dpeterso

Hello Mary, Thanks for looking and commenting on the slideshow. Many of you have mentioned fixing the colorless skies in photoshop. I guess I'd better begin paying closer attention to the details, such as sky color. Thanks again for your comments. Dave

Hello John - Please accept my apologies for a belated response. I enjoyed reading your impressions. I not only picked up some ideas about the show, I also learned a little more about you. A biker, huh! As you know, it's a most unusual way to travel. You asked about my bike. It's a 1988 Kawasaki Concours. It's 20 years old this year and I've put 95,000 miles on it. Now that I'm retired, the odometer will be more active than in recent years. There are many roads to explore; many pictures to take. Thanks again for your most interesting observations. Ride safe, Dave

Peter, Thank you for your comments. I was really nervous about posting a show that was largely personal. The responses so far have put me somewhat at ease, though I'm still not sure if it's appropriate. Time and feedback will tell. Regarding your "travel" pictures, I for one would like to see them in a show. I haven't seen a show yet that I didn't learn something from. And if it spurs some dialogue, then we all learn. Thanks again for traveling along with me. Dave

Thank you for the time and thought regarding my slideshow. An excellent idea about naming the new shows. I guess I was somewhat presumptuous. I liked what you called this type of show: "life-share variety". That's exactly what it was for me. I knew everyone was going to have trouble with the historical signs: I just didn't know what to do about it. Because PTE has fast-forwarding capabliities, I guess I could have pointed that feature out in the beginning. The problem is that it disrupts the continuity no matter which way you go. Maybe I should have made my own signs and captured just the essence of the original sign. Anyway, happy that you watched the show and took the time to comment. It's always appreciated. Have a good day, Dave

Hello Peter, You've put together an interesting show here. First of all, answering your three questions above, the only thing that didn't appeal to me was the color of the background. You are dealing with antiquity here, so a color less dramatic might work better. Personally, I'd go with some shade of gray with a texture. But as someone else already mentioned, if you like it, it's fine. I don't know what else need to ne done to make it better. Possibly make the red arrows a little slimmer: they seem a bit out of proportion. Your narriation is great, good voice, calming, and easily understood. I'm planning a project of documenting an historical church that is being torn down to make room for the new. Your slideshow has given me some ideas. Thanks for the submission Peter. Continue with your good work and sharing with us. Dave

Just a quick note to thank Ken, Morturn, Patrick and Dan for your comments. You all had to invest some time and thought to make a response. I appreciate that; it helps me considerably. Best regards, Dave

Hello Ray – It’s understandable about being nervous to post your first show. It takes courage and you are to be commended. I’ve posted quite a few shows and the uneasiness never goes away. But, that’s how we learn. I have several thoughts about your show. Perhaps it would be helpful to think of the show as being for two different audiences: one private and the other public. Let’s address first the show for the private audience, namely you. If you like what you’ve done, then it’s perfect. Don’t change a thing. If you are uneasy about a few things, but can’t put your finger on what it is, then the public feedback may provide some clues. Family and close friends can be helpful also. Assessing the show from a public perspective, it needs some work. You see, we in the public are not emotionally connected to your experience, so you’re going to have to make your case in a lot less time. Thus, we generally only want to see that which helps tell a story or that which is very pleasing to see, such as landscapes. From a public perspective, the show frequently uses multiple shots of the same scene. One or two good shots will suffice to convey the message. That being said, I think unnecessary repetition was the most serious problem. You have many good pictures to choose from, especially if you limit the duration of the show to 5 to 8 minutes. It’s hard to hold the public’s attention beyond that. You can improve it by fixing the many tilting horizons, eliminating any shots that are out of focus, or poorly exposed. Regarding the focusing issue, it looks almost as though you saved the pictures at 1024 wide and displayed them at 1280 wide. Just a guess. I didn’t care for the moving clouds, but that my little problem. However, I thought the music was awesome. Was the pan flute done by Ghoerghe Zamfir? I really like it! Ray, congratulations on getting back into photography. The digital world makes it much more fun I think. And again, hats off for have the courage to show us your work. Keep it coming. Dave

I have one more travel show I want to share with you. Why? Well, for several reasons: I want your feedback in order to learn what works and doesn't work, and secondly, I want to share with you. Some of you just might enjoy it. Let me know your impressions, good and not so good. Hope you enjoy it. http://www.epetersons.com/slideshows/Upper...gan%2804%29.zip Regards, Dave

Thank you for your kind words and suggestions. I appreciate all of you. Dave

Hello Bobby, or should I say grandpa Bobby. Congratualtion on the new grandchild. It's an exciting world to be born into. Regarding the show, you have some interesting pictures to work with. I liked the music and most of the photographs were of good quality; a good place to start. I have a few suggestions that would perhaps improve it. I would minimize the use of pans and zooms in this particular context. There is very little to be gained except a disruption to the continuity. I think it would benefit from mixing up the shots more; too many shots in a row up front of the child. It suffers some from lack of variety, so here are some ideas that may have helped. It could show a larger context, like pictures of the room, pictures of the hospital, pictures of the doctor(s) and nurses, pictures of that particular day's newspaper headlines, pictures of the birth certificate, the ID bracelet, the footprints, etc. In other words, try to include more things surrounding the child's birth. Try to imagine what the child would want to see 30 years from now when she looks back to that great day. Lastly, just a technical thing: the text falls off the left side of the screen on the last slide. Again, congratulations Grandpa. Dave

Barry - Excellent point about the intended message of the show, and for whom. I eleborated more on this in an earlier response to one of the posters. Thanks for your comments, suggestions, and above all, your participation. All the best, Dave

Hi Dan, Thanks for your comments and encouragement. Regarding the map, it was made using Microsoft's "MapPoint". The difficult part was figuring out how to save the map created in MapPoint as a jpeg. But after some online help, I got it! I use MapPoint extensively in planning my motorcycle trips. Thanks again Dan. Dave

Thanks again for your comments Peter. Let me know if I've not adequately answered your question about why I posted the show. I'm concerned that I missed your point. Regards, Dave

Thank you for your comments Patrick. I always find your impressions helpful. Regards, Dave

Hello - Nice show. I liked the beautiful colors of the season as well as the mountains. The music was relaxing and worked well. Somethings that might help future shows of this genre: maybe give us a little history on the area you are exploring, give the music credits, maybe show a map of the area, you might try a more landscaped format when showing predominately landscapes, very careful pans can work well with landscapes, and maybe more (you had some) of a people connection with you and your friends, maybe show them doing things that hikers and explorers might do such as lunch, tipping a canteen, looking through binoculars, reading a map, etc. Also, you used a few blurry pictures, so you might want to have one of your friends carry a tripod. If possible, time your hikes to shoot in the "good light". I've said it before, great slideshows beging with great pictures. Regarding this particular show, it's nice to see friends experiencing the outdoors, and you captured it well. Keep hiking and shooting. Regards, Dave

I’ll generally make an effort to respond if a critique is requested. If comments are not requested, I’ll only respond with comments on what I liked. I have to force myself to not offer an unsolicited critique. As to why people don’t respond, there could be many reasons: it takes effort, timidity, feelings of being unqualified, don’t know how to submit a reply, the show is beyond help J, being overly kind, etc, etc. I find it equally interesting that so few people submit shows. Of the 5000+ members, there has to be more that just a few shows being made. And it’s generally the same people submitting the shows. Let’s face it though; it takes guts to submit a show! You can get your feeling hurt easily. You can even submit a show and get your feeling hurt by not getting any responses. Although it’s instructive, it hurts too. I guess that I’m willing to risk the comments (or no comments) just to learn more about what works and doesn’t work. I’m so tickled by the power of combining images and music that I’m personally willing to invest in the risk as well as taking the time to assist others if requested. I feel a responsibility to participate in the community of slideshow makers if I want it to serve me. Last thoughts: slideshows are very personal. It reminds me of going to someone’s house and they pull out the projector and have me sit through reels of movies of their family. They are going nuts with excitement and I’m about to die of boredom. Slideshow are no different. It’s really difficult to create a show that has general appeal. In order to do so, it would have to be well planned and executed. All of my shows are just the opposite; they are an after-the-fact assemblage of slides and music. A real hit & miss proposition, I’ll tell you. On the other hand, I’ve looked at some of my earlier shows compared to my more recent shows, and I’m pleased with the improvements. I think my next step up the ladder of improvement is to plan ahead, even using a script if necessary to get the shots that really tells a story about what I’m trying to convey. I’d like for my future shows to be more theme-centric. Thanks for listening, Dave

Hello All - I've posted a new slide show and I'd like to hear your comments. I've tried a few new (for me) techniques that support a travelogue styled show. It's only about 5 minutes long, so you should be able to view it easily. I took the pictures in 2004 and had no idea about using them in a slideshow. I certainly wish I had more shots of the trip. I hope you'll watch it and let me know your thoughts. That's how we learn. You can find it here: http://www.epetersons.com/slideshows/Sandh...%20Nebraska.zip Regards, Dave

Andrew - I watched your 30 minute slideshow and generally found it, albiet long, enjoyable. I liked parts 1, 6 & 7 the best. Part 1 caught my attention because you actually had pictures of the trip's preparations. It's obvious you were thinking ahead with that idea. I liked 6 & 7 because they had more variety in the pictures. They showed more of the cultural/human side of the areas you traveled. I also noticed that the introductory slide for section 3 was the same slide used in section 2. I'm curious about where you stayed each day. It looked like they were people's homes, yet I never saw any other people other than yourselves. The pans were too agressive (fast) for my graphics card resulting in a good deal of jerking following the transition. That's my problem however, and not yours. Lastly, I think it's great that some friends can get together for a seven day road trip, shoot a bunch of pictures, then share the trip with a world wide community of photographers. Like you, I'm looking forward to next year's trip already. Regards, Dave

Andrew - Good to hear from you again. Regarding the "Big" file, if you are interested in many people seeing the show, I'd suggest that you break it up into smaller sections. A 500MB file is a considerable file to download, but more important, 30 minutes is a large time investment in a slideshow. It would have to be a really good show to hold my attention for 30 minutes. Just my thoughts. Regardless, I'm anxious to see what you've created. Regards, Dave

Well Michel, this is the third consecutive slideshow from you that I've enjoyed. It's so nice to see different places from around the world. There were a few distractions in the show for me: several zooms were a little fast, and the transitions of people (and a couple of camels) into a scene didn't look natural, maybe a little too fast of an appearance. Other that those little things though, I really enjoyed it. The music sounded culturally appropriate, and the photographs themselves were quite appealing. I liked the map at the start too, providing a perspective for someone that is geographically challanged. Also, that was an incredible pan from right to left. Perhaps you joined multiple shots to maintain the resolution when viewed as a slideshow. A good show Michel. Keep shooting and making more shows. Regards, Dave

Cor, Surprise surprise! I almost hit the escape key at the beginning, but the fantastic pictures kept me seated. As the show moved along, I realized that the musical chorography was nothing less than professional. And the pictures, Donald Somers could give us all a class on proper exposure. Very, very nice. This show in my estimation is definitely a cut above. Well done. Dave

Michel - Another very nice slideshow. The images are stunning. I liked the music and I liked the narration, although I don't speak French, so I didn't understand. Nevertheless, the voice, I presume yours, is pleasant. Also, I think you made effective use of a couple of pans. In both cases, the pans added more to the picture. Well done again Michel. I have to show this one to my wife. Dave

The technique you've shown for integrating verticals within predominately horizontals is a gentle way to mix the two. What seems to have really helped is that you maintained your original frame, and basically put a frame within a frame. On a side note, I enjoyed the show also. Beautiful place well seen and captured. Dave

Stunning Michel! Beautiful images and music. I'm sure you didn't go for a Sunday stroll with your camera to get these great pictures. You must have a considerable investment in time, skill, and equipment in this show. I'm curious, what camera and lens were you using? The clarity is incredible for a long lens. Great show. Dave