Lin Evans

Hi Mary, I just received an email back from Xara - they did not include a preload but once again informed me that it was "on the list of things they were considering" for their next release. That's what they told me a few months ago when I suggested it for their next release (this one which appeared without it) - LOL. I wouldn't hold my breath. I really don't understand why a company would even bother putting a video output with player and "not" have a preload. If they had even a remote "clue" about their market, they would realize that today HD video is "the" thing among videographers. With almost "any" HD video format, the data stream exceeds all but the fastest DSL and Cable broadband capabilities. People with 1.5 mbps download speed simply have to wait until a sufficient amount of data has streamed or the viewing will be constantly interrupted. It's a relatively simple task to program a preload for a player. I can think of four or five different ways to do it even if it meant providing a "dummy" video with zero opacity which was queued to run before the player would function after load. It's not rocket science. I often wonder why Vimeo, YouTube, etc., don't have that as an option. It's a simple thing, but nearly all except the makers of Flash FTP players seem to ignore it. Go figure.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Colin, I agree, but you may want to start with the free version of VideoPad here - then once you understand the benefits and limitations, move to either the professional version of VideoPad or Adobe Premier Elements... http://www.freedownloadscenter.com/Multimedia_and_Graphics/Video_and_Animation_Tools/VideoPad_Video_Editor.html Lin

Hi Dom, Thanks! First you need to find a video which has lightening with a minimum of intrusive objects in the frame. Ideally, lightening over the ocean or where there are no buildings or tall objects which are illuminated during the flashes. Next, you bring in your own still image which you want to apply the lightening effect to. If it's already an evening or night scene you can leave it as is, but if you want to make an image taken during the day "look" like it was taken at night, then using the opacity control can work wonders. Next you will want to "invert" the scene with lightening (rotate it 180 degrees) so that whatever "was" on the bottom, now is on the top where you can pull it up outside the viewable area of the screen. I find that using "Shift" plus dragging the control points can help in two ways. First you can move objects outside the viewable area and second, you can "stretch" the image to help position the lightening strikes where you want them in the image. Check your messages for some more information.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Mary, I've seen the "What's New" for Designer 7, but I saw no mention of preload either. I've had several conversations via email and web with developers of Xara and they were considering adding preload, but I've heard nothing. They do automatically detect HTML5 and there is no need for resident Flash to run MP4's any more. This means your web site with video via Xara Designer 7 would be available to iPad and iPod or iPhone, etc., but if they didn't incorporate preload it was a serious omission in my opinion. I won't upgrade if it's missing.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Patrick, Beautiful in every way! Excellent photography and amazing scenery... The music was a very nice complement to the show and fit perfectly. Thanks! Best regards, Lin

LOL - Eric, did you see 2001 a Space Odyssey? By the way - black and white are not considered "colours" ;-) Best regards, Lin

Hi Peter, Very nice implementation of your idea! Works well indeed! HAL (and Dave) would be impressed - LOL Best regards, Lin

Putting together disparate elements including stills, video, animated gif, and sound to create a quick and dirty sample which could give rise to ideas for more serious applications in the future.... http://www.learntomakeslideshows.net/wolf/wolfstorm.zip (about 35 meg - zipped pc executable) http://www.learntomakeslideshows.net/wolf/index.htm (800x600 video) Suggest starting show, then immediately pause and let it buffer to about three inches of "blue gas gauge" the restart to avoid pauses. Unfortunately, I do not yet have the ability to preload - hopefully I've talked Xara into incorporating a preload on the next version of Xara Web Designer 6. Best regards, Lin

Hi Maureen, A pleasure to view and excellent work all around!! Congrats! Hope you're feeling better... Best regards, Lin

Hi Colin, Any decent video editor will let you choose a start and ending position and let you export what is between them as an independent video clip. There are numerous choices for that. You might want to start with a freeware video editor then later you could go to something more sophisticated such as CyberLink Power Director or Adobe Premier Elements. Here's a link to Adobe Premier Elements - watch the video's which shows you what you can do..... http://www.adobe.com...cts/premiereel/ Best regards, Lin

Just a little 4 megabyte file to demo one way of using video with a still to create a special effect. This was done by taking a still photo of a mountain near my home with clouds, etc., during daylight and using a video of a lightening storm. The video was "inverted" to get rid of some unwanted reflections of objects and opacity was adjusted on the night scene with the lightening to make it appear as if the mountain scene was taken at night. Just a quick and dirty example of something which, when better executed, might be used as an intro to a slideshow about lightening or such.... http://www.learntomakeslideshows.net/demo/lighteningdemo.zip (about 4 meg) Lin

Right now I believe the answer may be no - I don't think you can do that yet. The default is zero so one would assume that if anti-shimmer is set on for a particular slide, that when and "if" we can successfully import older shows into version 7, it would correspond to "soft" on the slider and appear that way. The issue with beta software is that all features are not yet "turned on" and if they are referenced in the PTE file, the beta would not properly save the settings. Once everything is up and functional, then importing older shows will "probably" be possible without incident. Best regards, Lin

Hi Tom, I would suggest you go here: http://www.clubipi.1cd1.com/en-test.html Download all four of Jean Claude's tutorials in HD (be sure to click on the HD button on the screen first) and watch them, I think his explanation will get you going on using the sound features in PTE 7.0 just fine. Best regards, Lin

Hi Jean-Claude, Unfortunately, I don't have either an iPhone or iPad, but I did notice that when the mp4's were downloaded rather than played from your link, there was some degradation of quality on my players. I suspect it may be due to compression levels and slight incompatibilities with players. I tried it with IrfanView and with MediaPlayer Classic. It looked perfect on your link, but slightly less crisp when played back with the above players. Best regards, Lin [

Hi Jean-Claude, Your English is perfect and of course, understandable. Also, your explanations are very clear and logical. Thank you so much, and please do distribute them in English as well as in French they will be very well received by both English and French native speakers!! Best regards, Lin

Here's one technique which can be presently used to play slides behind a video. Once the video "tracks" are implemented, then a video will be able to span multiple slides placed in the slide list, but there are still other ways to play slides behind a video. One way is to include slides on the objects list and turn them on and off in sequence with keyframes and opacity changes. This is quite tedious and time consuming and will become obsolete as soon as video tracks are employed. Another way is to place a number of slides under a single parent frame as children. If they are lined up side by side horizontally with each slide touching the adjacent slide, then the entire horizontal "string" can be controlled by the parent frame and two keyframes. The first keyframe to mark the position to begin horizontal pan and the last to stop the pan. One "could" go to a photo editor such as Photoshop and create a single long "pano" type file consisting of multiple images placed side by side then save this as a single jpg and slowly scroll it, but that method requires the user to have a good photo editor such as Photoshop. Doing it the way I did for this demo only requires a little creativity. Because the lowest value in percent on the "View" is 10%, one can't "see" all slides lined up to be controlled with the frame. To get an even smaller "view" it's possible to "type in" a value smaller than 10%. I used 2% to be able to see enough area outside the display to get everything lined up properly. Next the entire "group" of slides is moved into position with the parent Frame so that the pan begins and moves to the left. A "mask" was used over a gradient background to soften edges of the frame. To get a pause on the last frame with a fade to black and avoid an abrupt return to the desktop at the end of the video, HyperSnap was used to quickly "copy" the very last frame. This "copy" was then added as an additional slide with a "quick, no transition" and then this last slide was faded to a black jpg via timed opacity to get a smooth transition back to the desktop. About a 19 meg download: http://www.learntoma...en/pittance.zip Lin

Hi Igor, Another issue of sound disappearing when converting to MP4. This time, a Flash FLV included with still slides and converted to mp4 ends up with no sound. The "only" sound in the test was on the FLV video. If "other" sound is included, such as via "add music or sound" it plays fine. Just take an FLV video and drop in as a single slide then convert to mp4 or try to upload to Facebook with the lower quality conversion - either way the sound is no longer audible in the MP4. Best regards, Lin

Hi Roger, I believe you are mistaken. See this: Best regards, Lin

Hi Robert, Let's try it and see... See your messages.. oops, you're message box is full - you need to delete some old ones - can' t send messages right now. I'll try to email you.. Best regards, Lin

Very nice cooperative effort - love the vocals by the way. Fantastic speaking voice by the young lady!! Good mix of video with masking and still images done in an understated but effective manner. Well done! Best regards, Lin

Hi Tom, LOL - I'll bet they were interested in the "call of the wild" from their country cousins! By the way, if you want to see a seriously nice implementation of video with stills, take a look here at Charlie's Jazz demo: Best regards, Lin

Hi Charlie, Wonderful implementation of masks, video and stills!! Bravo!!!! Best regards, Lin

Hi André, Of course there are always things which each of us would like included, improved, etc., about a software product. Unfortunately software developers are trying to please a very large and diverse audience where there are dozens if not scores of different ways of using a tool such as PTE. The product is constantly evolving and improving and serving the new as well as the old user. But the discussion here was intended to give users ideas of how we might implement this new video feature rather than to debate which other features might or should be considered "before" implementing video. In light of that consideration, I would like to suggest one way in which PTE might be used with the video feature and that is to help tell a story about some social or political item of interest. Ken posted a link and comments about what I find to be a very troubling issue. As a veteran of the Vietnam conflict myself, and having been wounded in battle and having suffered social pressures from citizens against an unpopular war when I returned home in the late 60's, I very much appreciate the actions of Terry Kelly who spotlights the need for society to recognize the contributions of the soldier toward trying to establish order in a chaotic world and preserve the freedoms we deem our right. Sometimes, such a story can be told such as that with the song "A Pittance of Time" by Terry Kelly. But clicking on a website URL and then reading and ferreting through the pages with the option of clicking on the video link sometimes carry less impact than having the items presented in an orderly fashion with a slideshow. With that in mind, I used some of the elements found on the website and the video to demonstrate one way we might use this new video feature of PTE. The web pages links and such were cloned out in Photoshop, then presented in an informational way in this demo: http://www.learntoma...en/pittance.zip And if you would like to see a seriously "excellent" way of using video with masking, stills and creative implementation, have a look at Charlie's Jazz demo here: Best regards, Lin

Hi Tom, Yes, there will undoubtedly be some really neat things possible and I expect to see some of our creative users put these new tools to great use soon. I added an extended version of the video cube with more video viewing time and some recorded vocalizations - only 2 meg more download but about another 60 seconds of viewing time. It's on original post as a second link.... Best regards, Lin

Hi Maureen, Sad news. Peter will be greatly missed by all. His words were a great comfort to me in my own time of grief. He was truly a unique individual and his wit, charm, words and works will live on in the memories of those who knew him and serve to inspire others. My deepest condolences to his wife and family. Lin