Lin Evans

Hi Al, Thanks for the favorable report! Yes, I was somewhat concerned because I used about 60% compression and the AVI, especially for the actual cube portion was sizable indeed but the zip compressed it considerably and made it feasible for those with broadband to download. I used a little inexpensive program ($29.95 USD) called Screen Recorder Gold: http://www.capture-screen.com/ I've been searching for a decent screen recorder program and have evaluated several. I would love to have a really classy program such Camtasia Studio which has all the bells and whistles, but the $300 price tag is more than I can presently squeeze out of my budget. Screen Recorder Gold seems to work well, but has issues finding my codecs which other programs easily find, so I may yet have to use something else. I like this one because it has a few features which are rarely found in inexpensive software but I have to work out the codec issues or try another. It only makes AVI files, but I have On2 Technologies Flix Pro so can easily convert to Flash FLV or SWF in any presently available format. If anyone has any suggestions for alternative video recording software, I would love to try other programs. Best regards, Lin

Hi Ken, It's always a guess about which codec to use so I may try to use Microsoft MPEG 1 if I can get my little capture program to read my codecs correctly. Best regards, Lin Hi Ralph, Thanks for the tip on Elements - I decided to use AVI rather than compress it with Flash and use a bit less compression in the actual AVI for smoother action. Zip does a pretty good job of compressing it further so the download isn't too bad for broadband users. It's great that you could actually work along with the demo as that makes much sense when it's possible to do. Best regards, Lin Hi Ron, Thanks for having a look. As I said in my post, it's not as smooth as I would like, but it's a first attempt and I'm glad it was easy to follow and may prove useful. Best regards, Lin

I'm up early this morning for a job, so thought I would post link if anyone is interested. After a couple email requests for more information on the cube construction in Photoshop, I thought I would make an AV tutorial and post it. Rather than compress it in Flash and not knowing how many have which Flash iteration, I left it in AVI format. The download is about 65 megabytes and contains two AVI files - one an introduction and the other the actual Photoshop tutorial. If you find the codec incompatible, let me know and I'll use a different one or convert it to Flash 8. Here's the link: http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/cubetutorial.zip It's a first attempt, so not as polished as I would like, but I think it may be helpful for those not real familiar with Photoshop's more esoteric functions. Let me know if you find it helpful and I may make others for supplemental purposes to the PDF tutorial Jeff and I have planned for the Version 5 release. Any suggestions for changes or improvement would be welcome. Best regards, Lin

Hi Nadine, Sorry about the hard disk crash, that can be devastating. Might I make a suggestion that you buy a program which will prevent disaster when and if that happens again? Acronis True Image 9.0 will not only do full or incremental backups, but will make a sector image of your entire hard disk and store it on another hard disk. Personally, I use a USB external drive dedicated to this. You make the drive image copy on the USB drive and absolutely "everything" is copied including all of Windows (Registry, settings, etc.) then when and if your system dies, you either purchase a new hard disk or use Acronis to reformat and restore the entire disk just as it was when you did the image backup. No need to re-install anything. When the program finishes you have all application programs complete with installation parameters, software keys, emails, preferences, just absolutely "everything" exactly as it was before the problems. Use this and you will never again have this bad experience. Acronis costs $49.99 and can be purchased at nearly any major software distributor. There is a similar program by Symantic called Ghost - not as good in my opinion nor in the opinion of reviewers. Here's a link to learn more: http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/ Best regards, Lin

Hi Fergy, Download this temp version beta - if it solves the problem it will be solved in Beta 6 - don't use it for a replacement for version 5, but if everything works as you expect then use it for this presentation. Be sure to install it in a different folder. http://www.wnsoft.com/test/pte500_b6_pre1.zip Lin

Sorry Ron, I totally disagree on a philosophical basis. My tutorials are free, always have been and always will be for PicturesToExe. I don't spend my time and effort making tutorials to sell them nor do I believe in advertising on the PTE forum for others who do. What expense other than time is involved in making your tutorials? You are well aware that Jeff Evans and I are working on a FREE PicturesToExe tutorial for the version 5 release which we hope will be translated into languages other than English and I've already had an offer from a forum member to translate them into Spanish. You also know well that Al Robins has had a very nice free tutorial for a long time on version 4XX. I have no issue with anyone who wants to make an income from writing supplementary tutorials, but it would it not be reasonable to put this advertising for someone else on an independent post rather than as a "rider" on an informative post about a Free tutorial? If you want to sell your tutorials, that's fine with me. It didn't go unnoticed that you said your tutorials were "free for now" to members of the forum. If you plan to later sell this information that's fine too, but be advised that the information in PDF format will be provided free for everyone as well, so perhaps plan on some "value added" to warrant the expense. Best regards, Lin

That's what I thought.... Lin

Is it free?? Lin

Hi John, Yes, unfortunately there is no good way other than by visual approximation to get the cube to exacting dimensions. I suppose one "could" use the grid in Photoshop, but a good visual approximation seems to work well. Also, if you are attemption to makeseveral cubes and keep the dimensions constant, then make one and save without the images to use over each time saving with a different name. Best regards, Lin

Hi Peter, Yes, this portion has not yet been realized in the beta. Using "silent" mp3's works well for me too - I make them with Audacity. Best regards, Lin

Cèlou posted a very nice photo-cube demo. Back some time ago when I was playing with these I wrote a PDF tutorial on how to do this, but I don't remember if I ever posted it, so for you who are interested: Download it FREE here: http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/cube.pdf Best regards, Lin P.S. Here's the link to the Photoshop plug-in in case you don't have it. Put this in your Plug-In's folder such as: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Photoshop CS\Plug-Ins http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/3DTransform.zip

I believe this one can do that.... http://www.blazemp.com/mirror_video.htm Best regards, Lin

Hi Derek, Go to Project Options, then Screen and look at Aspect Ratio. Your choices include 4:3, 5:4, 15:9, 16:10, 16:9 or Custom which you define. You can essentially set up for "any" aspect ratio with P2E. It would be a good idea for you to go to the Projects Options menu and just click through each tab and contemplate what each choice might mean. If you have questions about what a function choice does, write them down. Go through every choice and think about how that choice might affect the show and why there is a choice. This way you will become familiar with the program's features which might help make it easier to see how this all fits together. Best regards, Lin

But remember that you will have to manually insert any music (copy and paste doesn't work for music files) and you will possibly need to modify the ending transitions and perhaps insert a "black or white, etc.) page between the elements if the shows differ greatly. But it is possible to string together multiple pte files into a single slideshow quite quickly this way and with a few "tweaks" make it work very well. Best regards, Lin

Let me refer you to this link: ---------------------- Ron, Please try this new test beta: http://www.wnsoft.com/test/pte500_b6_pre1.zip Unpack to a new folder and run apr.exe file Now slideshow will work when "Use music" unchecked. Thanks that your found this problem! p.s. please don't use it as main beta, because it's not fully ready. --------------------- Note the caveat about using it as "main beta" because it's not fully ready, but it may solve your immediate issue and not affect anything else. Suggest you install it in a separate folder pending more information from Igor..... Lin

Just a couple quick questions. First, did you set the 60 seconds for this slide in the Customize Slide Main tab? If not, you need to set it there. Second, if you did set it for 60 seconds and that shows on the timeline in the Objects and Animation view, do you have any background music presently set? If so, please remove the music and try running it again and see if it works properly then. I'll explain a bit later.... To exit from the Objects & Animations screen you indeed do use the "X" at the top right corner which should return you to the main window. Recently there have been some issues with background sound and display times in the Objects and Animations screen. Your issue "may" be associated with this which is being corrected as we speak. If removing the music "fixes" the problem, then we can go from there. If it doesn't then it might be a good idea for you to use the "File" "Create Backup in Zip" and post a link so we can see what's going on and help correct the problem. best regards, Lin

Hi Robert, Yes, many years ago before there was an official trail of any kind - it was not and easy climb and I can appreciate what you went through - beautiful area though and the view of the valley is outstanding by night. It looks amazingly green now - much more so than when I made that climb. I missed your Lone Peak show but will go back and have a look. Best regards, Lin

LOL - yes, I can imagine what the animators must go through to produce the beautiful movie effect on major motion picture animations..... Thanks very much that does work well! best regards, Lin

Hi Igor, Yes, I had to make the values different on the second lap to prevent the problem of the planet turning dark too late when it entered the influence of the sun and turning light too late when it left the sun. The reason I didn't duplicate the slide, but rather continued with the original slide in the animation window window with the second orbit (lap) was that the random effects of the sun's swirling hot gas suddenly "jump" back to the original start position with the start of the "repeat slide" which is a sudden unnatural look. Certainly duplicating the slide would be a much simpler approach to continuing animation, but probably will not work well with this type animation. Of course this type animation is getting far away from the true purpose of the program (slideshow presentation) and more into animation programming which it was really never intended. Thanks very much for checking this. Best regards, Lin

Hi Ron, Send me a link to the pte file and I'll look at it and see what you need to do. Best regards, Lin

I have the Sun with Venus orbiting in an elliptical orbit. The sun consists of several PNG's designed to create a swirling gas/flame effect by moving in opposite rotational directions and by "horizontal flip" of one of the PNG's. Venus consists of a Venus and "dark Venus" PNG. The dark Venus PNG is in a child relationship to the regular Venus and exists to create the "silhouette" effect when Venus crosses the image of the Sun on the side facing the viewer. For the first orbit, everything worked exactly as expected. I adjusted the dark Venus to zero opacity at the start and put a place holder zero opacity just before Venus crossed the Sun on the first orbit and a 100% (some interim steps omitted for clarity) when it was over the sun. As Venus leaves the sun the Opacity was changed back to Zero (in increments) and everything works perfectly! The problem became apparent on the second orbit. When I essentially duplicated the procedure for the first orbit, Venus turned dark way too soon. After tinkering with it for about a half hour I finally did an iterative solution by making dark Venus zero until well into the Sun and didn't change the opacity back to zero until it was well out of the influence of the Sun. If you move the blue arrow manually through the second orbit you will see what I mean. However, the actual preview doesn't match the manual simulation. The actual Preview looks correct now, but to make it look correct I had to "fudge" quite a bit. Perhaps this has to do with insertion of a keypoint and then subsequently changing the time and may be solved by something I suggested earlier about the possibility of "linearity" of effects in terns of pan,zoom, etc., being optional or fixed via a "switch" check box - I don't know for certain, but if anyone wants to run the pte simulation, just click and hold on the blue arrow and run through the second orbit with the view set to about 150% so you can see what the manual movement reveals versus what happens with the Preview. So the issue is that it appears that the timing shifts so that the effect lags behind it's actual programmed time as the show progresses. What you see with moving the arrow along the time line is not what you get with the Preview. Tis a mystery - LOL http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/venus.zip Best regards, Lin

Do you mean moving the "keypoints" furher apart rather than "transition points?" The keypoints on the time line control when things happen and for how long so to make the text scroll slower you want to extend the space or (time) between when the text begins to scroll and when it leaves the screen. Of course if you make the scroll begin further down off the monitor and end further up off the monitor you are making it travel further in the same period of time so it will necessarily move "faster". Best regards, Lin

Hi Marian, Project Options, Comments Tab, Put check mark beside "Set Comments for all Slides To" then use the down arrow to select Picture Name. Lin

Much of the confusion comes about because when Photoshop was invented, the MacIntosh B&W displays and Mac's ruled desktop publishing. Adobe adapted the then pixel pitch of 72 pixels per inch used on the old monitors and made the error of calling it 72dpi which is a printer's term. Commonly newer color monitors display something in the order of 96 pixels per inch and above and the confusion has been rampant ever since. They also make the mistake of referring to it as "resolution" which is another misnomer. When we deal with scanning, we want an image which has a decent pixel count. The pixel count is determined by the scanning resolution and typically, for screen display we want something equal or larger than our highest screen resolution so we can resample to suit whichever display we use. For printing we want to match the input resolution of the printer engine which for commercial purposes is usually 300dpi, but we want 300 at the SIZE we intend to print unless we want interpolation. But since the majority of users today have digital capture devices, we start with whatever the capture provides in terms of pixel count. Many, if not all the older digital cameras simply adopted 72 (dpi) as a standard EXIF tag. Canon decided to make it 180 (dpi) and does so on many of their newer cameras. As the article points out - (but keep in mind that this stems from a scanning perspective) the dpi number simply describes the size of a print at a given pixel density. If you make the print smaller, then the same number of pixels are placed in a smaller geographical area making the (dpi) print density greater. If you print larger then those same pixels are spread out. The display on any monitor has a pre-set density into which these files must be displayed to they are either upsampled or downsampled if you elect to fill the screen (assuming aspect ratio compatibility). Other wise you must use a program like Photoshop to pan about to see the entire image. A projector doesn't give a hoot about pixel density information in the EXIF file. It doesn't matter one iota whether the density is 72 dpi or 1000 dpi to the projector, it only cares how many pixels make up the matrix. You get the best results when the projector doesn't need to resample so do it in Photoshop, etc., to match the projector output before feeding it the file and everything will be a good as it can be assuming compatibility with colorspace, etc. Best regards, Lin