Missing MP4

[Lowell Olson]

I expect that this is a quite an elementary question.

I am struggling with finding my show after publishing it (embedding it)

I tried the HD 4K. and the AVI Video file.

I would have expected it to be in the C:/users/Lowell/Documents

I have searched everywhere

I have made a show before. Somewhere I found the file. Copied .it to a USB device

and played it my TV

Once I embed it I cannot find the MP4 file

Hope you can help

Lowell

 

[Lin Evans]

It's probably in C:/users/Lowell/videos rather than Documents Lowell, but use the Windows Search and you will probably find it. One needs to pay attention when creating the video where it's defaulted to go. 

If you don't find it in the suggested place it may also be in C:/users/Lowell/Videos/Desktop.  Tell me what version of Windows you're running and maybe I can help you find it.

Best regards,

Lin

[Lowell Olson]

Hi Lin,

Thanks for your reply

Unfortunately, its not in C:/users/Lowell/Documents of which I have some practice shows (4)

Its not I C:/users/Lowell/ videos either There I have (3) practice shows

Please excuse my ineptness, I am not a windows person. Eagerly  waiting for the Mac version. I just bought

this laptop pc running win10 to get familiar with the software. 

I hope I don't have to do it over as I spent a lot more time on it with videos audio timing etc.

Thank you for helping me

Lowell

[Lin Evans]

Use the "search" feature of Win 10 to look for *.mp4

Best regards,

Lin

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4026289/windows-10-find-your-documents

 

[Lowell Olson]

Lin

No luck there.

I thought Publish. Go HD or AVI st the video to 1920 x 1080 hit OK. wait for it to encode

I think that's render in PSG land.  15-20 min later Find it copy it to mu USB Device and 

play it in my Smart HDTV

What am I missing.?  Lowell

BTW I'm from Cedaredge CO.  Wintering in Yuma AZ

[Lin Evans]

Hi Neighbor,

Warmer in Yuma for sure but we're having pretty good weather here in northern Colorado (Berthoud) the last few days.

It sound like you're doing everything correctly. If it actually took fifteen or twenty minutes, that show is "somewhere" on your hard drive. It's strange that the Windows search doesn't find it. Did it find ANY mp4's?  Since we know you have several, it "should" have found them using *.mp4 for the search key.  Do you still have the PTE file so you can open the slideshow again?  If you open it in PTE then go to create the video again, but stop before clicking O.K., you MIGHT see where the default folder is located. The * in *.mp4 constitutes a "wild card" which means ANY file with the extension dot mp4. That should locate all mp4's on your system.

Even if the mp4 didn't get rendered, the PTE file should still be available and you can do it again, nothing should be lost. I'm a bit confused by what you mean by "embedded" it? Usually only on the web with a social site like Youtube or Vimeo or such can you "embed" a video. It's not something you do on your computer itself.

Maybe if you explain exactly the steps you took to "embed" the mp4 we can figure out what happened. It's "possible" that somehow the process you used to "embed" this actually moved the file somewhere else, but you should still have the filename.pte file on you hard drive and be able to bring up the show and render it again. Unless you intentionally delete the PTE file it should still be available. The PTE file is a data file which tells the program where the images are as well as everything you did as far as timing, audio, etc., etc. It's like an electronic index to allow you to always load the original show assuming you saved it before creating the video.

Best regards,

Lin 

[Lowell Olson]

Thanks Lin,

I'll have to take this on tomorrow. Have a early get up 5am for an appointment in Phoenix tomorrow.

I so appreciate your help. I love the software just not windows. My 27" retina is asking me everyday " when's

the program coming"   I will be home tomorrow afternoon. I may not be so good on PET yet. But I'm tenacious.

God bless

Lowell

[Lowell Olson]

Hi Lin

I'm back from Phoenix.

I am giving up trying to find that show.

Have spent way to much unproductive  time on it

I'm going to start new, which will add to my learning experience. 

I have the images and the videos. I will add the music, separate audio from video, Delete audio clip etc  

I müst have seen embed on some other software. In ProShow Gold it was always render.  sorry for misspeaking.

Here's a question:  When my images are in the File List (thumbnails) I have been dragging them into the Slide List.

Also I have found my audio file in my File Tree,  and drag it into the Slide List. That seems to work fine except I get in trouble

when I go back to make changes after rendering to the MP4 file.I know that I have seen or read, that I need

to make a new file by clicking on "File" and name it. Also make a new (Folder) in the file tree (under what C:? or other?) Copy images, audio, etc

into that folder . So how does this folder correlate with the new file I just named?  I this why I am fowling up my show?  The shows that have made,

seem to end up all over in different files in the slide tree.

Thanks for your thoughts

Lowell in Arizona

 

[Lin Evans]

Hi Lowell,

In case you haven't seen this - my first suggestion would be to watch Barry's tutorial on this which answers some of your questions. Once you've watched this, then we can go on and proceed with more options. Link to Barry's tutorial below:

Best regards,

Lin

https://www.youtube.com/embed/IQ9zK-X7PME?rel=0&autoplay=1

[davegee]

 

[Barry Beckham]

Why not open up your show again, assuming you can, then create another MP4 and in the address string look to see where it’s being created. PTE will create the Mp4 in the same folder as your project file. Unless you tell it something different. I guess your not working from one folder.

Alternatively, create another Mp4 and change the address to place the video on your desktop

[Lowell Olson]

Hi Barry,

I can put my usb cruiser back into my PC. Find the file and it opens in the file list. plays on the minelayer, but only the first

slide in the Slide List.  If I could see see all the slides I might have the ability to revise some.       The show I made and played was a MP4.  When I tried to reproduce the file C:\users\lowell\appdata\local\pictoexe\version\10\recoveredprojects\

it did not show up.  But I sure had a lot of stuff in there.  Is there another way to access that file "recoveredprojects"?

Lowell

Shows what happens when you let a Mac guy have his paws on a windows 10 PC  ouch

[Barry Beckham]

Sorry, I have no idea what a USB Cruiser is. However, it seems you’re making a fairly simple process quite difficult.
 

When making a slide show, create a folder and copy EVERYTHING you use into that folder, then work from there and only there. Your project file and Mp4 should also be in that folder and if you do that, you will have the ability to adjust your show and recreate it any time. Plus you’ll always know where everything is

[Lin Evans]

Hi Barry,

It's a USB Thumb Drive..

Lin

[Aleina Show]

Lowell Olson

Let me give you a little advice. Do not add files from the USB drive to your show. Windows often renames the letter of the USB drive. Today you can have it F, tomorrow X and so on. And the PTE program saves its data that the files are on drive F, for example. And there is confusion. The next time you just lose all the files from the show, since you may no longer have drive F, but there is drive X, for example.

Kind regards,

Aleina

[Lowell Olson]

Aleina

My images and music are on my Western Digital Elements 3 tb external hdd

It is connected to my PC laptop via USB port. I will always have drive F. That is not why I

could not find my show. 

Lowell

[Robert Albright]

Hi Lowell, PTE has always been very particular about finding files. It's very easy to think you have saved a file where PTE will find it but then, often after a pause doing while you're doing something else for a few days, it won't appear. There's good advice from Barry as above: 'When making a slide show, create a folder and copy EVERYTHING you use into that folder, then work from there and only there. Your project file and Mp4 should also be in that folder and if you do that, you will have the ability to adjust your show and recreate it any time. Plus you’ll always know where everything is.'

[Lowell Olson]

Hi Robert

Thanks for sharing. I love this forum. Everyone is so kind to. help others.

Being a Mac person, I'm not fond of windows.

I  have opened the File new screen and named it.  Then finding my images from a Usb thumb drive

I have saved them to the new file I just created. I have done this with my music as well.

After I complete the show I Publish it, taking notice of where it will exist before I click on 

Lately that has been C:\users\Lowell\appdata\local\picturestoexe\versions\10\recoveredprojects

I understand that thesis not the correct direction. So I end up changing it to end up in the Desktop folder

Where am I going wrong?  Seems as if I am in a Cul-de-sac

Thanks Lowell

[Xenofex2]

Lowell,

In the last few days I too have completed a project that took several months to put together and around 20 minutes to render to MP4.

At the very beginning and like as already been mentioned, I created a new file structure within a Folder as originally, well for me anyway, recommended by one of Barry's tutorials. That way a copy of the images to be used are in the folder together with any editing completed that can be revisited at anytime in the future should you wish to change your project. However, as this was NOT an afternoon project, there were numerous saves made along the way and when it came to the final conversion to MP4, it was in this folder that the program automatically saved. I then have everything still together for archiving.

Regardless of using a Mac or Windows, surely when you save whatever, you tell the program where to save? If that is the right place for you, then that is all that matters.

George

[Lowell Olson]

Hi George,

Thanks for your message.

Seems my big problem now is that when I try to open PTE the screen grays out

And when I go control alt delete And then try to go back into the project, It goes gray again

Is my show to large? Sometimes I get the spinning blue circle and its ongoing.

Any cure for this?  

Lowell

[Lowell Olson]

George

I forgot to mention. I'm doing this large show on a evaluation copy and it is NOT responding.

Lowell

[wideangle]

Lowell

Two points regarding your original problems:

When you save a project, in your case, if you always use File -> Save As, you will always be asked and have full control of where you want to save it, so you should then be able to easily locate it afterwards.

Secondly, when you have completed a project, and after saving it, if you use File -> Create Backup in zip, then PTAV Studio will collect a copy of all the files you have used in your project (that is jpgs, video, audio etc etc) and save them in a single a zip file. That process will also ask you where you want to save it.
If you get into the habit of doing this for each project you make, it is a good way of making a security backup copy of everything you do.

Regards

wideangle

[Lin Evans]

Hi Lowell,

Give me an hour or so and I'm going to make you a little video tutorial which "should" make it easy to see where your .pte file is and how to get it to go where you want it. You'll have to excuse my voice - hopefully you will be able to understand me. I had a stroke a couple years ago which took my voice entirely and I'm still struggling with trying to speak normally. I just can't get words out quickly and that sometimes make me sound like I've been drinking... I wish !!!  Anyway I'll post the little tutorial here when it's ready.

Best regards,

Lin

[Lin Evans]

Here's a little Demo which might help....

Best regards,

Lin

 

[Lowell Olson]

Hi Lin,

This was so kind of you to take the time to do this. This has been a big help.

For some reason I believed that everyone was setting up their files before they even added

the slides to the Slide List.  So its ok to bring your images files into the file list (thumbnails, music)

and drag them into the Slide List. Do the transitions and all the things that make the show etc.

saving as you go.

And when you think it is complete Then you save as by going to the file in the upper left 

give it a name xxxxxxxxx.pte

Back to the top of page to PC  and to C drive on my computer etc

Im going to make a simple show and try it out

Thanks again

Lowell