October 2010 Newsletter

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Welcome to the Photo to Movie Newsletter

October 2010

Welcome to the October 2010 edition of the Photo to Movie newsletter!

In this newsletter:

  • Photo to Movie 4.7: Now With Video Clips! (Mac OS)
  • Photo to Movie Helps Win Short Video Award
  • Halloween for Kids -- Slideshow Tips
  • Photo to Movie for Education
  • Special Deals Mailing List
  • Newsletter Archive
  • Notices

Photo to Movie 4.7: Now With Video Clips! (Mac OS)

This month we released Photo to Movie 4.7, which now includes support for video clips in the timeline.

Currently, Photo to Movie 4.7 is only available on Mac OS. We expect to have a Windows version available soon.

This is a free update for anyone who has license key purchased since September 2009. If your license key is older, you can upgrade to the new version for $29.95 here:

Photo to Movie Upgrade

Video Clips in the Timeline

The main new feature in Photo to Movie 4.7 is support for embedding short video files into your slideshow. This has been one of the most requested Photo to Movie features.

Please try this exciting new feature and give us your feedback.

Now you can build your slideshow and include short videos. Just drag in videos from the Finder to the timeline. Supports videos in QuickTime .mov, .m4v, and .mp4 format.

You can control the timing (in/out/duration) of your video, the volume of the video, and whether it is zoomed to fit into the slideshow, or cropped to fit the slideshow.

The real time preview is highly dependent on your computer speed and size of the video. You should not expect to see real time previews of HD video on older machines.

For best rendering results, match the resolution of the video to the expected output resolution of the rendered slideshow.

More Timeline Improvements

A more minor, but useful improvement in Photo to Movie 4.7 is the ability to resize the height of the tracks in the timeline, including an ultra-compact photo track height.

Try this feature out by resizing the tracks at the far left of the timeline. Squish your photo track to its minimum and you'll see it's ultra-compact size, which is useful during editing if you're working mostly on audio or titles.

Photo to Movie Helps Win Short Video Award

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Sergio Messina is an Italian artist. Recently he produced a series of video called "Lettere Moderne."

His video "Stufa di tutto" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFu5QIWiJ5A) won the first mention at the Videominuto festival last September (http://www.videominuto.it). It's a recorded phone call of a woman complaining about the world. It's in Italian, but still worth watching even if you don't speak the language.

The whole series is made exclusively with Photo to Movie (and Photoshop), using only a fraction of its possibilities, as the rules of this project are very strict: no photos, three colors, one font (always caps), three transitions. Yet more evidence of the complex and varied results you can get using this software.

More at http://www.sergiomessina.com.

Halloween for Kids -- Slideshow Tips

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We're including our popular Halloween slideshow tips from last year.

Halloween is a classic American kid's holiday, full of mischief, dress-up, and candy. In recent years, however, this night of fun has spread much more; both to adults, and to other countries. We love Halloween, and as such we'd like to offer suggestions on how to use Photo to Movie to spook up your Halloween, whether you're a parent, a child, or a fun-loving adult.

Halloween is one of the most popular holidays for kids, a chance for them to do exciting, out of the ordinary activities with full parental approval. That kind of enthusiasm always makes for a great show. And you can harness it also in the creation of the show--get your kids involved in taking the pictures and putting the slideshow together on Photo to Movie.

It's yet another way for you to share the fun and games with your kids, creating good family memories even as you record them. Preparations start well before the actual day, and this gives you plenty of time and opportunity to take pictures. There are several ways to organize your slideshow, as we've written about in past newsletters. However you do it, though, be sure to take great pictures and have fun.

Costumes Start with the first trips to the store to get costumes--if you're anything like most families, your kids will go through several ideas about their costumes, tempered only by practicality and your budget. Get shots of them trying on different outfits, or just having fun in the seasonal Halloween superstores that spring up.

Pumpkins Next, the pumpkins: whether you grow your own or buy them at a pumpkin patch, this is a fine chance to get both Halloween--and fall season--pictures. You can throw a small pumpkin carving parties, inviting just a few of their children's good friends. Be sure to get pictures of each kid carving, and all of them posing together at the end with their jack o' lanterns.

Trick or Treating Do we even need to mention trick or treating? While taking photographs in low-light conditions can be tricky, a number of guides and how-tos can be found on the web, and modern digital cameras often have sophisticated automatic settings that take the guess-work out. As ever, getting a bit of practice before the main event is surely helpful.

More Photos If you prefer that your children not go trick-or-treating or if you participate in any other activities, then bring a camera along with you and snap away.

Candy Counting And that would be the end, right? Not quite; after the kids come home, laden with candy, it's guaranteed you'll have more opportunities to get great Halloween-themed pictures. Kids love candy--they love counting their haul, organizing it, trading pieces with each other, deciding what piece to eat and when (again, tempered by your parental oversight.)

Halloween Stories Another idea, good for younger kids, is to create a slideshow picture-book to help them get into the Halloween mood: ghosts and goblins abound at this time of year, and you can find a great number of pictures and sound effects on the web. Try making a story about your child and their adventures on Halloween night. Or you can create your own version of the classic Great Pumpkin story, featured in so many Charlie Brown cartoons and comic strips over the years.

Answering the Door If you stay home to pass out candy, you can take pictures of all the kids who come to trick or treat. Make sure you ask their parents' permission, of course, if they are along. You can add this to your main slideshow, or make a quick one as a side-project, and post it online for the whole neighborhood to see.

That's about it! As always, if you like our ideas, and put any of them into effect, send us an email with a link to your finished video. We love seeing them, and love sharing them with our readers.

Photo to Movie for Education

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Are you an educator? Photo to Movie is used in classrooms everywhere as an easy media production tool. Students of all ages can use Photo to Movie for basic video projects.

  • Story telling and informational presentations
  • Titling, audio, and narration
  • Visual composition on a timeline
  • Video, DVD, and web publishing, including YouTube
  • Book reports, science projects, and more

We offer Photo to Movie packages to fit any budget for your classroom. Please contact us directly if you're thinking of using Photo to Movie in your classroom and let us answer any questions or requests that you have.

Contact us at support@lqgraphics.com

Special Deals Mailing List

Due to numerous requests, LQ Graphics now has a special mailing list for special deals, offers, and discounts on LQ Graphics products and 3rd party products.

This is a great way to SAVE MONEY on software. We're negotiating with several other companies to offer special DISCOUNTS to our customers on their products. We expect the first special offer to be available in early December -- SIGN UP NOW.

This special deals mailing list is opt-in only. You must click on the link below and check the appropriate box to be included.

Sign Up for Discounts

Newsletter Archive

All of our previous newsletters are available on our website. Check them out for tips, news, and information items.

Browse through the Photo to Movie newsletter archive

Notices

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