An Ongoing Project Sample....

[Lin Evans]

As seen in the Styles and Templates section, I'm working on some styles for snowfall and rainfall which, along with an AVI tutorial, I hope to have finished this week and make available to any PTE user. Below is a link to a brief example I made very quickly for a friend and published on the PTE Facebook Group and on her FB page.

This is just a sample of what the styles will allow the user to do with amenable photos. The zipped archive when finished will contain not only a large quantity of styles but also a couple rain and thunder mp3 files as well as seven PNG files i've created of lightening flashes which can be used with your photos to simulate lightening flashes. It will also include drops of rain on windows PNGs which can be simply overlaid on the project to make it appear that the viewer is looking through a rain covered window glass. I'll include one style with a window glass so users know where to put it if they want to use any of them in their own animations. With proper timing it's possible to get vary realistic results I think. Six years ago I posted a rain-simulation to Youtube which was much more difficult to do than the way I do it now. It was just as good then but took hours to do what I can do in minutes these days....

Here's a link to the sample I created for my friend... I'll be glad to answer any questions...

http://www.lin-evans.org/storms/stormsovercolorado.zip (Windows exe - about 20 meg)

http://www.lin-evans.org/storms/stormsovercoloradomac.zip (Mac exe - about 20 meg)

Best regards,

Lin

[Ken Cox]

Lin

full w/s, manual control with lots of audio ))))

good job

thks

ken

[Lin Evans]

Thanks for checking it out Ken!

It's slowly coming along - As soon as Igor gets the User folder thing ironed out it will go very fast. Right now I'm having to manually transfer all the files from my development system to my Win 8.1 system and re-create all the styles I have already created. I can't export the styles from my XP machine and when I use the PTE create backup in zip, none of the files from the styles get included so I'm having to chase down their original locations and move them all to the other system and build them all again. Lots of moving from one system, checking values, moving back to the other system and inserting them multiple times for each of about 32 separate styles (16 for snow and 16 for rain). Once I get them working then I have to transfer my software which I use to create tutorials to the other system and it may not work under Window 8.1 so a huge problem which I normally don't have to deal with. Hopefully, I'll be able to get it all done before the weekend.

Best regards,

Lin

[smithrg]

Hi Lin,

I can't imagine how you do the things you do with this amazing program!

Thank you for sharing your work with us, less skilled.

Best regards, Robert

[JEB]

Hi Lin,

Most impressive!

As Robert says, how you think these things through and then get them to work is beyond most of us.

Wee suggestion - water running down the window?

Cheers,

John

[Lin Evans]

Hi John, Robert ... I'll work on trying to make a "water running down window" simulation soon. I hope to have all the styles promised completed by the end of the week. I have much of the work done but have run into a bit of a stumbling block exporting the styles so it's taking a bit longer than I anticipated.

I have finished a quick tutorial showing how to use the components I will be distributing along with the styles so that users can create their own versions of the simulations. They are fun to work with and not nearly as difficult as most think. It's really more a matter of thinking outside the box and combining creations from other programs to be manipulated in PTE. Six years ago I made a rain simulation which I posted to YouTube. It was actually very realistic but took a long time to create and lots of "trial and error" in getting it just right. Now I'm using other tools which work very much better to create the components, especially for the rain simulations and it's much, much easier and faster. The "styles" feature with PTE is incredible indeed. It's made it exceedingly easy to share ways to achieve different animations and will greatly help catapult PTE into the limelight soon.

Best regards,

Lin

[Lin Evans]

John, here's a first sample... Water running down window....

There's lots of water in this one - LOL.. If you just want a few drops, I'll have to wait until I can get someone to help me with a garden hose and one of my windows so I can get some video to work with. It's easy enough to convert for use in PTE but the original has to be amenable and that takes a bit of work to get correct. It has to have uniform light and color so I can manipulate the video file for best results in PTE.

http://www.lin-evans.org/demo/waterrunning.mp4 (use back arrow on browser to return here after watching)

Here are high quality Mac and PC links

http://www.lin-evans.org/rain/waterrunningpc.zip

http://www.lin-evans.org/rain/waterrunningmac.zip (about 13 meg)

Best regards,

Lin

[Ken Cox]

now maestro

make the clouds move ))))

ken

[Lin Evans]

LOL - to do it right would take a lot longer, but here's a quick preview:

http://www.lin-evans.org/rain/waterrunningcloudsmoving.mp4

L

[Ken Cox]

beauty

the moving clouds enhance the rain movement on the window

next

have a witch riding a broomstick across screen

might as well try to show as many features as possible))))))

ken

[Lin Evans]

My favorite "witch" has deserted me and took her broomstick with her. Maybe I can coax her to come back for a couple days and help me with the "witch on the broomstick" or at least hold the water hose while I shoot some video through the window..... LOL

L

[Lin Evans]

O.K., Ken,

Here's a sample with clouds moving - this image is much more amenable to doing that type of animation. So here you get moving clouds, water running over the window, water drops on the glass (sweat on the inside, I guess), lightning, rain and such.... Sorry, still no witch on broomstick - LOL

http://www.lin-evans.org/rain/waterrunningcloudsmoving3.mp4

Best regards,

Lin

[Guest Yachtsman1]

Used this one in my "Lighthouse Keepers Story" last year.

Yachtsman1.

[Igor]

Moving clouds looks great!

[Lin Evans]

Thanks Igor,

This type animation is an example of why it was (is) important for those who want to create this type scene to have alpha channel video capabilities with PicturesToExe. There are several software packages (I use Particleillusion) which let the user create some amazing alpha channel videos with particle generation algorithms. These type programs make it very easy to create and manipulate flames, water, clouds, vapor, and so on which are used by the movie industry to create special effects for major motion pictures.

By providing this feature you have opened up PTE to many other possibilities. PTE has tremendous power for manipulating elements created in specialized software and lets those with artistic inclinations become very creative. I don't have much in the way of artistic skills, but I understand how to demonstrate some possibilities so that those who have real creative talent can get a clue for the power inherent in your program. The fact is that it's much, much easier to create many amazing animations with PTE than even with some of the very expensive Adobe professional tools. Tools like Adobe AfterEffects are extremely powerful, but difficult and tricky for most to use and many things can be done much easier and more intuitively with PicturesToExe.

Best regards,

Lin