For Poppabob Only! Do not read under penalty of death...

[Granny]

Yeah, right, like that is going to keep you all away!

Ok, poppa, I decided to ask you in the open, cause we got to get more people to convert to digital.

I prefer working with slide shows or digital layouts, simply because... it's simpler. If I want to make a physical album, I buy the embies. Go figure. I don't like printing them. And I do love to do the shopping thing. So, when I do digital, it's all the way. Plus, this allows me to give the album to as many people as I want to. For instance, I recently did a slide show for a young friend who got married. I got all the pictures of her from a baby to the engagement, and same with his pictures. Then, I combined them and made a story like show out of it. Every one loved it. We showed it at the shower using a laptop, and then I made 50 cds that were given out to family and friends at the wedding reception. I could not have done that with a physical album.

Plus, I really hate working with the large pages. Every thing has to be done in huge sizes for printing. Very hard to keep the right proportions. Well, for me, anyhow. Not to mention the size of the files. So, I normally work in small sizes, like the templates that were originally a part of SBM.

Well, enough rambling. The question is, what size page do you use, Poppa? I tend to stick with 750x550. So, what is your mode operandi?

Granny

[MaggieMae]

I peeked!

Okay - I confess - I just had to peek! Okay - I'm going now!

[crops2dawn]

I'M DYING I'M DYING..... I had to peek to.

[MaggieMae]

Hee! Heee! I wonder how many posts there'll be before PoppaBob reads it?!!!

[Lisa S]

OOOppps, Don't tell anybody. You didn't see me here!

[eye]

HA ha

you guys are bad but I love it haha. I have to tell you embellshents are very noticeable. What I do is save my picture as 1600x1600 and am now awaiting for scrapbook max to develop them into 12x12 and all I have to do is slide them into my album sleeves.I am getting anxious to see the work. wall Mart made a mess.Will let you all know how they look Bye for now I gotto go dig my grave haha.

[poppabob]

Ok Granny, I'm going to leave the "criminal characteristic patterns" comment alone and get straight to the Vegemundus of the matter.

I may have mislead you earlier with my "strictly digital" comment on a previous thread. What I meant was that I'm strictly digital in the creation of my layouts as opposed to paper scrapping and not strictly digital in their distribution. I still print what I make. I like the 8 x 8 layouts at 200 dpi which equates to 1600x1600. This is a nice size for me for a trio of reasons. One being that they are large enough to view but without losing portability. That makes my mother happy. Two being that the bulk of scrapping "supplies" out there as freebies and purchases are in either 8x8 or 12x12 (which scales to 8x8 with zero problems or effort). Three being the fact that I really enjoying turning pages in a book vs. clicking the mouse.

That being said, when it comes to digital distribution I use two formats depending on who they are going to. If I'm doing a slide show in SVCD format on a CD I go for 640x480 and for DVDs 720x480. Of course, because I scrap square this is going to leave a black border to the left and to the right of the picture on the screen when viewing the slide show or DVD. This doesn't really bother me. I always start with the 1600x1600 pics and let the software do the resizing for me. They always fill the screen from top to bottom but not side to side.

If I were to design strictly for digital distribution I would probably go with 720x480 exclusively to be placed on DVDs.

The truth be spoken I've not paid much attention to the making of the digital items such as slide shows. I've always just let the software do its thing and left well enough alone.

Now you've gone and done it! I have to go out now and buy a couple more packs of CDs and DVDs and start experimenting with different size layouts and see what I get by scrapping keeping the 4:3 ratio in mind or 16:9 for the ole widescreen.

I would love to hear what others have to say on the subject.

[Gizmo]

Digital is the way to go...

Granny,

I created the same type of story book for my son and daughter in law wedding with the music of there choice, and played it at the reception during the meal on two large screen TVs. It was 45 minutes long.

After the meal I had people from both families asking me for a copy. Since then I've created several more for a close friend's daughter and a nephew. It's a lot of work, but what the heck, it was fun!

[poppabob]

What size did you use Gizmo? Did you do it in a DVD format?

[Gizmo]

Story Books

The first album I used 800x600 pics and the other ones I used 1024x768.

After that I had all the pictures sized and framed, I organized them, which was the longist process. Then using Roxio program I loaded the picture and added the transition time for each pics 7 to 12 seconds depending if there was text to read on the pictures.

Then when I knew the total amount of time I merged the music files together and attached them to the pics. Then I burned the whole file on DVD, and created the covers and jackets artwork.

I had 40+ hours into them by the time it was all said and done!

[cntrywoman72]

Is it ok if I opened the thread but didnt read it? I covered my eyes, really I did. Ok I didnt, but im a good girl.

I havent made anything on disks yet, but my mom has. It was a tribute to the family, sooooo many pages with music. It is a great show. Very sentimental. I dont know what size pages she used or resolution.

[Granny]

What a bunch of nuts!!!!!! I told you not to peak, you are all incorrigable!

Ok, well, I asked for that one, eh?

Well, your true character comes out, poppa... I just knew you were one of those... "Trust Me" guys. But I forgive you.

I use Roxio for my dvd shows, and the size of choice is 720x480, cause that the standar in the US. I always work with a black background, so there is really no noticeble black borders.

The reason I stoped using Roxio is because the program is great for videos or for straight picture shows, but when it comes to scrapbooking and fancy images, it flicked the colors too much, and it looked terrible. And tv never renders the images as sharp as a computer monitor. And Gizmo is right, it takes many long hours of work. I did a couple of dvd shows with Roxio, but I've decided to stick to computer cds.

Well, I guess I'm still in the minority. No one is ready to go totally digital yet, so I guess I will continue to bite the bullet and go for 1600x1600. Bummer!

And to all you nosey peons out there.....

Granny

[Moonbeam]

I never listen to anything you say anyway Granny so why on earth wold I peek? I didn't!! I am typing with my eyes closed

[Marion]

Me too, Honest, I didn't see a thing!

Marion

[OnieRN]

I had to read it too!

Oh Granny forgive me for peeking. Almost like peeking at your Christmas presents befor Christmas...... OK OK OK! I Peeked nie