Lin Evans

Hi Dave, Yes, that's the new way Igor described. To have it the old way you would select all points then click on "Timed Points" then "Set Time of Points" then specify the time as 6.5. Or in keeping with the new way of beginning of transition to end of next transition, just change as you did. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, Assuming you want the normal full MP3 to end at the penultimate slide with a silent script scroll at the end. You then have the present choice of running your sound track and having it end in synchronization with the next to last slide and the final script slide silent. For discussion purposes one mp3, ten slides plus a script slide. That's a count of eleven slides and one mp3. Using a silent MP3 to create silence for the last slide equals eleven slides and two mp3's. MP3's have size. Presently, we don't need a silent mp3 so it's adding to the resource load. Now is you wanted to cut the last mp3 short and fade it out then make the last portion silent to allow the script slide it would not add to the resource load, but generally, I like to have my full sound track play. Best regards, Lin

Copied from PTE forum to Bug Report..... Lin Bonjour Igor, J'ai installé la version 7 Beta 10 sous Windows XP SP3. Lors de l'ouverture d'un projet soit déjà existant en 6.5, soit un nouveau sujet, les couleurs des vues de la table de montage sont modifiées. Cela ne semble pas avoir d'effet sur la visualisation ni même sur l'exécutable généré. Cependant la vidéo HD, qui semble se servir de la table de montage, produit un résultat avec les couleurs modifiées. La version 6.5,que j'utilise toujours, ne présente pas ce problème. Merci de votre aide. Jean-Pierre Lavigne Hello Igor, I installed the Beta 10 version 7 on Windows XP SP3. When opening an existing project is in 6.5, or a new subject, the colors of the views of the timeline is changed. This does not seem to affect the display or even on the generated executable. However, the HD video, which seems to use the timeline, produces a result with the colors changed. Version 6.5, I always use, does not exhibit this problem. Thank you for your help. Jean-Pierre Lavigne Attached thumbnail(s) 0

Very nice Igor - might I suggest you also add a link to the Wikipedia PTE reference? Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, You'r right, it could be done internally. - that is one "could" use the envelope feature to kill the sound on an MP3 to use as the silence "mask," but then it's still using additional resources (the file for the silent MP3) to do something which can already be done more efficiently. I guess it's just the "programmer" part of me who likes to keep it as clean and simple as possible. Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, The reason I considered it a work-around is that right now, all the user needs to do is to put in all slides except the last one, click on Timed Points then from the drop-down on Set End of Last Slide to End of Music and then add the last slide. The penultimate slide will then end with the music and the last slide will be silent. If the situation were automated so that when one actually "creates" the show that the music and last slide were coordinated, to get the "desired result" would require the user to have and use a third-party software such as audacity or other audio editor to create the "silent mp3." Thanks for the help offer - I noticed that the offers to help were conspicuous by their absence - LOL. Perhaps when its a bit closer to the final 7.0 release, we can get a few more volunteers. Best regards, Lin

Hi Phil, Thanks!! It's amazing how, over time, pieces from a motion picture can be taken and made into something entirely different. It's good to know the source - something I'll probably purchase myself... Best regards, Lin

Of course that would be a viable work-around, but then the question becomes whether we need to create a situation where a work-around becomes necessary. Right now, it's simply a matter of understanding the features which already exist. The solution, to me, seems to be better user guides and this is something we can address once 7.0 is finalized. As I suggested a while ago, I believe the next definitive user guide should be made in a "modular" fashion so that it's not necessary to completely re-write when a new feature is added. For example, we could have user guides divided into categories such as sound, video, animation, 3D transforms, etc., without trying to make an overarching index which would need updating each time a new feature is added or a change occurs. I would be willing to write the guide in English, but would need help updating and maintaining it and also it would require cooperation to translate it to multiple languages. The difficulty of a user guide written by the PTE team is that it becomes difficult, I think, to work the intricacies in a foreign languages. Better for a native English speaker to do the English guide, a native French speaker to do the French guide, a native Russian speaker to do the Russian guide, etc.... This is not a problem unique to PTE. In recent years major software developers such as Microsoft, Adobe, Apple, etc., have encountered grave difficulties with user guides and owner manuals. It's become an online nightmare for new users to learn to use complex software and the developers have relied on third party "training" to augment their paltry offerings of support. Of course that's a viable means for huge companies, but not for small developers like Wnsoft. Jeff Evans and I created an early more comprehensive user guide, but changes occurred so quickly that we couldn't (or didn't) update it. In retrospect, I believe that had we done it in a modular fashion, it would have been a much easier task. Actually, if some of the more advanced users could coordinate with one another, we could probably knock out a really "good" base for Igor's team to build on. I know that resource limitations are primarily the difficulty at present. Fortunately, many of we "older" users have plenty of free time on our hands and should be able to help contribute toward making this product the very best it can be. How about it? Anyone game for volunteering once version 7 is released? If we divide the work load among several of us, we could probably have a good working copy in a few days of work.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Peter, What then to do if the user doesn't want the last slide and music to end together? For example, perhaps the user wants to roll scripts at the end of the slideshow in silence? Best regards, Lin

LOL - after all those years of hard work making that reputation, it's discovered that Ken's just a big "softie" Ooops.... HA! Got to thank you again for the link to this incredible little video. I would love to know the details of how it was made. I don't know if was done by Croatian videographer or whether the Croatian text was just added. Since the music chosen was in English from a Greek vocalist and the text on the dolphin study "building" went by too quickly to translate. There were also "flashes" of text which were not visible in frames long enough for me to translate and that could mean that the original was edited and some text was omitted. Also, a few of the words I couldn't translate. Perhaps if one of our members speaks Croatian we could get some more information. Best regards, Lin

Ken sent me a link to what I believe is a fantastic video. I was amazed at how this was ever accomplished and after watching it several times, I decided to wrap it in an executable and try to translate the Croatian test to English to better understand the story line. I thought perhaps also that a bit of background about the music might be helpful. The background music is by Demis Roussos, a Greek vocalist from the 60's and 70's with a beautiful voice and delivery... http://en.wikipedia....i/Demis_Roussos In the first song there are some Greek terms, for those who don't speak Greek I've provided a translation: The words are - Heleni mou, Aghapi mou, and Manoula mou. Heleni is a female name and Heleni mou means "my Heleni." Agapi mou means "my love" and Manoula mou is an affectionate way to call one's loving female. Literally, it means "little mama," but it's used in a romatic context as well. For anyone interested, it's a beautiful little video - warning: might bring tears of joy.... http://www.learntoma.../friendship.zip (about 75 meg download - zipped exe video) Lin

Or just copy and paste the values from one keyframe to the other - that way no need to write anything down.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Andrew, If I understand you correctly, you are trying to duplicate the start position of an object? On the Objects and Animations screen, Animations tab, you have numbers for Pan, Rotate and Zoom. You copy these numbers and paste them and the objects size and position will be duplicated for any particular keyframe which happens to be selected when you perform this operation. If you are trying to "visually" align two objects in a layer stack, you can do it several ways. You can move the position in the stack temporarily so that the two objects are on adjacent stacks then set the opacity of each to something like 50% temporarily and you will be able to see both simultaneously. Then you can use the "grid" feature to help align them. Once they are aligned, set the opacity and stack positions back to their originals. To facilitate the above, remember that the keyboard command "CTRL PgUp and CTRL PgDn" will move a selected object up or down one layer at a time. "Shift PgUP and Shift PgDn" will move the selected object to the top or bottom of the stack respectively. Remember also that on the Objects and Animations screen if you click on the "Tools" tab, you want to be certain there is a checkmark beside "Ignore Objects Not Selected" and that assures that if you click on the object in a stack, whatever you do in the way of "drag and drop" will affect only the selected object. If I've misunderstood what you are trying to accomplish, please let me know and I'll try to help clear up the procedure... I think you can use the keyboard "Ctrl S" to save in O&A... Best regards, Lin

Hi Dave, I don't think you can make the case that "all" properties of the parent should necessarily be inherited. I have experienced a number of times when I would not want all properties to be inherited. I think property inheritance should be an "option" but not a mandatory feature. Without the ability to mask, having "all properties" inherited could be a recipe for failure in some animations. I consider it "esoteric" because the type of animations where it is useful are those which only a few users will ever even try to experiment with. I believe that the vast majority of users will not build cubes, pyramids, fancy masked screens or few other things which you, I, Peter, theDom, or any of the fine French animation experts and some others here on the forum find enjoyable. Most will do simple transitions, add some videos, text, synchronize sound and do things which "most" users of presentation slideshow software do. There are hundreds and thousands of presentation slideshow users who don't even have parent/child options with their software - so in that sense, even having this ability qualifies as somewhat esoteric in my view. Best regards, Lin

Hi Peter, I suspect that your assumption about "programming complexity" is indeed correct and why this wasn't an original feature along with the other inherited features of the parent/child relationship. It would be a nice addition if it were possible to implement without too much effort, but I suppose that creating features more commonly used might have higher priority. I think perhaps getting those who have been asking for multi-track visuals on sound, etc., might be at the forefront of the next wave of improvements. Another area in which many would like to see implemented is text effects. Once video is ironed out, video sound controls are improved and expanded and sound features in general are improved, I suspect the development team might start working on more esoteric features such as you suggest along with some improvements in implementing "smooth" animation controls. I've often wondered why it wouldn't make more sense that when one chooses "smooth" motion that the individual keyframe groupings (separate here and glue here) were not defaulted rather than having to do it by individual mouse clicks. Then the "option" could be to change them individually, when needed. At least we do have an alternative means of achieving group opacity available, even if it isn't necessarily intuitive. There are also some types of masking which the competition has available that PTE doesn't yet support which might be nice to have. Best regards, Lin

Hi Jean-Cyprien, That's the way I've always done it and it works fine. I guess it could be helpful from a resource perspective to inherit opacity, but the mask works very well for me. Best regards, Lin

Hi Andrew, Sorry, I missed your post earlier! Master and Linked are found by selecting the video in Objects and Animations then look on the "Properties" tab. You don't need to worry about timing for the video, it will just continue to play in the background and the still slides can have whatever times you assign to each. The only thing you need be concerned with is to match the total still slide display times to the video run time you have either set via offset, start/stop or left at default. Best regards, Lin

Hi Andrew, You can't do it that way. You would have to mute the video sounds, extract the sound track(s) and add it as an mp3, etc., then use the audio waveform feature to turn the sound on and off. There is no provision for turning on and off video sound or audio via keyframe.... Best regards, Lin

Yes, of course. Or you can have stills rotating in the background while the video is playing. Just set the video in Objects and Animations "Properties tab" as Master on your first slide. Next copy and paste the video into each slide being sure that you have the slide on the top layer and set the properties for the video to "link" to your master video. Be certain you adjust the timing for total slide displays to correspond the the video run time. Best regards, Lin

Hi Boogie, There is one slight issue you may have, and that is that there may be a very slight "seam" between images. There used to be a feature with PTE where you could set the display to be slightly less "precise" and that would eliminate this seam, but this feature doesn't seem to be available in the Version 7 beta. There may be a work-around for this, but I've not yet discovered how to completely remove this seam. Perhaps one of our other users has a suggestion.... Never mind, I just found the solution - turn on "Low Quality of Resizing" on each image in the "Properties" tab of Objects and Animations and you will have no visible seam.... This feature is still available in Version 7 Best regards, Lin P.S. If you really want to make the "slice" easier than by using Photoshop, you could download and install the freeware PhotoScape here: Using the "Splitter" feature of PhotoScape is "much" easier than doing it with PhotoShop and it's incredibly fast. http://www.photoscape.org

Hi Boogie, I agree, the most resource saving way would be to divide the large panorama into sections. Actually, you can use the "slice" feature of Photoshop to do this in such a way that there will be perfect alignment of pixels on the edges from segment to segment. Then if you stop on one of these "slices" you can then resume the pan from that point. My suggestion would be to make the slices each at least half again larger than the horizontal width of your intended display. Then when you start and stop you can use a "Push Effect - right to left" to seamlessly continue the scroll between segments. Set the scroll time for each segment and the push effect to the same times. Best regards, Lin

Hi Jeff, That's another "False Positive" from AVG - this crops up every so often, gets reported and AVG takes care of it in their next version. Too many people have already watched this show for the threat to be real. Which version of AVG are you running? Best regards, Lin

Hi Fergy, What I would suggest is taking one of your executable files and playing it on another computer. If you have sound, then the issue is with your system and not with the files. I doubt that the problem is other than a setting on your computer. It's not feasible that the beta would affect your settings, but there are other possibilities. First, if you could tell us what operating system you are using, then perhaps one of us can help you unravel this mystery. Best regards, Lin

Hi Gerry, You won't be able to do it that way with PTE. This type 360 panorama is designed for QuickTime with manual controls. PTE can't display that type mov file in the say way as QuickTime or players designed to allow manual control in real-time with movement. The only way you will be able to do it is as I described in my demo, by creating a "flat" or "planar" rather than cylindrical 360. If you stitch as I described, you can then place the 360 degree horizontal view pano in PTE and run it in automated mode, but you will not have manual control and you can't display a cylindrical 360 in the video mode of PTE. The only way you could use a video for a 360 degree panorama is to shoot it in video mode from a tripod and display that video. Another way you "could" display a 360 degree panorama (including 360x360) would be to place the separate image into a "cube" and display it that way as a "cubic" panorama - in the same way as described in QuickTime 5.0. I have tutorials in the tutorials section on how to create cubes so having six square images containing all the geography for your 360x360 pano could be displayed in that manner. Best regards, Lin

It was too good an opportunity to miss "shades of Xaver?" Best regards, Lin