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ContaxMan

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Posts posted by ContaxMan

  1. Thanks for your comments gents - much appreciated. It's interesting that of over 100 people who have downloaded this show so far, only 2 here plus one other have bothered to offer any opinion.

    In my mind when planning the show, I felt the names were very important because we don't know who they were! In a sense, what I'm getting at is that here was a tightly knit local group from whom a whole generation of young men were taken - for what?

    The names I record are from THE history of the reserve - "The Wolds Wagoners - Ian Sumner" first published in 2000 by the Sledmere Estate. The list only includes confirmed names so who knows how many there were all together.

    I hope that this show is a tribute to their bravery rahter than mere entertainment. It is not a "finished work". As I get more information and images, it will be revised.

  2. I see what you meen Ron in that case I would resize the with to 1024 and maintain aspect ratio to let the "drop work its self out". I think the 3:2 ratio looks better anyway, it has a more cinematic look than the near square 4:3. I found a 3:2 option on my camera and intend to use this format for sequences, so there! :P:D;)

    An interesting discussion. As I work from scanned slides, the 3:2 ratio would be the norm but I find the empty strips at the top and bottom of the screen that are inevitable with this format rather distracting. So I nearly always crop but sometimes use Ron's cheat" of resizing the image without constraining proportions so that it ends up 4:3.

    Just to add to the list of resizing software, if you look at help in PTE you'll find a link to a WnSoft free tool that works well. Odd that it isn't referenced on the WnSoft website!

  3. On Beechbrook just now you can find my show (made with "standard version" of PTE) that tries to tell the story of "The Wolds Wagoners". They were a volunteer reserve drawn from the farms of the Yorkshire Wolds (in the East Riding of Yorkshire) who served their country in World War 1. The show tells the story with text, commentary, and images taken from the unique (and at one time controversial) monument to the Wagoners that stands in the village of Sledmere on the Yorkshire Wolds.

    Any comments from viewers welcomed.

  4. First of all, may I congratulate you on a wonderful set of photographs - lovely shots.

    I hope you won't mind my making two comments about your show:

    1. you should give the viewer more time to "take in" the picture. The slides changed so quickly that I couldn't appreciate each individual image.

    2. mixing landscape and format slides "at random" doesn't really work as it is distracting to the eye. You might try grouping the images - a set of portrait-format images together, then landscape-format and so on. Or you could display two portrait-format images side by side on a neutral background so that the overall image shape remains landscape format.

    But, once again, let me say how much I enjoyed the photographs. Well done.

  5. Tom,

    Having seen and heard it myself, I can vouch for Maureen & Robert's very compact sound system by Aego. :)

    Following Maureen's recommendation I use the same system too. It works very well and is (fairly) portable compared to others I've seen.

  6. I want my work to be more like a dream than a 'normal' film or video may be.

    Well, Peter, I reckon you've been successful. Most of the shows I've seen with PTE 5 have been (understandably) demonstrations of the possibilities, whereas yours is the real thing.

    Lovely photos (as always), matched to very well chosen music and your own inimitable verse.

    My only adverse comment is that I'm not a fan of the text font you've used recently. It's too fancy for my taste and detracts from the images.

    But a very minor irritation really - I'm just envious of your creative technique.

  7. But both methods take a lot of time, at least how I do the job.

    That's the way it is, I'm afraid.

    But here are some pointers:

    1. use rough selections to outline the object - any tool: magic wand, magnetic & polygonal lasso, pen tool if it's a "graphic type" shape say a car or building, colour range, etc.

    2. save the rough selection then use quick mask to refine it.

    3. I prefer to work on the selection itself (loaded from the channels palette) and refine it using minimise/maximise filters, gaussian blur, etc to soften it.

    4. a graphic tablet, e.g. wacom, is a huge help in all of this.

    So to sum up -select roughly first then refine later. Keep the selection so that you can reload and edit it if you're not happy with the first result. Get used to working with masks and/or quick mask.

  8. Thank you for sharing this show with us. I enjoyed your images a great deal and the music worked very well with them.

    Two points about the show - to think about:

    1. the title and end sequence is, to my mind, a little "over the top" - text effects used "because you can" which distract from the beauty of the actual subject. IMHO keep the title and credits plain and simple.

    2. a number of the images could do with a little help from Photoshop's retouching tools. If they started out in a digital camera then the sensor may need some very judicious and careful cleaning. However, I spotted some hairs which may indicate scanned slides. Although it's only a small point, is worth remembering that the eye is drawn to areas of contrast in the image. Black spots & hairs on a fuzzy backgound are real eye magnets!

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