PTE Demo on Vimeo

[Lin Evans]

A while back I created a PTE demo show for testing video cards, etc., which was a 100 meg download. The show contains 3D transforms, OOB (out of bounds) creations, reflections, water animations, snow animations, an unusually animated Panos FX "watch," mask animations, Earth rotating on its own axis around rotating Sun, etc. The show requires sufficient resources to tax less than optimal video cards so I suggested that only those with excellent resources try to run it.

So that others can see some of what PTE is capable of, I created an MP4 and uploaded a lower resolution version to Vimeo. Of course it's not nearly as smooth as a Windows or Mac executable, but it is better than I expected on Vimeo. It can be seen here:

http://vimeo.com/6844405

Best regards,

Lin

[davegee]

Nice one Lin!

I have posted a link on the Nikon Cafe web site.

The question of "which software" crops up there from time to time.

DG

P.S. Also liked the Atkins tracks - haven't heard those in a while.

[davegee]

The link posted at Nikon Cafe got just one very interesting reply.

Hardly anything to go by but interesting nevertheless and worth consideration:

http://www.nikoncafe.com/vforums/showthread.php?p=2813485#post2813485

DG

[Lin Evans]

Hi David,

You know the old saying about "you can't please everyone" .... The younger generation loves animation, movement, flash, etc.; just look at the success of video games and gaming computers! The older codgers like us have little use for it, but the product absolutely "must" have the ability to please not only those of us on the downhill side of life, but also those who will be the future users of PTE. Also, it's imperative that the capabilities of the product be demonstrated. Virtually "any" presentation slideshow product (even something like FastStone or Irfanview) can do simple slideshows. If that's all it took to sell product, then there would never be a need to go beyond 4.9 and the world would beat a path to PTE... Unfortunately, it takes more...

Best regards,

Liln

The link posted at Nikon Cafe got just one very interesting reply.

Hardly anything to go by but interesting nevertheless and worth consideration:

http://www.nikoncafe...485#post2813485

DG

[davegee]

My point is that care needs to be taken about HOW PTE is presented to the non-users?

DG

[Lin Evans]

Hi Dave,

Do you have a suggestion about how it should be presented?

Best regards,

Lin

My point is that care needs to be taken about HOW PTE is presented to the non-users?

DG

[davegee]

Hi Lin,

I think that what I was refering to has been covered elsewhere.

I was certainly impressed by your demo but the lady's reply underlined the fact that any demo which is broadcast to a wider audience of (possible) non users of PTE should, as well as showing the bells and whistles, show that PTE works very well and better than most at the basics.

There was, in fact a second reply to my post - did you read that?

http://www.nikoncafe.com/vforums/showpost.php?p=2814885&postcount=4

DG.

[Lin Evans]

Hi Dave,

I did, and concerning the opening and first parts agree completely. The first part of the show was just demonstrating the bells and whistles of 3D transform and of course nothing that would normally be used in a real slideshow. The middle portions were just demonstrating various possible animations which shouldn't actually either help or hurt a slideshow (certainly shouldn't make anyone "nauseated" LOL) while the last portion was demonstrating a way which 3D transforms could be used in a real show. Whether one likes them or not is of course another issue entirely. Actually, I've received mostly positive comments on it from non PTE users. The other side of this is that even though I posted it on Vimeo where the actual performance in Flash is mediocre, I asked anyone who really wanted to see it in the best light to email me for a link to either a Mac or PC version where things are much smoother and much cleaner. I think some people just don't care for spinning, whirling, twisting and turning effects. One either likes them or hates them - there are apparently not too many people in the middle. The primary reason I put it together was the stress the video and resources so users could determine whether or not they had sufficient resources to permit some of the animations which might really be used in a traditional slideshow. For example, the very nice "Creation" and "Color" shows by Jean-Charles Pizolatto used some animation for both steam or fog rising and a 3D simulation of a camera pan and zoom which both used PNG overlays moving simultaneously while the main image was also zoomed and panned. Though it played perfectly smoothly for me, I think I remember Dom saying that there was one point with his very good system where he had some "jerky" movement. My stress test may be helpful for people to use to determine which certain types of animation are more likely to cause issues. The other thing which we need to keep in mind is the actual size of the display. While Jean-Charles Pizolatto's file ran perfectly smoothly on my system with the display set to 1024x768 I suspect that Dom's system was playing the same show at a much higher display resolution. This greatly increases the stress.

So the bottom line is that this demo both shows the possibilities for playing with animation with the new PTE and the potential for using some of the features in a real slideshow. I think there are a sufficient number of straight slideshows demonstrating the great smoothness and images quality of PTE that anyone who is really serious about purchasing the product would certainly not be overly influenced by just my demo but would likely see a number of slideshows before making a decision. Actually, I have both technical demos and real slideshows on my site for download complete with descriptive text so people can tell the difference.

I agree that we should be careful to explain to people that a "demo" such as the one I posted on Vimeo is not designed to represent a "quality" slideshow, but designed to demonstrate possible uses of the product beyond the simple zoom, pan and fade. In fact, I am not inclined to post any shows on Vimeo or Youtube which have any "Pans" in them because they simply won't be smooth regardless of the resolution or simplicity. I'm just not satisfied that either Vimeo or Youtube or mp4 h.264 is up to the task of doing smooth pans. Zooms are not too bad, but pans just don't look all that great. That's why we really need to find a way to vastly improve web output. I still would like to see PTE output Flash directly rather than having to convert AVI, MPEG or MP4 to Flash. I think it's possible to produce smooth pans with Flash directly from an Executable. It's definitely something we need for PTE.

Best regards,

Lin

[mhwarner]

...

I still would like to see PTE output Flash directly rather than having to convert AVI, MPEG or MP4 to Flash. I think it's possible to produce smooth pans with Flash directly from an Executable. It's definitely something we need for PTE.

Best regards,

Lin

I agree with your last statement 100%. We all want to post shows directly on the web and it would make our lives so much easier if PTE could produce flash output. In addition, I just know that Igor and the team can come up with a better flash result than the conversion steps required to get there now.