PHOTO FILMSTRIP: FREEWARE PROGRAM
TO MAKE PHOTO SLIDESHOW VIDEOS
©2017 by Donald R. Snow
This page was last updated 2017-04-28. Return to the Utah Valley Technology and
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ABSTRACT: PHOTO FILMSTRIP is a free program that makes
"Ken Burns"-type videos of your selected photos. These
slideshow videos are formed from still pictures, but that have
movement in the picture to keep people's attention and focus
on the things you want. The program allows captions,
visual effects, and sound files for background music or
narration. This class will discuss the program and how
to use it. The notes for this class and related
articles, all with active Internet links, are on Don's website
http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-classes.html
.
WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION
- Instructor is Donald R. Snow of St. George and
Provo, Utah ( snowd@math.byu.edu
).
- These notes, with active Internet links and other
related articles, are posted on Don's website http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-classes.html
.
- Tips: (1) To put an icon on your desktop
for the URL for these notes, or any webpage, just drag
the icon in front of the address in your browser to
your desktop. (2) To open a link while
keeping your place in the original page, hold down the
Control key while clicking the link so it opens in a
new tab.
- This class will discuss the free program PHOTO
FILMSTRIP, downloading, installing, and using it to
produce video slideshows from still photos.
WHAT IS PHOTO FILMSTRIP?
- PHOTO FILMSTRIP is a free program
available from http://www.photofilmstrip.org
-- If it opens in
German, click on the "en" (upper right-hand side) for
English.
- Ken Burns is the fellow who makes historical videos
that are educational and entertaining for PBS and other
TV channels; many of his videos include still
photographs, but by panning around in them, they appear
in motion and hold your interest and you can emphasize
what you want; you set the length of time for each photo
and any background narration or music that you want
- Video tutorials are at http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=tutorial+photofilmstrip&qpvt=tutorial+photofilmstrip&FORM=VDRE
STEPS IN USING PHOTO FILMSTRIP
- Steps
STEP 1 - Download and Install PHOTO FILMSTRIP
STEP 2 - Select and organize the photos you want to use
- can be jpg's, tif's, png's, etc.
STEP 3 - Select the music or narration file you want to use
-- this usually determines the length of the final video
STEP 4 - Run the program and tell it where to find the sound
file, if any
STEP 5 - Drag and drop the photos and set their properties
STEP 6 - Render (produce) the video and save the project;
use Draft mode for rendering until you have it the way you
want, then render the video in High Definition
STEP 7 - Watch the video
STEP 1 - DOWNLOAD AND INSTALL PHOTO FILMSTRIP
- Go to the
website http://www.photofilmstrip.org
-- If it opens in German,
click on "en" (upper right corner) to change to English
-- It is written by a fellow in Germany, so it uses
European settings to start
- After downloading, install it. There is also a
portable version that runs from a flash drive, so it
doesn't need to be installed on the computer running it.
- On the website is information about the program,
including a video made with it.
STEP 2 - SELECT AND ORGANIZE THE PHOTOS TO USE
- Include as many or as few photos as you want, but to learn the program start with just a
few photos, e.g. 5 or 10
- When doing a video, keep
in mind how long you want it to be and that each photo
needs to be shown for a few seconds; photos with more
people usually need to be shown longer
- When using a sound track (music or narration), the
length of the video will be determined by the length of
the sound file
- To get a working average time for each photo, divide
the total time by the number of photos; this can be
adjusted for each photo later
- If the sound file hasn't set the time or you haven't
set it yourself, the program defaults to 5 seconds for
each photo
- To get the photos in the order I want, I copy them to
a folder and number them as 10-[name], 20-[name], etc.
-- this makes them sort in this order; the gaps in the
numbering allow me to renumber others later to go in
between; you can also rearrange them later in PHOTO
FILMSTRIP, but it is easier to get them in the right
order first
- PHOTO FILMSTRIP can handle several
image formats, including jpg's and tif's.
- Title screens can be made by using
text art features of word processors, e.g.
LibreOffice, and making screenshots so you have
jpg's of them to include.
STEP 3 - BACKGROUND MUSIC OR NARRATION FILE
- PHOTO FILMSTRIP only allows the sound formats of wav or
mp3, so if you have something in a different format, you
will have to convert it to one of these
- You can find music on the web, YouTube, CD's, etc, but
don't break any copyright laws; since you won't be doing
this commercially, you will be OK in most cases
- Music or narration can be recorded with the freeware
program Audacity -- http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
-- see other sets of notes for details
- The length of the sound track determines how long your
video will be; if it is a narration about the photos, note
the length of time for each description, so you can set
the time to show each photo; you can adjust the PHOTO
FILMSTRIP default time of 5 seconds to whatever you need
for each photo
STEP 4 - RUN THE PROGRAM
- Run PHOTO FILMSTRIP and click to start a new project.
- The setup screen asks for the aspect ratio to use, i.e., the ratio of width to height of the final
video; I usually use 4 x 3, rather than 16
x 9
- Tell it where to find the sound file and that will set
the length of the video
- If you don't use a sound file, you can let it default to
5 seconds for each photo you will use or set
the total length yourself
STEP 5 - DRAG AND DROP THE PHOTOS AND SET THEIR
PROPERTIES
- Drag and drop the photos into the program and they form
a "film strip" across the bottom of the screen
- The photos can be reordered by clicking and dragging,
but it's easier to sort them first
- Click on the first photo in the filmstrip and set its
parameters, i.e. how long to show it on screen, what
rectangular part of the photo to start with and what
rectangular part to end with; add a caption, if desired;
and set other options.
- The starting and ending rectangular boxes show what the
final video will show; these will be in full screen and
expand or contract and move to where the ending rectangle
is, so if you start with a small area of the photo, that
will be shown full screen at the start; it takes a little
practice to get used to how this works, but it's not hard
- The program has a default setting for the beginning and
ending rectangles of each photo that you can use to start
with and watch the video to get the idea
- Text jpg's can be included as titles in any photo
position to indicate new sections of the video; these can
be made using text art from word processors, as discussed
above
- There are fades and rotations and other settings that
you can also use for each photo
- Go through all the photos to set the options the way you
want
STEP 6 - RENDER THE VIDEO AND SAVE THE PROJECT
- "Rendering" means forming the video using the photos,
sound, and settings that you have made
- IMPORTANT NOTE 1: Before rendering, change the
default setting from PAL to NTSC, since PAL is the
European system and NTSC is the American system.
- Draft rendering takes much less time than the final High
Definition rendering, so you can see a rough copy of the
video and make changes the way you want before doing the
final rendering.
- When it is the way you want, Render a Medium or High
Definition video -- High Def may take 30 minutes or more,
but gives you a better final product.
- Formats for rendering: Of the several final format
options, I usually use mp4/avi format
- When finished rendering, the final video and subtitle
files will be in a folder and will be called "output.avi"
and "output.srt", respectively; you can rename "output" to
anything you want, but do it in each file so the subtitle
file will be recognized, and keep the two files in the
same folder or it won't know where to find the subtitle
file
- The final video can be converted to another video format
which will include the subtitles in the same file, if you
want.
- IMPORTANT NOTE 2: Save the Project -- This means
saving all the details, sound file, photos, options, etc.,
in PHOTO FILMSTRIP, so if you ever want to change parts of
it or render it in a different format, you won't have to
start from scratch -- When we first started using PHOTO
FILMSTRIP, we didn't know this, so after making several
videos and then wanting to out in subtitles, we had to
start over from the beginning and find the photos and
sound file again, and reset all the times and boxes,
etc. We had the final videos, but hadn't saved the
projects.
STEP 7 - WATCH THE VIDEO
- VLC is a good free video player -- http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
-- Bob
Rankin's Review calls it The Swiss Army Knife
of Media Players -- available for all operating systems
and devices and has features other players don't have,
e.g. you can move the sound file to match the lip
movements, if they are not synchronized together
- If the video doesn't show the subtitles, you may have to
tell the player where to find them.
CONCLUSIONS
- To edit the video later, run PHOTO FILMSTRIP and open
the project you saved, make the changes, and re-render it.
- Slideshow videos are fun to make and hold people's
attention; do a small one to start with to get the idea.
You can probably think of several videos you would like to
have for family reunions, presentations,
classes, and even Christmas presents.
- If you find other free programs that will do similar
things, please let me know. Thanks.
==================================================================================
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