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Stuncle Eve · Mar 26, 2004, 04:31 PM

We often need to burn a cd of photos to send to potential customers (we make doors & windows), and are looking for a simple program that would allow us to make a slide show type of presentation that could be viewed by the end user (regardless of platform) without them having to buy or download the actual program themselves. In the past, we have just dumped a heap of jpgs or bmps on a disc & sent it off, but we'd like to get a little more sophisticated than that.

Any ideas out there?

(We switched from windows a year ago, & are gloatingly happy about it, but we still have to deal with all those folks out there who have yet to see the light.)

Thanks in advance.

cpac · Mar 26, 2004, 04:59 PM

I think you can export photos from iPhoto as a quicktime movie - they'd have to have quicktime installed, but it's cross-platform.

Also, you might be able to export from PowerPoint or Keynote to a self-contained slideshow (more likely PP than Keynote), but there are others on these boards who know much more than I do on this.

walrusjb · Mar 26, 2004, 09:22 PM

iDvd. I know you said CD, but this is so easy to do with iDVD... and has always had a mild wow factor every time i've handed one off. The integration with iPhoto is there... it's pretty painless. Had a neighbor (a photographer stuck with an aging PC) authoring one with a couple of short minutes worth of introduction... easiest "switch" i ever pitched

Stuncle Eve · Mar 26, 2004, 11:38 PM

Originally posted by walrusjb:
iDvd. I know you said CD, but this is so easy to do with iDVD... and has always had a mild wow factor every time i've handed one off. The integration with iPhoto is there... it's pretty painless. Had a neighbor (a photographer stuck with an aging PC) authoring one with a couple of short minutes worth of introduction... easiest "switch" i ever pitched

It looks pretty good, but will it play on a PC?

walrusjb · Mar 27, 2004, 07:04 AM

Well, they have to have a DVD player obviously - whether it's a Mac, PC or a TV-centric player... and even then it's not a 100% guarantee, but i personally have not hit a player that wouldn't run an iDVD burned DVD, though they're certainly out there. I test ours on an old Samsung player that's **beyond** finicky with disks (half the off-the-shelf titles won't play properly on it, if not more than half... very frustrating player) and the Apple-branded DVD media + iDVD burned shows play just fine on there.

You might want to check the iDVD forums on Apple's support site to see if there are any major issues being bandied about... but this seems like the quick + easy solution given the tight integration with iPhoto, etc.

Stuncle Eve · Mar 28, 2004, 11:28 AM

You might want to check the iDVD forums on Apple's support site to see if there are any major issues being bandied about... but this seems like the quick + easy solution given the tight integration with iPhoto, etc. [/B]

Alas, my 800 MHz G3 iBook is just not enough - iDVD requires a G4, so I'm SOL with this plan.

Any other ideas out there?

macintologist · Mar 28, 2004, 04:41 PM

I saw a hack somewhere on the web where you can use iDVD on a g3..but it would be too slow to be worth the extra time.

Skypat · Mar 29, 2004, 02:25 AM

Why not just make your slideshow in Powerpoint ? There is a good chance that Ppt is installed on the PC ...

You can also quickly assemble your pictures in iMovie, and export them in quicktime or MPEG, which is more compatible maybe with our windozzz friends.

Another possibility is to make a web gallery. Then again iPhoto can create for you a ready-to-use gallery and you can export it to a website. But your PC friends need to be connected.

Finally you should have a look here http://guide.apple.com/index.lasso and search for a cross platform product

Hope this help

JKT · Mar 29, 2004, 04:47 AM

Why not export as a basic website from e.g. iPhoto and include a readme 1st with a link to the index page on the CD. Everyone on every platform is going to have some form of web browser - no additional software to install, no incompatibility.

Stuncle Eve · Mar 29, 2004, 11:00 AM

Originally posted by Skypat:
Why not just make your slideshow in Powerpoint ? There is a good chance that Ppt is installed on the PC ...

You can also quickly assemble your pictures in iMovie, and export them in quicktime or MPEG, which is more compatible maybe with our windozzz friends.

Another possibility is to make a web gallery. Then again iPhoto can create for you a ready-to-use gallery and you can export it to a website. But your PC friends need to be connected.

Finally you should have a look here http://guide.apple.com/index.lasso and search for a cross platform product

Hope this help

Good suggestions. I think we're going to try the iMovie route - we don't have PPt, & don't want it. iMovie looks simple enough with enough features to make things interesting.

I'll check out that Apple site.

Thanks.

typoon · Mar 29, 2004, 04:01 PM

On the Powerpoint note. Why not do it in Apple Keynote? you can save it as an interavtice quicktime movie. Then they can advance to the next pic when they want and it'll work on both Mac and PC. iMovie is a good choice too. You just need to export it.

Stuncle Eve · Mar 29, 2004, 04:54 PM

Originally posted by typoon:
On the Powerpoint note. Why not do it in Apple Keynote? you can save it as an interavtice quicktime movie. Then they can advance to the next pic when they want and it'll work on both Mac and PC. iMovie is a good choice too. You just need to export it.

We may eventually work our way up to Keynote. Right now the concern is time & the inevitable Learning Curve

involved in any of these activities.

typoon · Mar 29, 2004, 06:13 PM

Originally posted by Stuncle Eve:
We may eventually work our way up to Keynote. Right now the concern is time & the inevitable Learning Curve involved in any of these activities.

Putting it into iMovie is simple Just fire up iMovie and Click on the photos button. Just drag and drop and your done. Export and distribute. Not too much learning curve. What about doing an iphoto Export to Quicktime? Just select the photos you want click file then export. Choose Quicktime and export. Done. See if you like how it works out.

has anyone burned any photos from iPhoto? does it just burn as a photo CD or something? or does it just put a collection of your pics on the CD? Because if it created a photo CD type thing that worked cross platform that would solve your problem right there. No need to do anything special.

RayX · Mar 29, 2004, 07:19 PM

I'd look at the website method as JKT mentioned.

Create a simple HTML (eg. Start Slideshow.html, could make it auto load, to) page on the CD with some Javascript in it that rotates the picture, or have some controls for advancing the photo, etc.

It's cross platform (not just Mac/Windows), doesn't cost anything, really quick to make, etc

All the client needs is a Web browser (and no special plug-ins required), which everyone will have.

typoon · Mar 29, 2004, 08:42 PM

Originally posted by RayX:
I'd look at the website method as JKT mentioned.

Create a simple HTML (eg. Start Slideshow.html, could make it auto load, to) page on the CD with some Javascript in it that rotates the picture, or have some controls for advancing the photo, etc.

It's cross platform (not just Mac/Windows), doesn't cost anything, really quick to make, etc

All the client needs is a Web browser (and no special plug-ins required), which everyone will have.

You could take it one step less and create a quick applescript to open the file. Then have people click on that. use iPhoto to export a we gallery type thing. When they click on the script it fires up the web gallery you just created.