Photos getting reset upon program exit (Photo Story Easy)

relentlesschik wrote on 1/27/2015, 6:20 PM

After uploading images, setting them how I want, SAVING my progress...if I exit the program, my photos get mutated into stretched images which are not even in the place I had them on the slide. It's a slideshow for a 100 year birthday so the show is too long to leave open. In the same token, it's too long to simply "Reset" the image and fix it back the way I want it EVERY time I exit the program. I've tried opening it through the program, and through the save with the same results each time. Sometimes ALL the photos are skewed, sometimes half. I've already put several hours into the show, so I don't want to waste my time finishing it with this program if I can't Save it and have it open and run properly.

Comments

browj2 wrote on 1/28/2015, 9:26 AM

Hi,

I'm having a hard time following what you say.

When you save in PhotoStory, you are saving the project, at the point where you are, so yes you are saving your progress up to that point.

You say that when you exit (close) the program your photos get mutated. I presume that this is not happening to the originals, correct? So, it must be when you re-open the program and load the project, correct?

We can't see your screen and you have not described how you created your slideshow. Please try to give us a screen shot showing the problem, and describe how you made the slideshow.

Did you use Slideshow Maker? Did you use any effects on the images? Are you in timeline mode or storyboard?

Do you understand that when you have finished creating your project, you export to it to a file type that will play on other machines? You do not run the slideshow from PhotoStory. Have you tried exporting to MPEG or Windows Media Export? Try this before closing the program or project. Note where you save it to. Run it in Windows Media Player to see if it works ok.

Try doing a small project with a half dozen images to see if it does the same thing. Do it the same way that you have done your large project and note the steps. Same result?

browj2 wrote on 1/28/2015, 11:45 AM

1. What are you doing with the USB? Are you photos on a USB memory stick and you are accessing them from PhotoStory? Or did you copy them (which is what you should do) to the hard drive and access them from there?

2. To upload a screen shot, click on the top part of your program so that you don't just get one of the windows, then do Alt+PrtSc (PrtSc is one of buttons at the right of the top row of the keys on the keyboard). This copies the screen to the clipboard. Open a photo imaging program or Windows Paint, and paste the image by doing Ctrl+V. Save this as a jpeg type file to a location that you won't forget.

In the answer like this, position your cursor where you want to insert the image, then click on the Image button. Scroll across the second row of image buttons above the message and the one to the right of emoticon (smiley face) is the image button. Click on Browse. Navigate to your image, select it, and press on open. Then click on the button "Send it to the server." Wait until the button disappears and then click on "OK." Your image will appear in the message. See the images below:

For some reason, the forum (or I) am having problems with uploading today. I'll try a bit later.

3. Press on F1. This should bring up the manual. Search for the word "timeline." Read up on this.

There should be some icons at the very left of the arranger. Pass your mouse over them and one will probably say Overview, another Storyboard, and the last "Timeline." Click on timeline. You should normally work in this mode.

4. Project with only a few photos. You say "When making a small slideshow, same thing. 2 of the 4 photos were skewed when I loaded the slideshow." I don't understand. Please explain what steps you are taking.

If I was doing this, I would import from the media pool, my images onto the timeline. What are you doing? Why do you say "when I loaded the slideshow?" When you open a project, there is no slideshow and no images, so nothing is there. Are you clicking on a button on the startup screen to create a slideshow?

If so, you can do it once, but do not do it the next time that you load the project or it will mess up whatever you have done. Each time you will be creating a new slideshow or modifying what you have done. The second time that you open the project (an existing project), select open existing project. Once there, do not go into the Create slideshow part again. Use the timeline to make any modification.

This is why I ask you to describe exactly your steps. I can't see your screen.

In the timeline mode, you should have access to 4 tracks. Your slides will be on track 1. Titles would probably go onto track 2, music or audio onto track 4. You version can probably handle video files as well as images and they go on the timeline just like images.

5. When you have some slides on the timeline, you can export your project to one of the video formats. You don't have to wait until you have completely finished your project. Just export it, and then open the exported file in Windows Media Player to see how it looks. Keep or delete this file if you wish. Please read the part in the manual about exporting. In fact, read the first 50 pages or so in the manual, starting with Introduction so that you understand better what you are doing and that you get the jargon correctly.

These are probably the formats that you can export to: AVI, DV-AVI, MJPEG, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, QuickTime, WMV(HD)

This is different from your project. PhotoStory saves the project to its own format, probably with an extension like MPH. PhotoStory does nothing to your photos, it is a non-destructive editor. It loads the image and applies what ever effect that you want, within PhotoStory. These are commands and PhotoStory remembers all this as a series of commands. It does not save your images within the project file, only the locations of the original images, so these images always have to be available in the same location or PhotoStory won't find them the next time that you open the program. It is important to understand how all of this works.