PicturesToExe v5.00 beta #8t

[thedom]

Is anything known, when this feature will be implemented in V.5? I think this feature would be great especially for long shows :-))

Gerdi,

The navigation bar in its new version (ie customizable!) should be avalaible in beta #10 or #11.

You can read the full roadmap to final release of v5 here : http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index....ost&p=34489

Has the shadow not yet been implimented in the lastest Beta?

Stevep,

It should be implemented in next beta (beta #9). To know more about this feature, you can read this post : http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index....ost&p=35356

[Gerdi]

No, the "user controls" such as mouse action, nav-bar, etc., are not activated yet in v.5.

Does anybody have an idea how we can make Igor to implement the break-function very soon? :-)))

I think pte 5.0 is working very nice. But I want to share my slideshows with friends. And probably they want to stop for a while on some pictures to enjoy them for a longer time. So a pause-function would be really great.

We might collect some money to motivate him to implement it very soon. Other suggestions?

Gerdi

[LumenLux]

I am using V5 for a presentation of 200-300 slides. The photo files from camera are 3872x2592. (Same as 35mm, 2:3 ratio.) I want the PTE presentation to use the 4:3 ratio to fill my PC screen. I am content in most cases for the photos to be cropped equally left and right in order to fill the screen and leave no black borders at top and bottom.

It appears this can be accomplished in V5 by choosing the "Cover Slide" mode. This seems to require checking the "Cover Slide" box on each slide. In this case about 900 mouse clicks are required. Is it possible, or would it be possible to make a global option so all slides would take on the "Cover Slide" mode?

[alrobin]

Does anybody have an idea how we can make Igor to implement the break-function very soon? :-)))

........snip.............

We might collect some money to motivate him to implement it very soon. Other suggestions?

Gerdi,

Igor is not motivated by money. And he doesn't drink vodka. You could maybe buy him a gift certificate to a nice Russian spa!! But I doubt if even this would make him change his priorities for PTE!

[davegee]

I would like to second Lumenlux’s proposal regarding the choice of defaulting to “Cover Screen”. Excellent idea!!

By the way is there an explanation as to why, when Cover Screen is chosen, the Zoom percentage stays the same? When I put an image which is 1024 pixels high into a 5:4 show using my 1280x1024 monitor and using Cover Screen that is the way it SHOULD be (100%). I believe that the other option (which is, in effect, “fit to width”) is wrong. Having used Cover Screen I find that I have to zoom to around 83% to get my 3:2 image to fit to width again.

If I accept the “Fit To Width” default then I have to zoom to 120% to achieve “Fit To Height” which is clearly wrong because my image is 1024 and filling 100% of the height of the screen.

Perhaps all of this confusion will be cleared up in the final Beta but at the moment it is clearly wrong. The Windowed Mode of Version 4.48 copes with this problem because, having told PTE that my window should be 1280x1024, any image that I use is automatically sized accordingly.

Bring back Windowed Mode!!

(Only kidding - I know it's on the way - I hope!)

DaveG

[alrobin]

I see this a little differently - if an image in an AV has to be cropped, I like to have total control on where it will be sliced. Therefore, I rarely, if not never, use "cover slide" mode.

I am not against providing a global cover screen option in Proj Ops, which one could choose if one wished to apply this mode to all images, but I would not be in favour of making it the default.

For my own purposes, "Fit to screen" is the best compromise for v.5 as I usually use images large enough to be able to provide a sharp high resolution result even when resized on wide-screen high-res monitors. "Cover slide" mode results in arbitrary cropping with some monitor resolutions, a condition which I, personally, cannot accept.

[davegee]

There is sense in what you say Al, but you must admit that it makes no sense that the Zoom Percentage shown in the O&A dialogue is clearly wrong when using the fit to screen option (Fit to width when importing a 3:2 image into a 5:4 show).

Dave G

[alrobin]

There is sense in what you say Al, but you must admit that it makes no sense that the Zoom Percentage shown in the O&A dialogue is clearly wrong when using the fit to screen option (Fit to width when importing a 3:2 image into a 5:4 show).

Dave G

Dave,

I presume you mean "Fit to slide". ("Fit to screen" is another option in Project Options which I don't think is activated yet in v.5.)

"Fit to slide" means "adjust whichever dimension is necessary, either height or width, in order to obtain the maximum image size on screen without cropping the image or distorting the aspect ratio". In your example the image will be resized until its width matches the width of the screen. If it were a 2:3 image, then the heights would be fitted.

I don't quite understand your concern. I created the example you quoted, set the aspect ratio to 5:4 in Proj Ops / Screen, and the attached is a screen cap of the settings in O&A. The zoom percentage clearly shows 100% as it should.

When this example is played on a 5:4 monitor, the widths should match up (I can't try it out because my monitor is wide-screen).

Please explain further if I've misunderstood you.

[LumenLux]

I see this a little differently - if an image in an AV has to be cropped, I like to have total control on where it will be sliced. Therefore, I rarely, if not never, use "cover slide" mode.

I am not against providing a global cover screen option in Proj Ops, which one could choose if one wished to apply this mode to all images, but I would not be in favour of making it the default.

I agree Al that Project Option choice would be the best. And it seems if it is possible to make it the default then it would also be possible for Igor to make it a project option. As a project option it would be very easy for a growing number of DSLR users to cover full screen of "older" monitors. Of course I too would in most cases want to custom crop. But it my present project, I could save consideralble time by making the global choice and then custom crop the few slides that required it.

My desire to use Cover Slide is because, as far as I understand, it is the only way within PTE V5 to make a 3:2 camera file cover the 4:3 computer monitor at 1024x768.

[alrobin]

Robert,

Why do you want to cover a 4:3 monitor? Do yourself a favour and get a wide-screen LCD monitor! It will more-accurately match your SLR images, and unless you use a professional CRT monitor today, will appear much brighter and sharper. My Dell widescreen monitor didn't cost me a whole pile, either. In a few years, all monitors, TV sets, and digital projectors will be wide-screen (like in the movies).

[davegee]

Al,

Your example show black lines top and bottom which is what I do NOT want. If the slide you put in was 1024 high in a 5:4 format show on a 1280x1024 then the percentage shown is WRONG - it should be around 83%.

I agree with Lumenlux re: CHOICE.

DaveG

[alrobin]

If the slide you put in was 1024 high in a 5:4 format show on a 1280x1024 then the percentage shown is WRONG - it should be around 83%.

Dave, I agree there should be a "CHOICE" too.

But I still don't understand your reasoning about zoom percentage. Please rationalize your figure of 83%. To me it's still 100% (according to the definition of "fit to slide"). An image that meets this definition starts out as being at 100%. You zoom it in or out from that starting point.

This "relative zoom" is necessary in order to be able to calculate what numerical values would be required to achieve special effects (within the definition of "fit to slide"). If you use "cover slide" or more particularly "original", the appearance on screen will be different, but the starting percentage will still be 100%.

[davegee]

Hi Al,

Terminological differences can sometimes get in the way of a discussion, especially in a forum like this one. So I have tried to put my thoughts into a logical explanation of the way I think about PTE.

Let’s start at the very beginning…….

PTE is clever enough to know what my monitor aspect ratio is (it tells me in Project Options that my display is 5:4) so presumably it is also capable of knowing what resolution I have set. In my case that is the maximum resolution of the monitor – 1280x1024. The following assumes a project aspect ratio of 5:4 and monitor resolution of 1280x1024.

I like to fill the screen with my images in PTE and have no intention of getting a wide screen monitor at this time. However, since my camera produces 3:2 images this means that I have to make some choices. I usually get around this by panning any images which cannot be cropped to 5:4 without losing valuable information.

If we forget about zooming for a moment (it introduces some further problems) it makes sense to make all of my images 1024 high in Photoshop before creating the JPEGs for use in PTE whether they be 5:4 or 3:2 so my definition of “100%” is when my 1024 high image fills the HEIGHT of the screen.

What happens when I add these images to a project in PTE? If they are 5:4 images at 1024 high then they FILL the height of the screen. If they are 3:2 images then they default to filling the WIDTH of the screen (black lines top and bottom) and the ZOOM percentage is shown as 100%. Now I am used to thinking of 100% being the same as ACTUAL PIXELS in Photoshop so here we have a conflict. Some basic mathematics tells me that when the 3:2 image which is 1024 pixels high is fitted to the width of a 1280x1024 screen the zoom percentage figure should read something like 83% because the 1024 height of the image is only filling around 83% of the height of my monitor. Anyway, by right clicking on the image and choosing COVER SCREEN my 3:2 image 1024 pixels high now fills the screen with some overlap on either side, but here’s the strange thing, the zoom percentage STILL reads 100%.

I consider that the COVER SCREEN option is the correct option for the parameters I have given i.e. 1024 pixels high filling the HEIGHT of the screen. This ties up with my thinking about ACTUAL PIXELS.

So, if we had a choice of making COVER SCREEN the default I would be a happy man.

One other problem with all this is that if the 3:2 image that I add to the project is 2048 pixels high instead of 1024 (in other words 200% of my monitor resolution) it still shows 100% zoom percentage.

I want the zoom percentage to refer to the pixel size of my image compared to the screen resolution of my monitor, which is exactly what happens when I add the 1024 pixels image to my 5:4 project on my 1024 high monitor (cover screen mode). This is the reason I asked Igor a while back if we could have three options:

1. Fit to screen

2. Cover screen

3. Actual pixels

Unfortunately Igor did not reply. I can only imagine that either he did not see my request, did not understand my request or chose to ignore it. I would like to think that he did not see it.

In order to keep PTE running at maximum efficiency and not subject it to the needless calculations involved in interpolating images I like to keep my images no larger than they need be. To perform simple pans they only need to be 1024 pixels high.

However, when zooming, images need to be correspondingly bigger. To zoom into an image at 200% my start image needs to be 2048 pixels high. That’s an easy example. I sometimes use a 1024 pixel high image to determine the amount of zoom I am going to apply to the image and then go back to Photoshop and recreate the jpeg image at the correct zoom percentage so that PTE only has to cope with the zoom I ask for and not have to cope with the extra work of interpolating an oversized/undersized image to fit the screen at the requested zoom percentage. (I hope that makes sense?).

Anyway, that’s the way I think. Wearing my PTE Beta tester’s hat I have to ask:

1. Would PTE be a better product if we had the choice of either Fit to Screen or Cover screen?

I think that it would.

2. Would PTE be a better product if we also had a third choice – ACTUAL PIXELS.

I think that it would.

DaveGee

[Lin Evans]

Hi Al,

Terminological differences can sometimes get in the way of a discussion, especially in a forum like this one. So I have tried to put my thoughts into a logical explanation of the way I think about PTE.

Let's start at the very beginning…….

PTE is clever enough to know what my monitor aspect ratio is (it tells me in Project Options that my display is 5:4) so presumably it is also capable of knowing what resolution I have set. In my case that is the maximum resolution of the monitor – 1280x1024. The following assumes a project aspect ratio of 5:4 and monitor resolution of 1280x1024.

I like to fill the screen with my images in PTE and have no intention of getting a wide screen monitor at this time. However, since my camera produces 3:2 images this means that I have to make some choices. I usually get around this by panning any images which cannot be cropped to 5:4 without losing valuable information.

If we forget about zooming for a moment (it introduces some further problems) it makes sense to make all of my images 1024 high in Photoshop before creating the JPEGs for use in PTE whether they be 5:4 or 3:2 so my definition of "100%" is when my 1024 high image fills the HEIGHT of the screen.

What happens when I add these images to a project in PTE? If they are 5:4 images at 1024 high then they FILL the height of the screen. If they are 3:2 images then they default to filling the WIDTH of the screen (black lines top and bottom) and the ZOOM percentage is shown as 100%. Now I am used to thinking of 100% being the same as ACTUAL PIXELS in Photoshop so here we have a conflict. Some basic mathematics tells me that when the 3:2 image which is 1024 pixels high is fitted to the width of a 1280x1024 screen the zoom percentage figure should read something like 83% because the 1024 height of the image is only filling around 83% of the height of my monitor. Anyway, by right clicking on the image and choosing COVER SCREEN my 3:2 image 1024 pixels high now fills the screen with some overlap on either side, but here's the strange thing, the zoom percentage STILL reads 100%.

I consider that the COVER SCREEN option is the correct option for the parameters I have given i.e. 1024 pixels high filling the HEIGHT of the screen. This ties up with my thinking about ACTUAL PIXELS.

So, if we had a choice of making COVER SCREEN the default I would be a happy man.

One other problem with all this is that if the 3:2 image that I add to the project is 2048 pixels high instead of 1024 (in other words 200% of my monitor resolution) it still shows 100% zoom percentage.

I want the zoom percentage to refer to the pixel size of my image compared to the screen resolution of my monitor, which is exactly what happens when I add the 1024 pixels image to my 5:4 project on my 1024 high monitor (cover screen mode). This is the reason I asked Igor a while back if we could have three options:

1. Fit to screen

2. Cover screen

3. Actual pixels

Unfortunately Igor did not reply. I can only imagine that either he did not see my request, did not understand my request or chose to ignore it. I would like to think that he did not see it.

In order to keep PTE running at maximum efficiency and not subject it to the needless calculations involved in interpolating images I like to keep my images no larger than they need be. To perform simple pans they only need to be 1024 pixels high.

However, when zooming, images need to be correspondingly bigger. To zoom into an image at 200% my start image needs to be 2048 pixels high. That's an easy example. I sometimes use a 1024 pixel high image to determine the amount of zoom I am going to apply to the image and then go back to Photoshop and recreate the jpeg image at the correct zoom percentage so that PTE only has to cope with the zoom I ask for and not have to cope with the extra work of interpolating an oversized/undersized image to fit the screen at the requested zoom percentage. (I hope that makes sense?).

Anyway, that's the way I think. Wearing my PTE Beta tester's hat I have to ask:

1. Would PTE be a better product if we had the choice of either Fit to Screen or Cover screen?

I think that it would.

2. Would PTE be a better product if we also had a third choice – ACTUAL PIXELS.

I think that it would.

DaveGee

Hi Dave,

Just one observation. PTE does have a choice of "actual pixels". When you go to Project Options, Screen then check the Disable Scaling, you get the actual pixel dimensions.

Best regards,

Lin

[Gerdi]

Gerdi,

Igor is not motivated by money. And he doesn't drink vodka. You could maybe buy him a gift certificate to a nice Russian spa!! But I doubt if even this would make him change his priorities for PTE!

We have to find very soon something he like. I need the pause/break-function urgently!!! :-)) Are you sure there is nothing Igor could like?

Gerdi

[davegee]

Thanks Lin,

That’s well hidden – it’s a long time since I have been down there and had forgotten all about that. I do remember thinking that if Igor did not recommend it then there must be a good reason and I should avoid it until I have found out why he does not recommend it. I will play around with it and give it some thought.

It still does not address my other “requirement”. If I add a 2048 high image to my 5:4 project (with disable scaling ticked) on my 1280x1024 monitor I want the Zoom Percentage to read 200% straight away and not the 100% it gives right now. It should be possible to do this by comparing the monitor resolution with the size of the image within the software. One way around it would be to click on the “cover screen” option (the percentage stays at 100%) and then enter the 200% figure to zoom back into the image. This is exactly the same as what I have to do now, without the “disable scaling” enabled. So at first sight it is not the answer.

Do you ever get back over here to your roots?

DaveGee.

[ksf]

We have to find very soon something he like. I need the pause/break-function urgently!!! :-)) Are you sure there is nothing Igor could like?

Gerdi

I think Igor himself would probably appreciate a pause/break! It seems to me that he is constantly being bombarded with requests for changes, fixes, and enhancements, sometimes just to suit an individuals requirements. Should we not be a bit more patient with him - allow him to fix any current/major bugs, and give him the chance to produce a stable version before hitting him with change requests?

[Lin Evans]

Hi David,

Yes, lots of possibilities for future tweaks - I suspect once the release is out Igor will start working with scaling and such.

I was in Wales about 7 years ago. I told my wife I wanted to look up some of my relatives so got the phone book for Cardiff - LOL - half of it was "Evans" so I had to give up that idea.... Maybe some day I'll get some time to research it. Seven Evans brothers came to the U.S. and settled in KY and IL. One of these was my great, grandfather. They scattered about and our side ended up in Colorado, Kentucky and Missouri but I really don't know much of our history beyond my grandfather who ended up in Missouri and died young.

Best regards,

Lin

Thanks Lin,

That's well hidden – it's a long time since I have been down there and had forgotten all about that. I do remember thinking that if Igor did not recommend it then there must be a good reason and I should avoid it until I have found out why he does not recommend it. I will play around with it and give it some thought.

It still does not address my other "requirement". If I add a 2048 high image to my 5:4 project (with disable scaling ticked) on my 1280x1024 monitor I want the Zoom Percentage to read 200% straight away and not the 100% it gives right now. It should be possible to do this by comparing the monitor resolution with the size of the image within the software. One way around it would be to click on the "cover screen" option (the percentage stays at 100%) and then enter the 200% figure to zoom back into the image. This is exactly the same as what I have to do now, without the "disable scaling" enabled. So at first sight it is not the answer.

Do you ever get back over here to your roots?

DaveGee.

[alrobin]

We have to find very soon something he like. I need the pause/break-function urgently!!! :-)) Are you sure there is nothing Igor could like?

Gerdi

Stick with version 4.48, then, until it is provided in v.5!

Hi Dave,

Just one observation. PTE does have a choice of "actual pixels". When you go to Project Options, Screen then check the Disable Scaling, you get the actual pixel dimensions.

Lin & Dave,

There is also a third option in O&A called "original" (as in "original pixels").

PTE is clever enough to know what my monitor aspect ratio is (it tells me in Project Options that my display is 5:4) so presumably it is also capable of knowing what resolution I have set.

Dave,

You are right, terminology does get in the way of one's thinking - yet it is very important, in order to understand exactly what is meant by certain features.

As I have already pointed out, the term used in v.5 is "fit to slide", not "fit to screen". You can choose to use whatever slide size you want, and set the same aspect ratio in PTE Proj Ops, and then whatever image you select will be fitted to that aspect ratio (see the definition of "fitted" in my previous post).

If you are going to use "Cover Slide" as your option, then don't worry about "Fit to Slide" - it's quite acceptable as it is.

[LumenLux]

I am using V5 for a presentation of 200-300 slides. The photo files from camera are 3872x2592. (Same as 35mm, 2:3 ratio.) I want the PTE presentation to use the 4:3 ratio to fill my PC screen. I am content in most cases for the photos to be cropped equally left and right in order to fill the screen and leave no black borders at top and bottom.

It appears this can be accomplished in V5 by choosing the "Cover Slide" mode. This seems to require checking the "Cover Slide" box on each slide. In this case about 900 mouse clicks are required. Is it possible, or would it be possible to make a global option so all slides would take on the "Cover Slide" mode?

Thank you all for the interesting, sometimes confusing, and helpful discussion. For my personal current needs, it seems to me the "answer" would be to make "Cover Slide" a global choice. I hope Igor, when back, can answer here whether that is possible.

[alrobin]

Bob,

I agree - a global option makes a lot of sense (which was the recommendation you were making all along!)

But I honestly don't understand how you can accept any arbitrary cropping of your images, whether by PTE in the "cover slide" mode, or by photoshop, with a batch-crop operation. At least with PS, you can make an initial selection so as not to simply crop down the middle. Different strokes for different folks, I guess!

[jevans]

Have been waiting for the sound synch function to be implemented and so have not been trying latest beta version. However decided to download Beta 8r to try the video creation functions. I am very impressed with the stunning quality of the resultant DVD disc played on a Region 2 Samsung DVD player and a 28 inch Samsung LCD TV. Miles better than anything I have been able to do so far. Very well done to Igor and his team.

Jeff

[LumenLux]

Bob,

I agree - a global option makes a lot of sense (which was the recommendation you were making all along!)

But I honestly don't understand how you can accept any arbitrary cropping of your images, whether by PTE in the "cover slide" mode, or by photoshop, with a batch-crop operation. At least with PS, you can make an initial selection so as not to simply crop down the middle. Different strokes for different folks, I guess!

We are closer on our views on this than might be apparent. Most often, like you, I want to specific crop for a specific composition, subject placement, subject size, etc. My current project, being largely a "narrative" presentation of fun with the grandkids, allows me to "compromise" my normally prevailing approach and accept the "auto/arbitrary" crop on some 200-300 slides. Then if I see one that I clearly must make more aesthetically pleasing - I could make a new crop of it. That said, and now that I have found the auto crop tool I seek, I am worried I may not be satisfied with my compromise when I am done.

[alrobin]

Bob,

Which autocrop tool did you zero in on?

I can see your point when you have a whole bunch of images to quickly put together and I'm glad to hear you are not serious about doing this on a routine basis.

But, if you then turn around and use "Cover slide" mode, you are back where you started, aren't you? Unless your show will only be shown on specific monitor resolutions, some of your best images could end up being cropped again, and not necessarily where you want them to be sliced. Also, I wonder what impact "Cover slide" mode will have when it comes time to burn a DVD, where some further cropping will occur. I'm not trying to stir up mud - just trying to get to the bottom of the pool.

[LumenLux]

Bob,

Which autocrop tool did you zero in on?

After help from Ralph to have BreezeBrowzer do it, I then realized how to use Irfanview to do it. Irfanview is one I normally use, so will likely do the job in the future.

I can see your point when you have a whole bunch of images to quickly put together and I'm glad to hear you are not serious about doing this on a routine basis.

But, if you then turn around and use "Cover slide" mode, you are back where you started, aren't you? Unless your show will only be shown on specific monitor resolutions, some of your best images could end up being cropped again, and not necessarily where you want them to be sliced. Also, I wonder what impact "Cover slide" mode will have when it comes time to burn a DVD, where some further cropping will occur. I'm not trying to stir up mud - just trying to get to the bottom of the pool.

My intent was to possibly use CoverSlide setting instead of cropping outside of PTE. For the desired sequence at hand, I have ended up using V4.48 for the known-stable sound sync. I had considered using V5 if the CoverSlide would have accomplished the cropping instead of Irfanview.

I'm not trying to stir up mud - just trying to get to the bottom of the pool. smile.gif

I think now I can go back to making the envisioned show and leave the deep stuff to you. I don't even mind you stirring up the mud as long as you are near to guide me through it.