Photo slideshows - which program?

[Amy]

I'm currently taking a Photoshop Elements 4 class at our community college. Today we learned how to create a slideshow in Elements.

Our teacher also showed us a program called PhotoStory3 that's a free download from Microsoft.

On the way home, it occurred to me that PowerPoint is also a slideshow program.

Which one would be most useful? I plan to do my major photo editing (cropping, red-eye, cloning/correcting) in Elements, so basically all I'd need is a program to put the pictures in, maybe add captions, and add music and transitions. I'd like to be able to show the slideshow on my computer, and maybe burn a CD in a format that could be viewed on any computer.

Any ideas? We spent the first half of the class on Photostory (real easy to use) and the last half on the slideshow in Elements, so my mind is confusing the two right now.

 

[ukcatfan]

I am sure that you could do more with PowerPoint, but it would take much longer to do and would be much more difficult. I think I am using the old version of PhotoStory, but I have used it a few times without any problems. I believe that the new version actually had some functionality removed, so you might want to find version 2.

Kevin

 

[lorifl2]

I bought this software a few months ago to create a year-end slide show for my son's hockey team, and it is awesome.

http://www.roxio.com/enu/products/creator/suite/overview.html

It is very easy to use and does allows all the captioning, music, etc. that you mentioned. It also allows you to add movement to the photos and the captions, which it more interesting to watch than stills.

 

[Blueyed Girl]

You could use something as simple as windows movie maker, which is usually on every PC now days. The only thing is if you want to make it into a DVD to play on the TV set, you'll need other writing software such as Sonic MyDVD. If you just want to play it on computers you can just save it as a .wmv file.

 

[Amy]

Thanks for the quick replies! Sounds like I can pretty much use whichever program I'm most comfortable with. Since it's free, I might download PhotoStory and see how it compares to Elements.

DH and my boys will be so sorry I signed up for this Elements class - I come home from class and just want to play; forget about housework! Laundry is about the only thing I get done on my day off, and that's just because it practically does itself!

 

[garris3404]

In the PE organizer you may enter a caption for each photo. When you creat the slide show, I belive there is a checkbox to include the captions. PE also allows you to pan in/out of photos. I have added music, transitions, captions and it works fine.

 

[CheshireVal]

I really like the way slideshows look with PhotoStory-- almost like a TV documentary. But I've found it takes a long time to rearrange the pictures the way you want them once you've imported them into the program. Unless there's a better way to do it that I missed, it's a big drawback.

I still think it looks more professional than PowerPoint, though.

 

[GDUL]

I bought this software a few months ago to create a year-end slide show for my son's hockey team, and it is awesome.

http://www.roxio.com/enu/products/creator/suite/overview.html

It is very easy to use and does allows all the captioning, music, etc. that you mentioned. It also allows you to add movement to the photos and the captions, which it more interesting to watch than stills.

I've been using Roxio's Media Creator for over a year. I find it very easy to use and I love the results!

 

[Amy]

Unfortunately, Roxio isn't in the budget right now (final WDW trip payment is due end of April), but I'll keep it in mind.

I spent most of yesterday playing with PhotoStory and Elements. PhotoStory is definitely easier to use, and I love the transitions it has, compared to the Elements transitions (particularly the star transition). But I guess since it's a free program, that's why you're limited. Only one song can play for the entire slide show, for example.

Some of the advantages of Elements that I found (mind you, this is just after one day):

- you can select all the transitions at once and change them (PhotoStory you have to change each transition separately, a pain if you've got a big slide show);

- if you decide you need a blank slide with a title at some point in your slide show, it's easy to add one in Elements (can't do that in PhotoStory, or I didn't see where to do it);

- you can have more than one music track for your slide show in Elements, and can adjust the timing of the slides so the show ends when the music does (only one music track in PhotoStory).

BUT.....I think I'll still use PhotoStory for a quick slide show and save Elements for when I need something fancier. They're both good at what they do.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I like Pictures2Exe at www.wnsoft.com.

 

[ukcatfan]

- you can have more than one music track for your slide show in Elements, and can adjust the timing of the slides so the show ends when the music does (only one music track in PhotoStory).

I think that is one of the things that MS dumbed down with the new release of PhotoStory. I know for a fact that I have used multiple songs with the old version. There are some places that still keep old versions of software available to DL. I looked for my old install file and I do not think I kept it.

Kevin

P.S. It looks like you can still get version 2 on this website http://www.microsoft.com/windows/plus/tryit.asp, but I am not positive that it will have the disabled features of PS3 enabled on it due to this being a MS website. It can't hurt to try I guess.

 

[donaldduck1967]

Unfortunately, Roxio isn't in the budget right now (final WDW trip payment is due end of April), but I'll keep it in mind.

Right now Roxio is $49.99 after $20.00 instant and $30.00 mail in rebates.

 

[allyn]

i use proshow gold.

 

[Amy]

Update re PhotoStory & Music -

Kevin, I played around some more in PhotoStory3, and you CAN have more than one piece of music in your slide show! You just click on the slide where you want to start the next piece of music and add it.

The best thing about the slide show in Elements is the button "fit slides to music" where it adjusts the timing of all the slides so the slides end when the music does. What a neat trick! (You have to manually adjust all the slides in PhotoStory to do the same thing. Bummer.)

I can't wait until our WDW trip in June! Slide shows ahead!