slideshow software

[Mark von Kanel]

Does any one have any recommendations for slideshow software packages? i dont mind paying for it, then again i dont mind free stuff either!! it must give good professional results and allow playback on DVD players as well as PC and preferably allow me to store the full sized images as separate jpegs as well as the slideshow so that the clients can send/print individual images.

[Geoff F]

In one word, Mark, Proshow.

Produced by Photodex. The Gold version should do everything you require but there is an even more advanced Pro version; at a substantial extra price though.

I think the standard Gold version cost me around £40. There is a free trial version; but it has Proshow written across all your slides. This can be removed when you pay your money.

Originally I tried several alternatives. When asking for advice here, several people recommended Proshow and I have no complaints.

Still learning some of what it has to offer but I have produced 5 shows now. Each around 15 mins. One about the history of the local fishing industry, and 4 about local wildlife. All have a narration, which I have produced rather badly, and one also includes music.

Video can also be added.

Production can be for Windows Media Player (but that software seems to have a mind of it's own!) mpeg for DVD through a television works well. Apparently, internet formats can be used for Youtube etc but I haven't tried that.

Will be producing more work for my local history society soon.

If you want to see some samples, give me your address and I will post them. Unless you are likely to 'cross the water' anytime soon, when you could collect them.

As I said, my attempt at narration isn't very professional so I'm going to try that again sometime; or better still, get someone else to do it for me.

[Mark von Kanel]

Thanks very much for that Geoff, Im just off to sea for 10 weeks ill have a look and see if i can download a trial version to play with whilst im away, if your up for it ill dust off the passport and cross the water for a coffee when i get home end of march.

[Geoff F]

I found Proshow to be a very logical programme once I mastered the basics and understood where the adjustment settings were located. I did purchase the book as well and found that very helpful, but there is a lot of information in the Help Files.

Basically, I find that preparation is important. I resize my images as copies at 800 x 600 pixels at 96 ppi (although the ppi isn't that important) and store them in a dedicated folder. Obviously 800 x 600 is a max size so you can use any variation which fits. But this is for standard Mpeg replay with widescreen equipment. Other sizes can be used if required.

You don't have to exactly size the images as they will be auto resized; but I find it is as well to work with the optimum sizing and quality levels. Highest quality Jpeg works well.

The same goes for sound, which I store in the same folder. Wav or MP3 both work.

The soundtrack can be one continuous length, as with a music track and various slides, with different timings, can be adjusted to show as required.

However, for doing commentary about the individual images, I often like to create short snippets of sound which just relate to each slide. These sound files can be dragged directly onto separate images in the timeline and each image play length adjusted to suit the sound length.

Sound and image for each slide are then 'locked together' although the slide can still be fully edited with regard to effects concerning both image and sound.

If you have any questions, you can always contact me and I will do my best to help.

[Mark von Kanel]

Thanks Geoff ill play with it and see what happens, at the moment ive used IDVD but all the stuff ive done has been for free and even though i saved it all for 1080p playback it seemed very low quality to me. i dont have a dvd player though so im waiting for feed back from the customers.

[Peter Ryan]

Proshow gets my vote as well. Great little program and easy to use.

[pnodrog]

Has anyone tried Lightroom 4 slide show feature?

[DavidM]

For a freebee that you may already have try Windows DVD maker, it comes with Windows 7.

[Geoff F]

Tried the XP version. But didn't use it for more than a few minutes before it was obviously unsuitable for what I needed. And almost certainly for what Mark wants.

Also tried it for DVD editing but it just didn't have even the rather simple options which I required. Probably OK for simply stitching a few video files together but I found it wasn't sufficient for any serious editing work.

The Slideshow option from a rather old version of Serif Moviplus (version 5) looked possible but I found it difficult to use; particularly when it came to adding sound to slides.

Some people have suggested that MS Powerpoint will do everything required. But I don't have that installed. And I never seem to get on well with any MS software.

The other free slideshow/video editing software which I have tried also didn't fulfill my expectations. I'm afraid, it seems to me, that if you want anything decent you have to pay for it.

Open Source software which accepts donations can be a slightly cheaper alternative, depending on your generosity. Any many of them do work extremely well.

[stuck]

As they are free it wouldn't hurt to try the slideshow features in Irfanview and Faststone Image Viewer.

Ken

[socusoft]

hi.there are many slideshow software. I use DVD Photo Slideshow, it can easily create a slideshow and burn it on DVD. And I can play the DVD on my DVD player and TV. This is a good way to enjoy my photos.

Also you can use Windows DVD Maker.

[proseak]

Nero - usually comes free with a DVD burner. I think that the sound is limited to 192kbps MP2, though

HTH

[KCBrecks]

One of my friends, who has joined this forum, uses Picture-to-Exe. He produces Audio-Visual presentations at full 1020 HD TV size complete with titles, music and assorted transitions very easily. The interface is excellent and is drag and drop. It will make a variety of file types including Windows Executable files, hence the name. It costs about £40 I believe and is a somple download. You can try before you buy but it will put a logo on the sequences. It is well worth having a look at and I understand is recommended by the Royal Photographic Society, but don't quote me on that.

My friend Hugh would no doubt have been giving his recommendation right now were it not for the fact that he has been having vision problems lately and therefore not doing much at all. He has used P2E for about 10 years and has hundreds of AV presentations which he uses in displays to local societies.

[wobert]

I have used with great success- Pictures-to-exe to be found at ( http://www.wnsoft.com/picturestoexe/ ). It is very powerful when you learn all its functions. A freeware program I also like is XnView that can easily create a slideshow that can be saved to an ".exe" file- great for sharing with other 'windows-pc' friends and an easy method of creating presentations for lectures etc (use a bit like power-point)

[Bobobird]

A freebie slideshow creator bundled with an image viewer - FSViewer, www.faststone.org.

Compiles into an .exe and can extract the individual files too. Pretty neat for quick and easy.

[pasusan]

Has anyone tried Lightroom 4 slide show feature?

Yes - and it brought my computer to it's knees. It was running for hours trying to make a movie out of 161 photos - mp4, I believe. It does make a PDF file pretty quickly though - but then you can't have any sound.

[pnodrog]

Yes - and it brought my computer to it's knees. It was running for hours trying to make a movie out of 161 photos - mp4, I believe. It does make a PDF file pretty quickly though - but then you can't have any sound.

Thanks - if I do a slide show it must have sound.

[proseak]

I've just seen this -

http://www.megaleecher.net/Photo_Slideshow_Creator

HTH

Peter

[Geoff F]

I don't know anything about that site, but if I understand the offer correctly, they are giving away 10 product keys to make a trial download into a paid up version.

And there is some sort of a draw to find the 10 winners. From over 400 entries.

I'm a cynical old whatsit and suspect that everybody else who enters the draw could accidentally sign up for a load of spam; or worse. I've been caught like that before.

Perhaps somebody has more information.

[jcuknz]

I have not used ProShow for ages and currently am getting to grips with AVS Video editor which seems to be a quite competant programme and as its title suggests handles video with great precision of control but one can also insert stills ... earlier I faced a problem that the editor I bought wouldn't handle MOV files even with a file converter programme.
Yet to try to export the final results but surely one keeps the quality originals and makes small files for projection?