New Soundslides: Any Opinions?

i think we have talked about this before,so ignore me if i am repeating myself.

the best programme for assembling slideshows is adobe after effects. when you are finished,just dump the whole thing into fcp(i guess you can also drop a completed piece into soundslides,but i never tried),and fine tune the music.

if you want inspiration,i would look at films,not other slideshows,and see how a good editor works to achieve different moods etc.

as for the ken burns effect,i wouldn’t bother myself,or use it very sparingly and only if the material absolutely demands it.

and preston is correct,badly mixed or innappropriate music/voiceover is a killer.you have to experiment,try different things,and hope for a visit from the random gods of chance.(you know the very famous scene in kubricks 2001?the one with ’thus sprake zarathrusta as the soundtrack?when he was editing it,that piece of music just happened to be on the radio,and he noticed how it worked with the images,so used it)

Word.

How would one send this out to a magazine?
In the folder it creates sub-folders with the images and a file called index.html.
Do you put that on a CD and send the whole thing to a magazine explaining how to open up the slideshow?

You touched on my only disappointment with Soundslides – there really isn’t a good way (to my knowledge) to feature a soundslides piece off-line. The swf file requires an internet browser window for display, and Soundslides doesn’t create a stand-alone file.

The best way to showcase these slideshows is online – I’ve sent links to folks.

hope this helps.

http://www.boinx.com/fotomagico/overview/

You could also just output your Soundslides project to a QuickTime movie and put that on a CD. I was having this issue at a paper I worked at where readers wanted copies of the audio slide shows as a video. Thankfully there’s now a plug-in to help you do this. It has it’s limitations though. Here’s a link to the SoundSlides documentation for this:

http://www2.soundslides.com/support/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=41

When I’ve sent out projects on CD I either pull the index page out of the “ready_to_publish” folder and link it to the files in its folder. Requires some understanding of HTML. Then I title that index page something like “click_here_photostory” For mulitple projects I make an HTML index page with simple links to each “ready_to_publish” (which you’ll want to rename) folder, that way you don’t have to mess with the code for each slideshow HTML document.

going back to your question: i just upgraded my SS version to the new Plus to take advantage of one new feature that i wanted/needed for projects i’m working on…and that’s the full screen playback. another feature that i like is the multiple image import (naturally!).

as for the CD question: i never had any problems from sending my SS shows to editors. i just add a “Read This First” file to the CD. most editors i deal with know Soundslides…it’s easy, fast and super-fast to learn and does the job.

keep well,

t.

Thanks.
I forgot I could do that.
I think it’s a cleaner format to send out. It creates less work for editors.

Any ideas?

http://www2.soundslides.com/support/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=41

There is no need to create a “Read me file” to a CD containing a Soundslides presentation. You can add a piece of code to the index page that tells the index page to open automatically in a browser when the CD is inserted.

I had this done for CD’s I sent out a long time ago. No need for any plug-in or read me intro, the CD will open and play auto as long as the viewer has a browser.

If you want I can see if I can work out what the code is and post it up here.

But…why would you send a CD when you can just send a link to the presentation online, assuming you have a website or blog.

Is there any chance you might be able post the code to auto play the slideshow.

Would make life much simpler.

Thanks.

i agree. but as you well know, photo editors will be photo editors. if you do find the code, it’ll be great. thanks.

Sorry for the delay in replying. I get no notification when a reply is posted on a thread.

I will take a look and see if I can work out the code and post it here.

How are you Tewfic? I trust your well.

cheers,
t.

I am eager to send this project out and would love to see if this code works.
By the way, I am going to be in London on Thursday and will be there for a few weeks.

Do you have any time to meet up?

Srinivas

http://www.ezau.com/latest/articles/autorun.shtml

Just had a look at the link. Yes that is exactly how to do it. Although I don’t think you need to download the software to make an HTML file autorun. You just type that into the code. Obviously you need a program that allows you to to ammend the code.
I use Dreamweaver but you can also do it in Adobe Go live. Although I belive Adobe has bought Macromedia who created Dreamweaver and has discontinued Go Live to concentrate on Dreamweaver.