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 Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 3:04 PM
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Has anyone tried out the free MS Photo Story slideshow software?
I'm not sure if this is the right place to mention it, but I just downloaded loaded it up on Friday night. I'm finding it to be a fantastic way to turn pictures into an interesting story. It takes your pictures and turns them into a .wmv file, letting you put them into motion with music or a narrative. I spent the better part of yesterday making wmv "movies" out of some of the digital pictures that I never seem to do anything with. A Rockies Trip 2002 movie, a Rockies Trip 2004 Movie, a Castle Towers movie, a Moxie movie (our dog), plus a few others along with 2-3 that I've just started. Plus, it was very easy and intuitive to use.
It would be great for some of the threads I've seen in here such as trees, mushrooms, Chilliwack River peaks, North Shore peaks, etc. It's also great for presenting panorama shots in the movie. I figured the movies would be too big to be manageable, but a 4 minute movie with music tends to be about 6 mb. Not too big.
Best of all, it's FREE for Windows XP users. If anyone's interested, here's a link to the software:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/photostory/default.mspx
I'm finding it to have some limitations. There are a few things I'd like to be able to do with the presentation of the photos that I can't seem to do. But hey, it was free software.
Is anyone else using this great tool or another tool to make movies out of their still photos?
PB
By the way, I have no connection whatsoever with Microsoft, just keen on finally putting all my digital pictures to some use and thought others might be in the same boat. |
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 double-double seeking, snow-chasing, short-cutting, vertical feet collector
4523 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 3:11 PM
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Thanks for mentioning this software Peak Bagger. I don't use it, but I do use Windows Movie Maker to make movies about some of my hikes (or about other events, such as this past week's eclipse)
It comes pre-loaded in most windows machines. I thought that this was an XP toy, but then I used an old laptop this week (that runs Windows ME!) and Windows Movie Maker was pre-loaded there, too.
The interface to Movie Maker is very easy to use - just drag and drop photos or digital camera movies you wish to incorporate, add an mp3 song for audio, some pre-loaded transition effects if you wish and add a score on top of that if you want to. Then, save, execute, and play at your heart's content.
cheers ! C Wall |
Edited by - seawallrunner on 10/31/2004 3:39 PM |
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North Vancouver, BC
Canada
1542 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 3:11 PM
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| Hey Peak Bagger, does the software work with movies too or just stills? Can you edit the movies that come from your digital camera? |
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Kootenay Bud
2695 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 3:19 PM
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| Got any of your new slide shows up on the web PB for the rest of us to enjoy? |
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Buntzen roving stealthy beer mule and artist, aspiring weird image findmaster who loves BC
lower mainland
Canada
1647 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 3:34 PM
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Thanks PB for starting this and C Wall for the tip about Movie Maker, I never considered using it before. I always wanted to be a movie director! |
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Fungi Filmin', Wine Drinkin', 'Shroom Eatin', Early Risin', Deer Whisperin', Curry Cookin', Macro Maniac
Chilliwack + Osoyoos
3618 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 4:08 PM
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Thanks for the tip, PB...
I just downloaded it... now to go and play...
C'Jack...
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...hang on, I'm coming... |
Edited by - OK Jack on 10/31/2004 4:09 PM |
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 4:13 PM
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Magnetite, I think it only works with stills unfortunately.
Sandy, I haven't put our movies on a website. I don't have any webspace. That's the next step for me I think. I'm also going to figure out how to burn them to a DVD so that they can just be popped into the DVD player and view on the TV and also allow us to send a slide show to our folks as a stocking stuffer. I know my mum would love that.
PB |
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 5:55 PM
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C-Wall, thanks for the heads-up on Movie Maker. It's good stuff too. It allows you you use moving pictures as well as still pictures. I like the timeline feature underneath the storyboard. It's pretty easy to use too.
The one main limitation of the Movie Maker software I have is that the photos can't be zoomed-in or or panned. I find that the ability to pan with Photo Story really brings the still images to life. Also, can you save files as wmv files? I didn't figure out how to do that and I think the wmv files are more compressed and significantly smaller.
Ideally, a good package would combine the elements of each of these two pieces of software. And be free. 
PB |
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double-double seeking, snow-chasing, short-cutting, vertical feet collector
4523 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 6:16 PM
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hi Peak Bagger,
As far as I know, the Movie Maker does not pan and zoom individual pictures. I was looking at the demos of the Photo Story (esp the little film about Venice) and thought how nice it would be to have the ability to do this in Movie Maker as well.
Movie Maker saves films in wmv format by default.
About a program that combines the best of both:
Why not create the panning/zooming of your pictures in Photo Story, save and create a wmv file.
Then, include that file that you just created as one of the inputs into Movie Maker, eg drag and drop the film you just created, among the other inputs of Movie Maker (eg, pictures, audio, score, other movies)
cheers ! C Wall |
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2004 : 7:20 PM
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Yeah, that would probably be a good work-around C-Wall. It would be a little awkward, though. Once you've made the wmv in Photo Story, it would be pretty set. You couldn't play with the individual pictures within the wmv file in Movie Maker. To get timings right for the soundtrack or other changes, you'd need to go back into Photo Story, make the changes, then reload the wmv file into Movie Maker. Getting timings right would be difficult. But if they could add the picture movements into Movie Maker, it would be great.
PB |
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double-double seeking, snow-chasing, short-cutting, vertical feet collector
4523 Posts |
Posted - 11/01/2004 : 3:03 PM
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here's a neat gizmo to shake up the audio in one's films!
The Audioshaker is a project by designer Tom Jenkins which captures and records sounds in a manner not unlike cartoon physics, where a sound can be placed inside, shaken about, then poured out again. Many different noises come out of the urn, using the initial sound as a base to create new sounds depending on how forcefully it is shaken. You can even add additional sounds after the first, then shake them up to mix them.
I'm probably not doing a great job explaining it, but fortunately there's a video.
http://www.interaction.rca.ac.uk/alumni/03-05/tom/1styr/audio_shaker/video(short).html
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2004 : 09:03 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by seawallrunner
As far as I know, the Movie Maker does not pan and zoom individual pictures. I was looking at the demos of the Photo Story (esp the little film about Venice) and thought how nice it would be to have the ability to do this in Movie Maker as well.
That little Venice movie was cool in that it gives you an idea of what you can do with a single quality picture. I took that capability and incorporated it into a couple of opening sequences last night and it can be a surprisingly powerful tool to enhance the impact of images. The more I play with this little tool, the more I love it! It's very addictive. I unintentionally stayed up quite late last night working on our 2001 Rockies pictures. We uploaded a few of our movies to the web to share with family (apparently Telus gives you 20 mb of web space with a high-speed account), but we're having some difficulties in setting up the web page. I can post the link here when it's ready.
PB |
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Satirical photoshop junkie who frolics in the mountains of the Chilliwack River Valley
Chilliwack, BC
Canada
6908 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2004 : 11:27 AM
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I've used photostory2 that came with the XP plus digital media edition CD, and I've found it quite easy to use. I like it that you can dub sound over the slideshow, so you can either make a running commentary, or make a soundtrack to go with the slideshow.
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"If you don't know where you're going any road will take you there" Randy Bachman
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2004 : 2:41 PM
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Billygoat, version 3 just came out last week. It's supposedly a huge improvement over version 2 with much better control of panning/zooming options and more output options such as 800*600 and 1024*768 resolutions for the wmv outputs. If you enjoyed version 2, you'd probably love version 3 as well.
PB |
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2004 : 10:36 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by sandy
Got any of your new slide shows up on the web PB for the rest of us to enjoy?
Sandy, Leslico just put together a website for us. We've put the three smaller videos in there. I've also finished a Rockies 2001, Rockies 2004 and Garibaldi Neve traverse video but they put us over the 20MB limit. The ones in there are at medium resolution to save bandwidth. These are my first efforts, but at least they give an idea of what the software can do. Feedback appreciated!
http://www3.telus.net/peakbagger/
PB |
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double-double seeking, snow-chasing, short-cutting, vertical feet collector
4523 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2004 : 11:00 PM
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VERY nice PeakBagger!
I watched the Castle Towers film and was impressed by the grandeur of the area - very well done! Great pictures! Great editing!
If you Castle Towers video is 'medium format' I'd love to see the full format version! What resolution was the camera with which you took the pictures then?
cheers - C Wall
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2004 : 08:01 AM
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Thanks C-Wall! That was my first one and it's still my favourite. It's hard to go wrong with such a great area! The resolution is 640*480. The 800*600 works best for me, while I find the transitions a little too choppy on my system at 1024*768. I can certainly put up the higher resolution movies when we get more server space.
The pictures were taken with older model Canon Digital Elph's. I don't know the resolution, but the pictures are all around 500k in size. I think I'm going to experiment with 2mb pictures and slower panning to see how well it performs in terms of "jerkiness".
PB |
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double-double seeking, snow-chasing, short-cutting, vertical feet collector
4523 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2004 : 08:21 AM
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I watched the other two movies on your web site and they are fabulous.
No dog lover will be able to resist 'Moxie' - what a sweet film!!!
I'll download the Photo Story program and play with it. I still wonder whether there's a way to make it play nice with Movie Maker.
A fun weekend project!!
cheers - C Wall
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Moxie scambler of pinnacles, tireless leader haunting the CDN/US border climbing everything in sight
Burnaby, BC
Canada
1273 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2004 : 09:05 AM
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C Wall,
I came across this website last night:
http://www.eicsoftware.com/PapaJohn/MM2/MM2.html
The guy who maintains the site is talking about exactly what you're saying - using Photostory as a companion tool for Movie Maker. Looks like you're bang-on in that they work well together.
PB |
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Kootenay Bud
2695 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2004 : 7:30 PM
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| PB, way cool. Of course, winnner is the dog flick. |
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| Terra
Intermediate Member
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Never-Never Land, B.C.
Canada
720 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2004 : 8:40 PM
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Wow Peak Bagger, those are very well done!
I'm particularly fond of the Castle Towers video. Your choice of "Extreme Ways" for the music fit it perfectly. I liked it so much I had to watch it twice.
I'm in the process of learning to use ProShow Gold 2. ProShow Gold caught my eye because it is capable of importing stills and videos, from my camera, into the slideshow however I specify.
Here is the link to the program if anyone is interested: http://www.photodex.com/products/proshowgold/
Oh ya, just as a side note, the site offers a free, full version, 15 day trial.
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"Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower."
~~Albert Camus~~ |
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Photo slideshow software
