Vol. 1, No. 32
Become a ShowMotion Wizard

You've probably been sitting around, trying to enjoy the summer, but unable to shake the feeling that it's high time for a fabulous new Tripod feature. Maybe something to do with multimedia, made easy? Well, it is time to hit the beaches, folks, but bring your laptops. ShowMotion is a quick, largely automated way to create slideshows, video presentations, little rock videos, long scrolling title sequences (like "Star Wars"!), and so forth.

Unfortunately, ShowMotion is only available for Windows users. In fact, you have to have Windows 95 or 98, a 166-MHz or faster processor, and at least 32MB of RAM. The rest of you can just skim the rest of this newsletter for the jokes, and then go back to enjoying the outdoors or whatever else it is you'd otherwise be doing.

Now that we have the stipulations out of the way, let's begin. Step one: download the ShowMotion software. Click one of two links: either download the whole thing in one fell swoop (a 6MB download — probably long enough for a quick dip in the pool); or, if you suspect you may already have some of the files you'll need, you can shorten your installation time by using InstallFromTheWeb Client (yes, all one word), the second link on the page. Put the software in your favorite folder. Now is probably a good time to reboot Windows. (Mac people, you still here? Now is probably a good time to go get that last sentence printed up on T-shirts.)

Start ShowMotion. The main window will appear with an empty project. All you have to do is add slides using the five cartoony buttons on the left: Text, Files, Scan, Snapshot, and Video. (For our purposes, a video clip is considered a kind of slide.) "Text" is used to create title cards and other text-based slides. "Files" allows you to import a picture or AVI-format video as a slide. "Scan," "Snapshot," and "Video" are used to grab images or video from a scanner or digital camera attached to your computer.

To add a Text slide, click on the Text button and a window will pop up, ready for you to type (or paste) the text you desire into the box. You can choose small, medium, or large text, and four color schemes: yellow on blue, blue on yellow, black on white, or white on black. If you have too much text to fit in the box, when your slideshow plays, the text will scroll up slowly.

To add an image or video slide that you already have saved as a file on your machine, click the Files button and select the file you want to add. Thumbnail images of your slides appear in the workspace at the bottom of the window. Once you have a bunch of slides, you can rearrange the order that they play in by dragging each slide to the position in which you want it to appear. You can add a text caption to any slide by right-clicking on the slide and choosing "Add Text Caption" from the pop-up menu. A box will pop up in which you can type some text that will appear at the bottom of the window while that slide plays. You can crop and rotate image slides, and adjust their brightness by right-clicking on their thumbnail and choosing "Edit Image Slide" from the pop-up menu.

If you want sound in your slideshow (which of course you do!), you can add a background track to the whole presentation, as well as put audio captions on each slide. Audio can be taken from a WAV file that you already have, or recorded on the spot using your computer's microphone. To add a background track, select "Background Track" from the File menu (way up at the top on the left). A window will appear with options to record and a "Files..." button if you want to use audio files you already have saved on your hard drive. The same window appears when you want to add audio captions to individual slides; just right-click on a slide and select "Add Audio Caption" from the pop-up menu.

That's about all there is to it. You can preview your slideshow at any time by clicking the big Preview button. RealPlayer will open and show you your slideshow. When you are satisfied with how it looks, click the Publish button, which will automatically bring you to the ShowMotion section of Tripod where you can put your presentation on your Tripod site. Pick a name for your slideshow and click Submit. Now you can upload your slideshow. (This may take a while, so be patient.)

Once your slideshow is uploaded to your Web site, you can customize the look of the page it appears on, and add whatever text you want to accompany it.

That's it! Once your slideshow is live, tell your friends to come and see it. They'll be so impressed!

HINTS, POINTERS, AND TIPS 'O THE TRADE:

The usual cautions apply: If you make your ShowMotion slideshow huge, it will take your audience forever to download. Be considerate, or you may find your viewership dwindling.

The length of time that a slide is displayed is dictated by the length of the audio caption that runs with it. If you want a particular slide to play for longer, just add a bunch of silence to its audio caption.

Your audience will need RealPlayer G2 version 7 to view your slideshow. It's a real nice idea to tell them this in advance.

To keep your iced coffee from being diluted when you add ice cubes, use cubes of frozen coffee! The same technique can be applied to other cold drinks.

RESOURCES:

Download ShowMotion

ShowMotion help

ShowMotion tips and tricks

Handcrafted Archive