Delicate

Like your work a lot, and this is one of your good one. Jan Vermeer is also one of my favorites, and I try to watch him live every time I'm travelling around. He has also a lovely forename, Jan

Hi nobeefstu. Nice!! This was the first time I realize that the PTE-template (or slideshow) can be opened with a text editor, and edited with "find and replace (all)". There must be a lot of other tricks that can be made? Any tutorial on that? Thank you so much, Jan

Hi Let's say I made a template named template_1 (or short slideshow) with a single slide, but which contains 30 pictures. The pictures in the slide are named 001, 002, 003,... etc. Then I use the same template to create a new template named template_2. In this slide I replace every picture with pictures 031, 032, 033,... etc. Then I make the third template the same way, ... drinkin little coffe under a pause... Well, it can be made like this, but there must be another way? How can I rename multiple pictures in a template (or the variables that will call the pictures into the template)? Jan

Wow, learning always something new. I will have a try with these options... Thank you! Jan

Hi Re: My fast sequence "mum" test described above I did still do some testing... I thought, that if I use Indexed (256 color) BMP "mum"-pictures instead, would the sequence be faster? For an indexed BMP picture of 1620x1080p size the file size is 1710 kb (ko). But because a BMP-file is unpacked, would the sequence be faster? (by experience from a map-software, which loaded indexed BMP-maps much faster) When started on PTE, the software first announced that "PNG, BMP and GIF pictures will be packed". When run on PTE there were no difference in the test result as describe above. So I think, using another picture format makes no change...? But I would also like to add, that when TEST 2 and TEST 3 (the setup with the best picture quality, see above) was exported with PTE to MP4 (H.264), then these clips did run jerky-free and just perfectly. Well, loosing a bit of the high quality that a executable EXE file has... Having these experiences in mind, and remembering Jean-Cyprien's rule about the 2 following pictures beeing loaded in the computers memory, it might be easier to plan fast picture sequences in a slideshow. I hope I'm not sailing now on ground water ...? Jan

Hi I thought I should make a picture sequence test, so I did. I made the test the easier way, putting the pictures in the timeline. Description: - all pictures were placed in a sequence on the picture timeline - the test was saved in a executable EXE format for PC with PicturesToExe version 6.5.2 - first there were 7 pictures (of a seagull) showed for 1s with 900ms fade-in transition (pictures of appr. 330 kb file size) - then there were a sequence of 29 "moving mum doll" pictures - then the same seagull pictures were showed again (I did put the segull pictures before and after the "mum" sequence, because I wanted to make the total slideshow test more memory consuming) So I did 7 different tests: TEST 1 The "mum" sequence with 300ms interval, 1080p size pictures, file size appr. 220kb (ko) TEST 2 The "mum" sequence with 150ms interval, 1080p size pictures, file size appr. 220kb TEST 3 The "mum" sequence with 40ms interval, 1080p size pictures, file size appr. 220kb TEST 2-1 The "mum" sequence with 150ms interval, 1080p size pictures, file size appr. 72kb (compressed low quality picture, but still of 1080p size) TEST 3-1 The "mum" sequence with 40ms interval, 1080p size pictures, file size appr. 72kb (compressed low quality picture, but still of 1080p size) TEST 2-2 The "mum" sequence with 150ms interval, 360p size pictures, file size appr. 80kb (low resolution picture of 360p size) TEST 3-2 The "mum" sequence with 40ms interval, 360p size pictures, file size appr. 80kb (low resolution picture of 360p size) The result for this test with two PC:s of mine, was that TEST 1, 2-2 and 3-2 did work jerky-free, the others not. So this test gave the result, that it's the picture size in pixels that is of importance, and that the file size in kb (ko) is of less importance. Or in other words, in TEST 2-1 and 3-1 the sequence was jerky when the separate "mum doll"-picture file size was 72kb (and picture of HD-resolution), but in test 3-2 where the picture resolution was smaller and the file size was 80kb it was jerky-free. This could be explaned (i think) with the fact that the JPG-files have to be uncompressed before being showed, and that the degree of compression doesn't influence the result. Well, this was at least what I find out with my test. Quit interesting to do this kind of small experiment... Regards, Jan

Almost nothing is static in this world, it is the nature of man to have an interest in movement, like now talking about slideshow and video. Thank you Barry for your tips. It would certanly help to use just a base picture, followed by PNG-tranparencies of smaller image size. Regarding alignment og pictures, it's quit easy to manually align pictures on the timeline (using the grid under Objects and Animation). Thanks for the tip to automatically align pictures in Photoshop. ... and I must congratulate, the slideshows on your website is one of the most artistic ones I have seen made by PTE. Thank you Lin for taking your time to explain the technology behind PTE. The key word seams to be "hardware rendering". My experiences with PTE regarding fast picture sequences are quit equal to what you are saying here. And I agree, it will help when there will be a possibility to ad video on PTE-shows, video or timelapse made by other software. I have already material waiting for some projects ... Jean-Cyprien, what a cool slideshow you have made! It must have taken a long time to make! I saw it for many times. And you have included picture sequences the way I would like to do. I watched it with the same computer I have been using, and I just think that you have managed to make faster sequences than I have done? Well, the explanation must be that I have tried to use 1620x1080 size pictures, and you say you used 640x480 size. And I think you scaled up your pictures to full view. Re: P.S.2: What nice to end your Christmas present with a finnish Christmas carol. I'm honoured... Going into detail, I see a small difference in Lin's and Jean-Cyprien's response, regarding "several pictures per view (pictures on the timeline)" and "one view with several pictures (multiple pictures in one slide)". Maybe the conclusion could be (note my amateur thinking), that for the "multiple pictures in one slide"-case, all pictures are loaded in the memory before the sequence starts, and that would explain why it seems to work yerky-free, but have a pause before it starts? On the other hand, pictures that are put on the timeline needs to be loaded on the fly, which could cause a jerky-behavior, if the sequence is too fast? Tip?: Maybe the "pause" before the "multiple pictures in one slide"-case could be used as a bluf to be a part of the earlier pictures showtime? Thank you all for your responce. Jan

Hi I'm just a happy amateur, who have spend much more money on camera equipment and high speed tickets on nature photography trips, than ever earned with pictures sent to magazines... I like to add illusions of movement in a slideshow. This can be made in many ways, e.g. with 3D-animation in PTE, which the software do quit nicely. But there are many other ways, where only the imagination puts limits to what can be done. I have used a realistic looking "zoom"-effect, simply by using two pictures and fade-in transition. Pictures taken with the same view, but where the foreground is sharp in one picture (and the background is blurred), and the background sharp in the other one (with the foreground blurred). Another very realistic looking effect (you do not see a difference compared to video), is to use pictures with exactly the same view (no difference in the actual graphic of the pictures), but where the lighting change from picture to picture (fade-in transition used between pictures). A third one is to use "timelapse" or "stop-motion" frames in a slideshow. I have used these three effects in one slideshow I uploaded on internet, please watch http://vimeo.com/18584973 Now to my experience and questions conserning timelapse with PTE, and there are two ways: 1. One is to put a serie of pictures in the timeline, using fade-in transition between the pictures. This allways works, but there seems to be a limit for how fast the pictures can be showed. I get the best result if each pictures are shown not shorter than 300ms, with a fade-in transition for each picture for almost the same time. Experience/questions: - if just a timelapse test is made, then pictures can be showed much faster, e.g. for 40ms - and everything seems to work fine, but when you do a complex slideshow with a lot of pictures, then the slideshow starts to be bumpy. I have used 1620x1080 size pictures in JPG (not even tried with 1920x1080). One can say that this is a question of the platform and performance of a computer. To my experience (well not widely tested), the problem stays with different performace of computers (to my profession I'm doing 3D CAD design, and have tested the slideshows on the PC:s I use)? - the problem seems to remain with PTE and EXE format, and MP4 format exported with PTE - well I know that PTE is not made primary for making video, but because I don't know the technology behind PTE, I can't understand why it is not possible for the software to e.g. export bumpy-free MP4, when the software can take all the time needed to render a video 2. The other way is to make the timelapse within one slide (under "Objects and Animation"). I made a test putting almost 70 pictures of 1620x1080 size (JPG) in one slide. For each picture I made two keyframes to be able to change the opacity between 0% and 100% (a "fade-in" looking effect), this bacause I wanted a smooth timelapse. Experience/questions: - in this test it looked, that the pictures could be showed faster, BUT: - there is a long pause before the timelapse starts, there is the feeling that the software loads all pictures in the computers memory, before the timelapse starts? - if this timelapse-slide is put in a slideshow, the result is not smooth at all, there is still this pause before the timelapse starts - same result with PTE and EXE format (didn't try with MP4) - when I put two different timelapse-slides with 70 pictures in each, the software crashed when run (or becamed at least blocked?) Comments on method 1 (still having the problems described above): - easy to make - not very handy with a lot of pictures in the timeline, mixed with other pictures in the slideshow not beeing a part of the actual timelapse - 3D effects/animation of the whole timelapse can not be made, like for other pictures in the slideshow (or is very complicated to make) Comments on method 2 (still having the problems described above): - much work to make(templates needed to be made) - in theory a more "professional" way of doing the timelapse, just one slide on the timeline - would in theory be easy to make 3D-animation for the whole timelapse, because it's just one slide Finally I would like to say, that I'm very pleased with the style and quality of PTE slideshows. It's a software that is under development and growing all the time, so I look with interest for comming releases. If anybody has any good idea how to improve the result of a fast runing slideshow/timelapse on PTE, I would be glad to hear. Regards, Jan

Hi I'm a user of PTE since one and a half year, so I'm sort of familiar with the software. But now and then I'm stuck with some issues ... Here is one: Is there a way to make a multiple resize of pictures in slides to the original size (100%), without having to do this in each and every slide. I mean the procedure in "Objects and Animation" -> "Common" -> "Size/positions in pixels..." - and then klicking "Size", which force the picture to be of the original size. By purpose I want some pictures to be larger (= original size) than the slide in a slideshow. Thanks, Jan