a friend who makes an excellent little device called the Xtend-a-View which attaches via velcro (easiest way) to the back of your camera and allows you to use the LCD just as you would a regular viewfinder. That is you put your eye right up to the "viewfinder" and you see the LCD, in focus and magnified 2X. It works perfectly in any light whether bright sunlight behind you or in total darkness. Here's a link to his website. His name is Phil Williams and his company is "Photosolve". Look at the "Xtend-a-View" - it may be all you need to get lots better and easier use from the SX-30 IS. I've been using the Xtend-a-View (I have multiple models) for many years (over 10) now and even use it underwater with my little Olympus UW housing. http://www.photosolve.com Best regards, Lin

Hi David, Nice Job! You might want to add a bit and explain that "trimming" while converting results in a "real" trim with the resulting AVI actually different from the original input file. Best regards, Lin

Would appreciate if any Mac users could play this and let me know the results - smoothness, etc. http://www.lin-evans...xmascardmac.zip Best regards, Lin