Here's a little Puzzle for you to figure out :-)

[thedom]

When I highlight a keypoint, all the images are moving. I could not get it to allow resizing. The images just stayed 'glued' together.

Gary,

It's probaly because your images are all in the same group under a master object.You have to add them in the O/A screen as separate object (and not as sub-object).

[goddi]

Gary,

It's probaly because your images are all in the same group under a master object.You have to add them in the O/A screen as separate object (and not as sub-object).

thedom... I looked at what I did and I do have them as separate objects...if I understand it right. Here is what it looks like:

Objects (10)

Image1

Image2

Image3 (etc...)

I have found that there is a difference in making the images as above versus subobjects:

Objects (10)

Image1

.

.

.....Image2 (etc...)

But I really don't have a handle on why I would want to use one or the other method...yet. I just do something, and something happens.... When I click on an "Imagex", I just don't see what I should be seeing. Usually, nothing seems to be highlighted......very confused at this point.

Gary

[Lin Evans]

thedom... I looked at what I did and I do have them as separate objects...if I understand it right. Here is what it looks like:

Objects (10)

Image1

Image2

Image3 (etc...)

I have found that there is a difference in making the images as above versus subobjects:

Objects (10)

Image1

.

.

.....Image2 (etc...)

But I really don't have a handle on why I would want to use one or the other method...yet. I just do something, and something happens.... When I click on an "Imagex", I just don't see what I should be seeing. Usually, nothing seems to be highlighted......very confused at this point.

Gary

Hi Gary,

It's a little confusing because of things like overlapping keypoint exc. One way I think you could get a better handle on what's going on is to create a show with only two images.

Put one on the slidelist and call one by clicking on the Objects and Animations tab then change the zoom to about 20 percent or so and bring on the second image by right clicking in the grey area outside the boundaries of the green rectangle surrounding the first image and then adding a file.

With only two to be concerned with you will get a better idea of how they interact. At first set them both to 100% opacity. Rename both by clicking on them one at a time then click on the "Properties" tab and change their names. Then click on the lower one (in the objects list) and right click the mouse, then choose "Order" and "bring to front". With this object brought to front, everyting you do in terms of resize, pan, zoom, etc., will affect only this object. Even though you can "see" both objects by moving the little blue arrow on the time line, all changes you make by setting keypoints and changing animations will "only" be associated with the object brought to front.

So set some actions unique to this object. Click on the zero keypoint then move the object by dragging it clean off the page (off the black area which represents the page). Next change the time for the slide to about 20 seconds so you have some working room on the timeline and make a keypoint at about 6 seconds. Highlight this keypoint by making it blue (click on it) then drag the box containing the object to another place completely across the screen from where it started. Next put some numbers in the rotation like 360 and change the zoom. What you have just done will be reflected in the activity of the first image between zero and six seconds.

Next click on the other object in the object list and right click, choose "Order" then "Bring to Front" Click on the zero keypoint and click inside the green rectangle and drag this object to the opposite side of the screen from where you placed the first object. Resize it by using the "handles" and dragging them in or out. Probably it would be best to make it smaller.

What you have essentially done with this object is to define it's size and starting position at zero time. Next create a keypoint at about six or eight seconds, drag the object to yet another place and change the size, rotation, etc. When you "drag" an object you are automatically changing the Pan, but you must either type in different numbers for the zoom or use the green handles on the rectangle to drag the object to a different size. You can rotate it by either dragging the diagonals of the green rectangle or putting in numbers in the rotation box. 360 in the box will rotate the object one complete revolution clockwise. -360 will rotate it in the counter clockwise direction one complete revolution. 720 will make it revolve twice, etc.

Also notice that when you bring an object to the front, it changes its position on the objects list. try it by watching the position and bringing first object 1 then object 2 to the front.

By playing with these you will get a feel for what's happening when you have multiple objects. In short, the one which you have brought to the front will be the one which anything you do to keypoints, rotation, pan, zoom, center, etc., will affect.

In some cases, you may not even see the object you are affecting "because" you may have the opacity set to zero! So trust the software. If you bring an object to the front, that's the one you are affecting by changing things.

Best regards,

Lin

[goddi]

Lin... Thanks for the instructions. I printed them out and I'll give them a try. I'm a little PTE'd-out at the moment. All these new features can get me into brain-lock!!!! Thanks much. Gary

[goddi]

Hi Gary,

I posted a link to a new "puzzle tutorial" on the main page. There is also a link to the included components and the p2e files so you can follow step-by-step.orial.zip]http://www.lin-evans.net/p23/puzzletutorial.zip...

Lin

Hi Lin... Thanks so much. I haven't had time to go through it yet but I will print it out and see how you do your puzzles. Much appreciated... Gary

[JPD]

Hi Jean-Pierre,

There must be some type of bug - possibly because I used a midi-file. On most systems this show plays very well so it would be a good idea to find out why it's not working for you. The delay between the begining of the sound and begining of the images on my system is about 4 seconds and pressing the "ESC" key kills the action immediately. The fact that you have had problems and had to kill the process with other slideshows indicates something unique to your system is incompatible with this, when we find out what it is it will probably be easy to correct.

I have removed the midi sound and posted another zipped executable with a link for you to try. If you could try it and let us know the results it might help to determine the cause. There should be about six or seven seconds delay on this before images appear.

http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/puzzlenosound.zip

Best regards,

Lin

I have download the file without sound and it's the same thing black screen). I have also download the PTE album and it works fine. I don't know if it's the same, but it's also good with the exe file I did with it.

[Lin Evans]

I have download the file without sound and it's the same thing black screen). I have also download the PTE album and it works fine. I don't know if it's the same, but it's also good with the exe file I did with it.

Hi Jean-Pierre,

That's strange, there must be some quirk in the executable which isn's being interpreted correctly. I'm glad you could create the file from the pte elements and get it to work.

Best regards,

Lin

[thedom]

I have also download the PTE album and it works fine. I don't know if it's the same, but it's also good with the exe file I did with it.

Do you mean the .pte file with the 20 puzzle pieces ?

I would like to do the same test fut I can't find the link to download it

(I only found the links for the exe files)

Thanks for your help.

[Ken Cox]

dom

see

Here's the link to the tutorial

http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/puzzletutorial.pdf

Here's the link to the zipped file containing all the components so you can play with them:

http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/puzzletutorial.zip

Best regards,

Lin

ken

[Lin Evans]

Do you mean the .pte file with the 20 puzzle pieces ?

I would like to do the same test fut I can't find the link to download it

(I only found the links for the exe files)

Thanks for your help.

Hi Dom,

I think the one Ken linked to is the four piece puzzle which goes with the tutorial. What you want, I think, is the pte file for the 30 piece puzzle. Here's a link for that one:

http://www.lin-evans.net/p2e/puzzle30piece.zip

Best regards,

Lin

[thedom]

Yes, actually it was the "30 pieces puzzle" project that I wanted.

Thanks anyway to both of you.

I generated a new exe with your project but I had the same result (very bad framerate).

At least, in my case and for my configuration, it shows that the compilation on a computer or on another doesn't have any effect on the final result.

In a way, it's a good news.

[Lin Evans]

Yes, actually it was the "30 pieces puzzle" project that I wanted.

Thanks anyway to both of you.

I generated a new exe with your project but I had the same result (very bad framerate).

At least, in my case and for my configuration, it shows that the compilation on a computer or on another doesn't have any effect on the final result.

In a way, it's a good news.

Hi Dom,

Having 31 layers with all the simultaneous actions apparently pushes all but a very powerful video graphics environment to the limits. I've run this very smoothly on my development machine which has an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro card and plenty of (3.2 GHz) processor power and RAM (2 gigabytes) to run it.

On my wife's notebook computer the frame-rate is very, very slow - about what you were getting on the original executable - perhaps 2 frames per second or so. But I have a friend with an older Dell notebook which has an Nvidia card which runs it very smoothly too, so I think too many levels with simultaneous animation just pushes the limits of graphics on many systems. Perhaps this is something we need to be aware of when creating our slideshows so that we build for an average rather than super graphics environment.

I'm actually shopping for a new notebook computer for myself and I wil carry this executable with me on a 2 gigabyte USB flash stick to "test" the video environment so I'll be sure and get one suitable for high resolution 3D graphics.

Best regards,

Lin

[JPD]

Do you mean the .pte file with the 20 puzzle pieces ?

No, I just tested the 4 pieces' puzzle.

I just download the 30 pieces puzzle and even with the PTE file I have a black screen.

If I go in Objects and Animations Windows, I can see the Slideshow. I think that I have understand why it doesn't work for me. My graphic card is only 64 Mo of memory and there are more than 30 pictures 1331 x 888.

I don't understand why all the pictures are so large. It's possible to do the same with only little files. It's not necessary that all pictures are 1331 x 888, one is enough. If you have a picture to level one, 1331 x 888 and 30 little pictures under it at level 2, all put in original size, and the one to level one fit to screen, you'll do the same thing with less datas in memory.

I did a test of that with the 4 pieces puzzle, it's OK.

Note, I am doing a slideshow with pictures of 1920 x 1080 px size and it work fine on my PC, and there are some views were there are more than 40 objects with 8 keypoints for each objects, so it must be possible to do the same puzzle with 30 pieces which work on my PC.

[Lin Evans]

No, I just tested the 4 pieces' puzzle.

I just download the 30 pieces puzzle and even with the PTE file I have a black screen.

If I go in Objects and Animations Windows, I can see the Slideshow. I think that I have understand why it doesn't work for me. My graphic card is only 64 Mo of memory and there are more than 30 pictures 1331 x 888.

I don't understand why all the pictures are so large. It's possible to do the same with only little files. It's not necessary that all pictures are 1331 x 888, one is enough. If you have a picture to level one, 1331 x 888 and 30 little pictures under it at level 2, all put in original size, and the one to level one fit to screen, you'll do the same thing with less datas in memory.

I did a test of that with the 4 pieces puzzle, it's OK.

Note, I am doing a slideshow with pictures of 1920 x 1080 px size and it work fine on my PC, and there are some views were there are more than 40 objects with 8 keypoints for each objects, so it must be possible to do the same puzzle with 30 pieces which work on my PC.

Hi Jean-Pierre,

I think you are right - the reason I used the larger file sizes was that it's very easy to maintain precise positioning because each piece of the puzzle remains in the position it was when cut from the original image. Doing it this way one can use zero pan and 100% zoom for each piece in the final stage when that piece connects to the rest of the puzzle and the fit is "automatic". Since I have lots of processing power and a very robust graphics card, I didn't think about the effect it might have on a less than ideal graphics environment.

Best regards,

Lin

[JPD]

Since I have lots of processing power and a very robust graphics card, I didn't think about the effect it might have on a less than ideal graphics environment

I understand, and I thnk it will be a big problem for V5 because many people will do the same.

[Igor]

Jean-Pierre,

I noticed you have problem with black screen. It could happen with old video cards.

We've fixed bug in future beta #3.

[JPD]

Thanks, Igor, but I think we'll have to try to do the lightest slideshows as possible in order evrybody can see them.

[thedom]

Thanks, Igor, but I think we'll have to try to do the lightest slideshows as possible in order evrybody can see them.

I think you're defintely right JPD.

It's something we really have to keep in mind.

Note, I am doing a slideshow with pictures of 1920 x 1080 px size and it work fine on my PC, and there are some views were there are more than 40 objects with 8 keypoints for each objects, so it must be possible to do the same puzzle with 30 pieces which work on my PC.

Woowww !!! Do you plan to share it with us JPD ?

Because it sounds very interesting to watch such a piece of work...

[JPD]

Do you plan to share it with us JPD

I did it for the meeting of the Diapositif's forum members in Chantilly this week-end. I will put it on the web next week, probably with the PTE file.

[Michel]

Lin,

the limit is the video memory (as you know) and for your puzzle, we are near 100mb loading, only for your images.

So, it's difficult to see the puzzle perfectly smoothly, even with a Geforce 6800 128mb and the loading is long.

This comment is also true for the photos in a slide show and we must to remember this fact: the physical limit, if we will keep the slideshow suitable. A 25-30 mb loading (large 360°pan by example) is already enough for a maximal reliability.

Best regards.

[Lin Evans]

Lin,

the limit is the video memory (as you know) and for your puzzle, we are near 100mb loading, only for your images.

So, it's difficult to see the puzzle perfectly smoothly, even with a Geforce 6800 128mb and the loading is long.

This comment is also true for the photos in a slide show and we must to remember this fact: the physical limit, if we will keep the slideshow suitable.

Best regards.

Hi Michel

I'm not sure exactly how to calculate the load. The total of the file sizes for the puzzle and background is less than 5 megabytes but I assume during the time when all are in flux it's loading 31 of these each second. It does run smoothly on most of our systems (we have seven desktop systems), but not on a couple of our notebook computers and it's really slow on my wife's Dell 930m. Our desktop computer are all fairly new with decent video cards so I guess we need to use the slow notebook to test shows. Actually, I intended this puzzle show to be rather a "torture test" to see what we could expect from pushing the limits. I think designing this type graphic would probably require minimizing the file size and that's lilkely why game programmers generally use 256 colors and smaller moving objects to keep everything working

I'm not certain of the effect that layers has on the graphic load, but probably the fact that there is simultaneous movement of all pieces for about 10 seconds is where the load really comes from. I would assume it takes less memory to display a static image than one changing size and direction but I don't know exactly how this works with an executable rather than a video type file.

It will be fun to try and work out some systematic way to determine how not to exceed the limits.

Best regards,

Lin

[Michel]

Lin,

you can use Irfanview and open one of your image : with "info", you will see 3,3 mb for one.

In your puzzle, you load 32 images + perhaps the engine.

To use 64 mb (all content: images + engine) is even almost reliable for most PC with decent video cards.

[Lin Evans]

Lin,

you can use Irfanview and open one of your image : with "info", you will see 3,3 mb for one.

In your puzzle, you load 32 images + perhaps the engine.

To use 64 mb (all content: images + engine) is even almost reliable for most PC with decent video cards.

I'm amazed at how much these compress and how large the empty transparency portion seems to be. I just looked at the RAM requirements for one which was 4.4 megabytes in load size and it was 97K bytes compressed. I cropped it with perhaps a half inch of transparency surrounding the puzzle piece and the RAM requirements dropped to .32 meg so the transparency portion is exacting a huge load on RAM.

Now if I could just figure a way to keep the alignment correct for the assembly of the pieces at the end of the movement I could reduce the memory requirements for the whole show to a tiny fraction of it's present load size. I guess I could manually line up all components by keeping the original cropped size until I found the exact coordinates for each individual piece. Then I could write the numbers for each piece's pan location and insert them for the final assembly. There may be an easier way, but I'm not certain how to proceed.

When I first decided to make the puzzle I began to do it this way but it was terribly time consuming and that's why I left the full sized layer for each component since the positions were precisely correct as long as the dimensions of the individual components were not changed.

I'll have to play with it and see if it's feasible to do it this way. Obviously, for most slideshows this is not really a consideration because rarely would anyone want to have so many layers active and precise alignment would not usually be an issue, but it is an eye opening experience to see just how large these PNG files can be with extra empty transparency areas.

Best regards,

Lin

[alrobin]

Some respondents have been associating the size of the show with liimitations in video RAM. It should be pointed out that the entire show is not loaded into video RAM but pc RAM, which is usually over 512 Mb, and can sluff over into virtual RAM if absolutely required.

The video card only uses it's RAM as required during the playing of the show for individual images & objects.

[Michel]

This preview puzzle requires video card memory (animation) as Pan/Zoom/Rotate.

You can try this animation.

Do you find it smooth ?