Lin Evans

Hi Pat, Because of the high resolution hardware rendering PTE doesn't support drop-in movie clips. You may want to look at Proshow Gold or Proshow Producer by Photodex which supports dropping in movie clips. I can't answer you question about the sound track but if you go here there are probably people who can: PicturesToExe is more oriented toward the professional presentation with high resolution animation. http://www.proshowenthusiasts.com/ and here to try Proshow: http://www.photodex.com Best regards, Lin

Hi Mike, There are two ways to do what you want. One way is a complete manual show without transition effects via the "pause" control button on the Navigation Bar - the other is to set longer default times on the Projects Option and apply to each slide. When you click on the Pause button (the parallel lines) it changes to an arrow. If you don't click on it again but use the double forward or double back arrows buttons, the slides will advance or go back one at a time but without any transitions. In other words you now have a strictly manual slide show which just shows the slides and holds each slide for as long as you avoid clicking on the arrows. If you set the timing for each slide for an extended period (as suggested by John) then you can have the animations and transitions for each slide as well. Of course the other way is to click on Pause (as Ken suggested) between slides then click the Pause off before proceeding. Best regards, Lin

Hi Colin, That's a bummer. I don't know if this is relevant, but I understand that Alienware has been purchased recently by Dell so this may be impacting the availability for the short term. Of course this does nothing to remedy your problem. Let's hope Alienware US can help sort it out for you. On the issue of graphics cards - I'm not sure how relevant this might be but you may want to read this review and comparison in its entirity before making a graphics card decision. The very best that is available is definitely the NVIDIA 7950 GTX cards. The NVIDIA 8600 GT was compared here in real-life tests against the earlier 7600's and may be of interest: http://legionhardware.com/document.php?id=637 Best regards, Lin

Beautiful Igor! It looks like the iPhone's camera and the photographer each are quite capable! Early colors, they are just begining to change in Colorado but already you have beautiful Fall leaves! Best regards, Lin

Hi Barry, It's really strange the way prices are distributed around the world. I've never understood either why it's so much higher in the UK than elsewhere. I suppose VAT has a hand in it but it varies in other countries as well. I have a friend in Switzerland who I bought and shipped a camera for a number of years ago. It was almost double the price in the US there. For a while cameras were cheaper in Canada than in the US and people were buying them there. They have higher taxes than we have and not a fraction of the market so you would "think" they would be higher there. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to it all. Yes the Mark 3 is definitely pushing the limits of the platform with some serious enlargement potential. It's into medium format territory for certain, but your 1DS is still a dynamite camera even though it's a bit long in the tooth as digital camera go. They pulled out all the stops when they built it so inside and out it's a first class piece of equipment. I had "distinction," if you can call it that, of being the first to find a "bug" which was fixed in later production models. In the original the antialiasing filter was bonded to the sensor all around. Air trapped between them caused my original sensor to warp at when I used the camera at 14,268 feet elevation. Canon replaced the sensor and had me back in business in less than a week and made production changes to allow trapped air to escape when used at extreme altitudes so no one else will have that unfortunate experience. Since it's been a wonderful tool. Best regards, Lin

Hi Barry, Yes, for certain if you are using the laptop to do Photoshop manipulations, etc., the more power the better. I only use mine for presentations so can get by with just the video clout. I have seven other systems of various configurations but all with decent CPU up to 3.2 GHz and lots of RAM. The Alienware systems can be configured to amost any needed power but of course that takes a toll on battery life so having AC power becomes important. I think Canon has gone to more pixels than necessary for producing a 35mm platform. I stopped with the 1DS and 1D Mark II and went to Nikon D2Xs which has all the clout I can really use. The new full frame Nikon D3 will be about as much as I think reasonable for a 35mm platform sensor. I have looked at the 1DS Mark III's output and though it's long on pixels I don't see any real improvement in the other areas to warrant spending $8K again. I have the D30, 10D, 1D, 1Ds and 1D Mark II but really get more use from my Nikon D2Xs and my Sigma SD14. One thing the new Nikon will have is incredible ISO performance. I've looked at the output from the Sony Alpha 700 which uses the same Sony sensor as the Nikon D300 will have and even ISO 6400 is completely usable. It's the only camera I've ever seen which actually bests my old Kodak DCS-720X which I've given to my son-in law. For low light use that one was unparalled for many years, but this new Sony chip is something else. The new D3 will apparently actually be usable as high as ISO 25,600. Personally, I don't like to shoot at higher than ISO 400 right now, but I may pick up one of the new D300's when they are released. I shoot mostly wildlife for fun these days. I'm trying hard to retire and have cut way back on my gallery art clients so having a crop factor for the tele boost is more important for me now than having the full frame but I am tempted by the D3 with nine frame per second at full resolution, etc. It's great as long as you can get close enough to the subject, but out here in the mountains shooting wildilife pretty much requires nearly 800mm for really good frames and the rugged terrain and high altitude make a tripod, head and huge lens a non starter. So with a good crop-factor sensor, a fast stabilized 400 (I use the Nikon 200-400F/4 VR, Canon 100-400L IS and Sigma 80-400OS) plus a 1.4 tele I can get an 840mm FOV with the Nikon, 896mm FOV with my 1.6x crop Canon's and 952mm FOV with the Sigma. All this with full resolution sampling. If I had the 1DS Mark III using the same lenses when cropped to the identical FOV of the crop factor cameras I would only have 10.5, 8.4 and 6.3 megapixels respectively for the 1.5, 1.6 and 1.7 crop cameras. So all my crop factor cameras way out-resolve even the 1DS3 for my purposes. Of course for landscapes or studio work, those 21 megapixels would be put to great use. You're sure right about the file sizes - it's gone nuts hasn't it? LOL Best regards, Lin

Could you post a zipped PTE with only about 4 slides showing the effect you are using so we could see how it's set up. It may not be possible to do this because there is no way that I know within PTE to apply a common attribute to slides if this attribute resides in the O&A. So to make sense of it and get a definitive answer it would help to see the set-up. Best regards, Lin

Anyone wanting a fantastic laptop for running PTE shows need look no further than Alienware: http://www.alienware.com/?from=PAIDSEARCH:...21-S-6181999021 These are first class all the way. You don't need one of their super machines with dual GPU's or super large hard disks or even super fast CPU's though they do offer all that if you want to spend the money. What you need is the top-end Nvidia graphics cards they use in all their machines. The really nice thing is you can order them with XP or with Vista. Personally, I won't touch Vista until they get SP2 out the door, but others have had good luck with it. So you have a choice. About $2200 will get you a dynamite machine which will run "any" PTE show smoothly. The lower-end systems also have LCD's which are perfectly amenable in display resolution to run high-end LCD projectors without jumping through hoops. Our younger forum participants may really relish super high resolution LCD's for everyday work, but we old codgers with compromised eyesight need a bit larger icon and print so the lower resolution possibilities are fine. The nice thing is you have a choice. In the US, at least, you can find great compact external USB drives up to 500 gigabytes for only about $150 so it doesn't make a lot of sense to pay the additional for a large notebook hard disk. Just get the 100 gig fast one, the 1.8 gHz processor (no need for battery eating super-fast processor) and put your money into the finest Nvidia graphics card. No need for duals - one will suffice nicely. The graphics card you want is the NVIDIA 7950 GTX - by a landslide the most powerful graphics card available. Again, you don't need the "dual" 7950's - just one will work perfectly. Best regards, Lin

Hi Martin, That explains the problem. If the program didn't put the .wav extension on the file created, it's not really a .wav file and PTE won't play it. Apparently Windows Media Player knows which format it "really" is and plays it but PTE hasn't any idea which is why even though you have an extension ".wav" it's not recognizing the format. I can't tell you exactly what the problem is, but what I will do is post a link to a zipped file containing both a .wav and .mp3 file of the same song. Try using the song I provide to test the function in PTE. If it works for you, then what remains is simply to get a program which will "properly" rip the CD to a good .wav or preferably good .mp3 file. Here's a link. Try this as both the .wav and .mp3 files. If they work let me know and I'll give you some further suggestions for a program to properly rip the CD to get working .wav and .mp3 files. File size about 45 megabytes for download: http://www.lin-evans.net/pte/trythis.zip Best regards, Lin

Hi Martin, It sounds like you are doing it correctly, but probably don't have a good .wav file for whatever reason. Typically, I would suggest converting the .wav file to .mp3 but either will work fine. Try a different music selection and see what happens. Essentially it must show up in the list. The fact that you see zero on the time duration tends to make me think it's a problem with either not really being added or it's a defective file with no real content. Best regards, Lin

I was recently looking on a web site devoted to competing presentation slideshow software and noticed someone had posted one of my quotes from back in June or so of last year. The question revolved around why PTE was so much cleaner and sharper on executable shows that the competition and I had been quoted in this regard when I had discussed the fact that only PTE had hardware rendering. Someone posing as an expert on the forum had answered "nonsense" and had informed the petitioner that he (the "expert") knew for certain that neither their product or PTE had hardware rendering and that my statement had obviously been made in error. Further, this expert suggested that my statement about "9 megapixel monitors" needed "explanation" LOL. What amazes me is the extent of ignorance on the web and the number of pseudo experts who influence people with their self-assured attitudes about things which they obviously haven't a clue. It's nice to be self-assured and confident, but it's even nicer when you also know what you're talking about. For those who are new to PTE - yes indeed, PTE has true hardware rendering. The competition does not. What this means is that the competition renders their animation at low resolution, near the 800x600 level which makes it very easy to convert to NTSC or PAL (720x480 or 720x576 pixels) resolution for DVD conversion which is their principle goal. This is done via software algorithms rather than by using the power of the GPU (Graphical Processing Unit) in the video card. PicturesToExe gives the user a true "input=output" resolution so that it's possible with the right hardware to have shows output and displayed in true high resolution. And for the record. For a couple years now nine megapixel monitor and display resolutions have been available. A PTE show on a nine megapixel system is incredibly impressive. All it takes is "money" folks. Several of my art patrons for whom I do photography use IBM and Viewsonic systems for which they pay dearly, but which produce nine megapixel resolution on the displays. These monitors average around $6000.00 U.S.D. and the display cards to drive them are quite expensive as well. Typically some of my clients have over $15,000 in their computer systems so it's not something which is common, but it's very real. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_T220/T221_LCD_monitors Here are a few links to the monitors used: http://www.engadget.com/2004/07/06/viewson...hose-new-apple/ http://www.viewsonic.com/support/desktopdi...series/vp2290b/ http://www.monitoroutlet.com/844555.html http://www-03.ibm.com/servers/ch/intellist...o/why_t221.html So next time someone tries to tell you that PTE doesn't have hardware rendering - just send them over to the forum and we can straighten them out quickly. Best regards, Lin

Nice improvements Kim! The sound effects were used very well - the ending ride-off was a nice touch. Something to think about for future shows might be to look into masking. You could zoom a few of the stills inside their frames (where you incrementally display multiple frames on the screen). Making up a few good masks would let you use them for different shows and not only pull two or three frames to view simultaneously, but also get some dynamics and animation on the individual frames where and if it would benefit the presentation. Used sparingly it can be a useful eye-catching effect. Best regards, Lin

Hi Annemiek, Icons are either sixteen by sixteen or thirty two by thirty two pixels. You can take any jpg file and resize it using Photoshop or other software then save it as a Compuserve GIF file with 256 colors only (no more than 256 colors). Then open the file in a program like IrfanView which will let you save it as an icon with the .ico extension (Windows Icon). Obviously, it best if you use an image which is closely cropped so there is a major subject or even a design rather than lots of detail. Fewer colors are better than lots of colors. Sometimes it's nice to put about a four pixel black border around a 32 pixel icon for better visibility. The essence is that an icon must be 32 pixels or 16 pixels square (32 looks better) and must have no more than 256 colors. Since a Compuserve GIF file is 256 colors it's just convenient to save a jpg this way to strip off the excess colors then simply open the GIF and save it as an .ico file. Best regards, Lin

Hi Kim, Cool bikes and nice show! My only suggestion would be to use non-linear "smooth" on the zooms which would make the starts and stops less "abrupt". You can see how to do this in the User Guide on the tutorials section. When and if you do this, you might click on the "blur" for those photos which have the really sharpened cooling fins on the cylinder heads which tend to shimmer a bit. The blur isn't sufficient to make the images less desirable but will cut the shimmer a bit especially for the slow start on non-linear smooth. Nice music. You might want to lengthen the last slide a tad to end with the music. Best regards, Lin

PTE scr files are just renamed executables. The easiest way to do what you want is to put all the scr files in a folder together then rename each to "filename.exe" Next create an invisible menu. I discribed this in a previous post in the tutorials section. Essentially what you do is create a slideshow with as many slides as you have executable files to be sequenced. The best way I know is to use a very small jpg image and repeat it in the slide list once for each exe show you want to run. Set the time for the "display" to one second and set each slide to run a different executable show. When you have it all working then just set the opacity attribute in the O&A section for each slide to zero. Set the menu to repeat until "ESC" is pressed and click the hardware acceleration off for this "invisible menu". Execute this invisible menu and your renamed scr files will execute in a serial fashion until ESC is pressed twice. Once to end the executing slideshow and again to end the invisible menu. Lin

A little more information would be necessary to help you. Explain exactly what you did, what you played the DVD back on, etc. Lin

I just checked the User Guide and it's actually already there in 4.4.4.4 Best regards, Lin

Hi Tony, Probably a good idea to download and read the PTE User Guide at the top of this forum. To get zero opacity you simply go to the Objects and Animations screen, highlight the object you wish to make zero opacity then click on the animations tab and type in a zero for the opacity number. If you do this with the first keypoint highlighted the opacity will stay at zero for that object. If you want to change the opacity somewhere later but keep opacity at 100% before that time, it will take an additional keypoint to hold the 100% opacity and a third to change it from that keypoint time to zero. Best regards, Lin

Looked great to me. I didn't see the first but my only suggestion on the second would be to shorten the blackout time on the first long black pause. For those unfamiliar with this old ship and its colorful history: http://www.nzmaritime.co.nz/earnslaw.htm Best regards, Lin

Hi Ray, I don't think that's possible unless each slide has an identical duration. Of course you can universally change the time for slides in the Project Options and apply to all slides, but that would be the same value. I'm assuming you have different values set for each slide so it wouldn't be presently possible to universally add an increment to each when they already have different values, at least I don't know how it could be done. Best regards, Lin

It's been nearly 40 years now since I came out of the jungles of Vietnam after two years of fierce fighting - many friends and brothers-in-arms didn't come back with me. Each year I remember those who were left behind, friend and foe alike, and wonder about the senselessness of it all as I see it repeated time and again. This is just my way of remembering, not just my war but all wars - not pretty but necessary..... http://www.lin-evans.net/pte/brothersinarms.zip (about 32 meg) Lin

Cool Dom! Lin

There "may" be a way to make this work. It can't work if the show is actually run from the CD, but one of our members writes some very creative software which may accomplish this. What it does is automatically copy the file to the hard disk and run it from the hard disk. The program is called "autopano" and you can download it here: http://www.thailandphotoalbum.com/ A donation is suggested if this works for you. You can email Granot from his site for more information. Just scroll down on the lists of software until you find "AutoPano". Best regards, Lin

Hi, The operant word here is "burnt". These security features are not designed for DVD slideshows but for executable slideshows. There is no way to alter code which has been made into a movie format. Setting the number of times a show will run or an expiration date is a function of a computer. The executable code must make modifications to make this work so from what you have said I'm assuming you are creating a DVD. If this is the case there is no way to make it cease running after a date or number of times played because there is no way to write to the code from a TV or DVD player. These features will work when the slideshow is played from the executable file but not from media like DVD. Best regards, Lin

Buffering capabiliies depend on primarily the file size. The new Nikon D3 has the ability to shoot 9 frames per second for 64 frames and that's a 12 megapixel jpg. With only a megapixel file that would equal 768 frames and the VGA would files would probably be about a quarter meg at most which would equal 3072 frames at 300 fps or at least 10 seconds worth with media available today. 60 fps is useful even if only for reasonably well lit sporting events. I use 15 frames per second all the time and get excellent results. Lin