Creating Slide Shows – Power Point & Picasa

Some basic Power Point Info...

WHAT IS POWER POINT:  Gives you the ability to create a slide show combining your photos, text, animation, sound and more… to make your information much more enjoyable.  Power Point presentations have been used in business for years, but today you see them being used at weddings, showers, birthday parties, reunions, memorial services and by groups & organizations.  Students as young as 3^rd grade are using power point presentations to enhance reports and projects.

POWER POINT APPLICATION SOFTWARE

Can be bought individually or it is included as part of the MICROSOFT OFFICE bundle.  The Power Point Application Software is always required for you to create and or modify a power point presentation.

POWER POINT VIEWER: This is a free software offered from Microsoft that allows you to watch power point presentations sent to you via email.  You can then save them on your computer to send to someone else, you cannot however change or modify them in anyway or create your own without the full Power Point Application Software Program.

ADD POWER POINT VIEWER TO YOUR COMPUTER: Go to www.Microsoft.com – on right hand column – choose Downloads & Trials, search for “Power Point Viewer” and when wizard opens up – choose DOWNLOAD NOW button – in a few minutes this free software will be on your computer – follow directions as it adds it…

CAN YOU MAKE SLIDE PRESENTATIONS WITHOUT POWER POINT?? Yes, use Picasa (a free photo editing software program from Google, if you don’t have it, go to www.picasa.com and download for free).  Picasa’s version 3, has both a slide show & movie making application to use and they are easy to work with.. For those with Windows XP or Vista, your windows software has a free program called Windows Movie Maker which works in much the same way as power point and the Picasa applications… and if you have Windows 7 or 8 you can always search for and download

In our next posting we will talk more about using PICASA to create slide shows.. 

Configuring iTunes for Music Downloads

Before you can start downloading and/or converting songs in your iTunes library, you need to select an audio format to convert to: To do this:

1. Be sure you your iTunes library/account open
2. Click edit (from the main menu at the top of screen) and then click preferences.
3. Select the advanced tab and then the importing tab.
4. Click on the import using drop-down menu and select an audio format (such as mp3 which is my personal favorite to use in most free movie making and other project software or wav).
5. To change bitrate settings, use the settings drop-down menu .
6. Click the OK button to finish.

Note-many of the songs we purchase today are downloaded in mp4 or another format and are often too large to be used in some project software, such as Picasa's movie making; Windows Movie Maker, Power Point and some mp3 players - so personally I always download all music to my computer using the mp3 format, so I can use it just about anywhere anytime...

Converting File Formats - Music & Videos

Making sure files are in the correct format is very important when we are “inserting” them into projects such as videos and music into PowerPoint Presentations, MovieMaker, PicasaMovies and others..

That includes when you want to download a YouTube video for use in either a MovieMaker project or PowerPoint.

This free software/tool does everything you need and much more and also has great additional conversions for all types of applications and is one of my personal favorites… It is a great program “free” to convert music, videos (even YouTube Videos) and much more for use in numerous applications including Movie Maker, PowerPoint presentations etc…

Remember with many of the free & other programs, it is advisable to use the smallest files possible, such as MP3 for music vs. mp4 and this software helps you with all those conversions..

Download from http://www.dvdvideosoft.com/

1. Chooser to install all programs – FREE STUDIO 5.0.4
2. This way you can then do various types of conversions for all types of projects
3. Once installed it will put a great shortcut on your desktop-called Free Studio Manager. This is the complete interface for the suite of programs that are available from dvdvideosoft.com.

Note for Power Point Users: While it is faster to simply link to a YouTube video that will play in your PowerPoint presentation, the down side of this is that you must have a live & fast internet connection for the YouTube video to play.

Here is a link to a youtube video that walks you thru inserting the link directly into the PowerPoint if you have a good internet connection:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RApFAXMtero

When you are unsure about the internet connection where you are going to do your presentation with, you can embed the YouTube video right into your PowerPoint presentation. No internet connection needed.

And also refer to updates & video tutorials which are referenced on our class blog to make this easier.. Using this and other programs simply takes a little practice – so play & enjoy…

Tutorials for Windows Movie Maker 2.6

On these cold snowy days - why not be creative with some of the digital photos you've saved on your computer or that are sitting in your camera...

Windows Movie Maker 2.6 (which is an older version than the new Windows Live Movie Maker) but is more enjoyable to use. Movie Maker 2.6 allows you to be more creative has more options to work with your digital photos, music and video when "creating" your new movie...

The following websites at Microsoft will help you when you forget what you've learned in class... Check out each of these websites and save them to your favorites for future reference..

Let Movie Maker create a movie for you
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/getstarted/movies.mspx

AutoMovie, a feature of Movie Maker, automatically creates a movie for you using a theme, title, and background music of your choosing. AutoMovie is the best way to quickly see what Movie Maker can do. This article shows you how to use AutoMovie to create an exciting movie in just a few minutes.

Create and trim video clips
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/getstarted/clips.mspx

Movie Maker can automatically split your home movies, which might be an hour long on a single tape, into smaller clips that are easier to edit. You can also manually trim your video clips to show just the most interesting moments. This article shows you how to use Movie Maker to automatically split movies into short clips and then how to manually divide those clips.

Work with Movie Maker Collections
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/create/collections.mspx

Movie Maker organizes your video, music, and pictures into collections. You can then drag items in your collections to your storyboard to make a movie. This article shows you how to add items to your collections, edit items, and add them to your storyboard.

Use special features to polish your movie
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/create/polish.mspx

Once you add video clips to your storyboard, you can make your movie more fun and professional-looking by adding transitions, special effects, background music, narration, titles, and credits. This video and series of articles show you how.

Save your movie in different formats
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/create/formats.mspx

Once your movie is polished, find out how to save it and share it with your friends.

HOW TO PLAY MUSIC CDS ON THE COMPUTER

Why not listen to your favorite music while you work - it's easy once your computer is on and when you have speakers:

• Put your favorite music CD, label side up, in the CD-ROM drive and close the drive
• When auto play is enabled (which is pretty standard) the CD will start playing the first track (using your default media player, such as Windows or VLC Media Player )
• If the CD doesn’t start playing automatically, open the Start menu. Choose Programs, then Accessories, then Entertainment and Click CD Player. Click the Play button on the CD Player window (a single right-pointing arrow in the top row)
• You can use the Pause, Stop, Skip to Next Track and Go Back to Last Track buttons to control what you listen to.
• Choose Edit Playlist from the Disc menu to program a particular sequence of tracks
• Minimize the CD Player window if you plan to listen to the entire CD while working and you can bring it up anytime from your taskbar

In the system tray (right side of the monitor) you can quickly control the music volume with the speaker icon - just left click on it to slide volume up & down, and by checking the speaker icon or box - you can toggle between MUTE to turn music off for that phone call and then again to turn it back on...

Why not save/rip the entire CD to your computer so next time you simply access your “music list” just as you do with a word document.. it’s there ready for you to listen to

When I download music from the Internet (such as iTunes) or from my CD’s, I always download (save/rip) it in mp3 format so that I can use it on my mp3 player and just as importantly, so that I can use the music in projects that I might create, such as in Power Point Slide shows, Picasa & Windows Movie Maker projects)

What is Windows Movie Maker

Windows Movie Maker is video creating/editing software that is included free in versions of Microsoft Windows XP & Vista; it’s fun & easy to learn to use, to enhance your photos and share them in a different way by combining photos, music, text slides and much more... It is not included in Windows 7 but we recomend going to Microsoft and downloading an earlier version used on Vista or XP, NOT the new Windows Live Movie Maker, which has none of the favorite features which allow us full editing ability…

The LAYOUT consists of a STORYBOARD VIEW and a TIMELINE VIEW, collections for organizing imported video, and a PREVIEW screen. These are the areas where you create and edit your project is displayed in two views, the storyboard and the timeline. You can switch between these two views when making a movie. All versions use “DRAG & DROP” for the effects or transitions, and titles and credits can be added as stand alone titles or overlaying them on the clip by adding them onto the selected clip.

• STORYBOARD: Where you will drag your video or pictures to, creating a project. When in STORYBOARD VIEW, the video project appears as a film strip showing each scene in clips

• TIMELINE: Shows your project & where you add your music/audio to and the TIMELINE VIEW consists of:

• one 'Video' (with accompanying 'Audio' bar)
• one 'Music/Audio' bar, and
• one 'Titles/Credits' bar

EFFECTS, TRANSITIONS, TITLES & CREDITS
Versions 2+ include a wide variety of effects, transitions, titles and credits you can easily use to add professional touches and visual interest to your movies …
• Windows XP has 60 transitions, 37 effects, 34 title and 9 credits animations-Windows VISTA has even more.

ABOUT THE MOVIE TASKS PANE
The Movie Tasks pane lists the common tasks to perform and guides you thru the process step-by-step..

1. Capture Video. options to begin a movie (capture video, import video, pictures, or audio).
2. Edit Movie. options for making a movie (view existing video, pictures, audio & add effects, titles etc.
3. Finish Movie. options to save your final movie, ie to your PC. CD, DVD, email attachment or the web
4. Movie Making Tips. Provides help for the common Movie Maker tasks.

BE SURE YOUR PICTURES, VIDEO’S AND/OR MUSIC ARE IN THE APPROPRIATE FILES SO YOU CAN FIND THEM QUICKLY & EASILY - As always, organizing your work “before you begin a project” is very important… Personally I create a project folder in each category and then sub-folders for specific projects so it is easier to find what I am looking for – in those I put “copies” of hat I am going to use, so that originals stay in their original folder…

• All editing of photos - cropping, lighting, whatever – must be done before you begin this project
• Be sure any music you might want to use is copied (ripped) from the CD and saved on your computer in a file you recognize, so that you can access them easily when you want to bring them over to the project