Can PTE do this?

[Larry Wallis]

Hi

I’m completely new to AV; my experience is watching a few presentations, for the first time, at my camera club the other day and finding this web site.

It has led me to think that an AV presentation based on “PicturesToExe” may be a solution to something I’m working on.

I have not bought PTE as yet because I’m still thinking about how to implement my ideas (e.g. I am familiar with Microsoft PowerPoint and I know it would do some things, but not others). Will PTE do everything I need?

What I want to be able to do is:

1. Create a user interactive “slide show”;

2. The show to run on a laptop PC, or possibly an iPad;

3. For pictures to fade from one to another; e.g. start with a colour picture of many items then fade all but one item to B&W (I could create a few pictures in Photoshop and fade from one to another in PTE, but perhaps PTE has a masking feature so a single colour picture could fade to B&W?);

4. To zoom into the single colour item (what is the zoom range? Can it be programmed to different values?). Also, to zoom back out again;

5. To be able to program the timing of all effects (what is the range of times available?);

6. To add text and user “interaction areas”; i.e. you could have a red object and a green object (either as a button, or simply an area on the picture). The text asks a question and the user has to choose whether to press red or green. Each interaction then jumps to a new section in the AV presentation. Each new area also will have “jump” sections. Eventually, the user will end up in a common ending. How many “jumps” can PTE keep track of? Can you set up a “back button” (i.e. like using a web browser)? When you press a “button”, the software counts the number of button presses in a user defined variable. At the end, the value of each variable can be displayed (i.e. “You pressed red 4 times and green 6 times”).

7. When using an iPad, for all interactions to be touch screen compatible (I’ve never used an iPad, let alone written a program for one so I’m not sure how this works…yet!);

8. To have some sort of index (either text based, or miniature versions of each picture, or both), permanently visible, so a user can easily click (touch!) on an item and be taken straight to that section of the presentation. Then be able to move backwards and forwards from that point.

I’m sure that PTE can do some of the above, but I would be most grateful to anyone who could confirm if it can do ALL of the above. Also, can you give me an idea of what the learning curve is like? Is access to any “coding” areas simple; e.g. in Microsoft Office, using “Record macro” can get you doing simple tasks in seconds.

Thanks for your help.

Wal

[Lin Evans]

Hi Wal,

I'll try to answer your questions below:

Hi

I'm completely new to AV; my experience is watching a few presentations, for the first time, at my camera club the other day and finding this web site.

It has led me to think that an AV presentation based on "PicturesToExe" may be a solution to something I'm working on.

I have not bought PTE as yet because I'm still thinking about how to implement my ideas (e.g. I am familiar with Microsoft PowerPoint and I know it would do some things, but not others). Will PTE do everything I need?

What I want to be able to do is:

1. Create a user interactive "slide show";

Yes...

2. The show to run on a laptop PC, or possibly an iPad;

You can run shows on laptop, iPad, iPhone, desktop, etc. Interactive requires a CPU so a "computer" rather than an iPad, iPhone, etc. The device must be able to run an exe type show for it to be "interactive." Videos created with PTE can be run on any device capable of running a pc video, but video's are not interactive.

3. For pictures to fade from one to another; e.g. start with a colour picture of many items then fade all but one item to B&W (I could create a few pictures in Photoshop and fade from one to another in PTE, but perhaps PTE has a masking feature so a single colour picture could fade to B&W?);

Yes - You can fade from color to B&W or Sepia

4. To zoom into the single colour item (what is the zoom range? Can it be programmed to different values?). Also, to zoom back out again;

Yes, the zoom range is only limited by the resolution of the image. All zooming is controlled by keyframe.

To be able to program the timing of all effects (what is the range of times available?);

Yes. Timing is primarily determined by the device's capability. PTE can give the device an instruction from 00:00:000 to thousands of hours

6. To add text and user "interaction areas"; i.e. you could have a red object and a green object (either as a button, or simply an area on the picture). The text asks a question and the user has to choose whether to press red or green. Each interaction then jumps to a new section in the AV presentation. Each new area also will have "jump" sections. Eventually, the user will end up in a common ending. How many "jumps" can PTE keep track of? Can you set up a "back button" (i.e. like using a web browser)? When you press a "button", the software counts the number of button presses in a user defined variable. At the end, the value of each variable can be displayed (i.e. "You pressed red 4 times and green 6 times"). PTE won't directly "count" the number of button presses but the rest it can do....

7. When using an iPad, for all interactions to be touch screen compatible (I've never used an iPad, let alone written a program for one so I'm not sure how this works…yet!);

That would depend on the iPad's capability - can't answer. As far as I know, only video's will run on the iPad - not executable code from PTE.

8. To have some sort of index (either text based, or miniature versions of each picture, or both), permanently visible, so a user can easily click (touch!) on an item and be taken straight to that section of the presentation. Then be able to move backwards and forwards from that point.

This could be programmed using features of PTE. It would not be an "automated" feature of PTE, but PTE is very much like a low level programming device in that you "can" create the ability to jump to a particular slide the jump from that slide to any other point in your slideshow forward or backward.

I'm sure that PTE can do some of the above, but I would be most grateful to anyone who could confirm if it can do ALL of the above. Also, can you give me an idea of what the learning curve is like? Is access to any "coding" areas simple; e.g. in Microsoft Office, using "Record macro" can get you doing simple tasks in seconds.

The learning curve is as with any other complex software. There are numerous video based and text tutorials available which are designed to take the user from their first steps to complex animations and features. There are no "macro" record features such as with Photoshop Actions or with Office.

Thanks for your help.

Wal

Best regards,

Lin

[Larry Wallis]

Hi Lin

Thanks very much for your answers. There is only one way to get fully conversant with software and that is to buy it and use it! However, I was not sure whether PTE would even get close to what I’m thinking (particularly with “buttons” etc.); your replies certainly show it can.

If my project gets the go-ahead I will seriously consider using PTE.

Thank you once again.

Wal

[nobeefstu]

Wal

There is only one way to get fully conversant with software and that is to buy it

PTE works with all features in a full use Demo mode ... this way you can fully test it out to see if it suits your particular needs before you buy it.

[Larry Wallis]

Good point nobeefstu. If all features are enabled it would give me a good idea (often, software demos cripple the more advanced stuff which is invariably the things I want to use!).

Thanks.

Wal