Barry Beckham

I can't say I have read every contribution on this third image debate, but do I have it wrong? In the D.D.B.D. (Dark days before digital) when two projectors where used, I always looked on the third image as the image that was created by both projectors being lit. One projector would be on the transition to fully lit and the other on the way to fully dark. It depended on the density of the slides where the third image showed itself in this cycle. If I had a particularly interesting third image I could hold the transition for a couple of seconds at the critical point to give the viewer a chance to see the third image before completing the transition. What I seem to be reading is a third image made up in Photoshop, no problem with that at all, but I am not sure if that is a third image if we are comparing back to DDBD. There probably is a solution using layers and making three images rather than two. A reduced opacity layer can be used to spot the potential of a third image as many members have stated, but we mustn't get too obsessed with the third image. Give me a top quality first and second image before worrying about a third !!!!! One way I have used to try and ensure the best transition possible (and increase the possibility of a good third image) is to start with my first image correctly sized for PTE. Drag the next image into a layered form, but do so with the image at full resolution. It will look huge (depending on resolution of your digicam of scan) in relation to the first PTE sized image. Reduce the opacity and move the large image around over the original to the optimum spot for a good transition and possibly a good third image. Wack the opacity up full and save as a Jpeg. bbdigital

I have a new AV show on my web site if anyone is interested. Those of you who subscribe to Digital Photo magazine may have already seen it in the last issue. If not, you can find it here http://www.barrybeckham.co.uk/slide_shows/cornwall.zip bbdigital

I use the same size for normal screen use 1024 pixels by 768 or thereabouts. bbdigital

The Image Suite And the cost? barry

What do these workshops cover, how are they structured? bbdigital

Gogs Almost certainly this is being caused because you have a new transition starting before the previous one ends or (more likely) the transition is very close to the previous one. Go into the timeline and you can fix your problem there. I have experienced the same thing where my main PC handles the close transition fine, but another PC or my Laptop doesn't. Bbdigital

Can anyone tell me why I cannot open a piece of music into Audacity from a standard music CD. Thanks bbdigital

I had to come in with a personal view here. I think that there is far more concern expressed about images being stolen from a PTE show than the reality warrants, or have I got it wrong. To be worth anything to anyone the files would have to be much bigger and look at the risk that people would run if they did use our work. I have had people use my images as screen savers and can't get too exoited about it. Quite flattering really that they like them that much that they can live with them as wallpaper. I think many of you are worrying without cause. bbdigital

Great Royalty free music is now available on my web site at http://www.barrybeckham.co.uk/music/music.htm Check out the quality and price and save all those worries about using copyright music. bbdigital

Great Royalty free music is now available on my web site at http://www.barrybeckham.co.uk/music/music.htm Check out the quality and price and save all those worries about using copyright music. bbdigital

I have downloaded an extended journalist copy of both TMpegEnc Plus and TMpegEnc DVD Author and tonight will try writing a DVD using those two pieces of software. Has anyone done this yet already? bbdigital

Cindy Rather than using the eraser method of cutting things out try using a layer mask, which does the same as the eraser when black is applied to the mask, but can be undone even days later. Use a soft brush and Bobs your uncle. Alss, use the shift key to mask (or erase) in short straight lines. Using this method you can cut out the most delicate of subjects bbdigital

Igor Would it be possible to rename all the slides as a batch once they have been pulled into the slide list. I find that I have names of all sorts by the time I am at that stage and would love to be able to rename the lot. 1,2,3 etc The other option would be a display of thumbnails of images in the left panel that I can see all the time to select from. Another nice thing would be, to be able to go straight into the time line from the main screen. I find I often jump back and forward and would love a shortcut button on the main screen. bbdigital

Make them the same size, my experience is that it is better around 1024*768 bbdigital

I have been privilidged to try Igor's newest addition to PTE that he has just announced with the ability to burn our slide shows to DVD I have sucessfully produced DVD's that play a super quality PTE slide show on my 32in widescreen TV. The following information may be usefull as I found the best results were obtained by Selecting Windowed mode from the options. Make sure that any text you add is not close to the edge of the frame or it may be lost in the conversion to DVD. I used Ulead Moviefactory 2 with no trouble at all. Create the AVI file in PTE, switch to Ulead and create the DVD. Well done Igor, but £24 is too cheap. bbdigital

Thank you, I will try that bbdigital

Experts help please I have used the object editor to create 4 buttons on my last slide of a sequence. Three of those buttons are set to trigger a web page opening and I have applied the address (in full) in the boxes provided. However, at the end of the show the buttons are dead. What am I doing wrong? bbdigital

Mart I would do this using sound editing software. I use Adobe Audition (formally Cooledit) but there are much cheaper alternatives around. Try Audacity at the link below and although I have no personal knowledge of this software others on this forum do. http://www.barrybeckham.co.uk/tutorials/tu...al_av/sound.htm I expect most sound editing works in a similer way and with Audition you can add each piece of music to separate tracks while retaining the sterio nature of course. Remove the silent gaps and them mix them down into one file that contains both pieces of music. That way you can decide if there is a gap at all between tracks. It is often very effective to overlap each piece of music so that as one is gently fading down and other is fading up. These fades over any length of time can be done using Adobe Audition. Get this process right with the right music and the whole thing is seamless. www.bbdigital.co.uk

Bert Yes I do resize first from a photoshop or tiff file. The file you work from is not an issue as they are all Photoshop files while open in photoshop. There can be some differences between PC projectors, but nothing you can compensate for. It is mostly colour and contrast and the better the projector the better the match between small and large screens. Generally most ,odern projectors will do a great job. They do have controls too and contrast and lightness and darkness are all available on my Sony bbdigital

Bert. If I am producing images for a PTE show I do not sharpen them until I have resized them. I have no scientific reason for thinking that sharpening twice may not be a good option. It's something I have always done. Having said that I now shoot images in raw and do sharpen them within the Photoshop Raw filter, but that is done before I converty to a Photoshop file and it does not appear to give me any negative aspects at all. When we remove pixels from a high resolution image, which is what we are doing when we size/prepare PTE images, it effects the overall sharpness. Try getting them to size first and then add unsharp mask, but I agree you should not overdo this. I don't know if that helps? bbdigital

Given the time it takes to temporary transfer a 25 meg file from CD to a Hard drive I wonder if this is such an issue. I would copy the file to a temp folder and play iot from there. bbdigital

Hi all. Check out this page for some great royalty free music that will be available on my web site shortly. No more hassles about the legalities of using good quality music and all at great price of £14.99+vat. Check out my site at this page http://www.barrybeckham.co.uk/music/music.htm and you can also check out samples of Medwyns music on his site at http://www.medwyngoodall.com but remember the music you can sample is NOT royalty free. There will be royalty free samples on my site soon. bbdigital

Medwyn is going to put together two CD's as a starter and I will be stocking and selling them from my web site, so watch this space. bbdigital

It looks like great music can be sold for about £14 royalty free, there must be some interest from this site? bbdigital

Ron I am also surprised at so little reaction as this is music from someone who does not usually record royalty free music. It is good stuff and just what we need. The idea is that he would make CD's from his back catalogues of music, but it is still good stuff. I am hoping the price will not be much more than a regular CD, but will amateurs pay for this or choose not to and just use their home CD's. I suppose this royalty free music is more important to those of us who want to put slide shows on CD's for sale and do it 100% legally. bbdigital