Images in Premiere, Flash

June 15, 2005 6:33 AM

I want to make some movies using photos (jpegs), as a photo montage with mp3s in the background. How should I go about doing this? 1) Should I make Flash movies or actual mpegs (avis? mov. files?) with Premiere? I've tried this in the past with Flash, but no matter the resolution of the original, the movies come out pixellated/with funky color changes. And with Premiere the end movie is waaay too large, far larger than the sum of the pics and music. And also with the funky color/pixellation. 2) Should I convert the jpegs to bitmaps or some other format before importing? What's a good resolution?
posted by zardoz to media & arts (7 comments total)

I recently made a DVD slideshow with music in the background using scanned photos (as JPG) that came out looking great. I'm not sure what resources you have available to you, but I made mine on a Mac using iPhoto and iDVD. I edited the photos, put them in order, added the music and effects, and turned them into a slideshow in iPhoto. Then I exported the slideshow to iDVD, gave it a menu, and burned it. It was pretty easy considering I had absolutely zero video, iPhoto, or iDVD experience prior to this project.
posted by geeky at 6:40 AM on June 15, 2005

Thanks, geeky, but alas, I'm on a PC. That's the one reason (just one!) I'd like to get a Mac, for photo and video editing.
posted by zardoz at 6:44 AM on June 15, 2005

Have you tried Windows Movie Maker? Basic but it'll do what you want and is free.
posted by punilux at 6:52 AM on June 15, 2005

On the Mac, the disc burning program Roxio Toast ships with a little slideshow maker application called Motion Pictures that I actually like more than iMovie for this purpose, since you can rearrange things much more easily without waiting years for the transitions to regenerate.

Roxio makes a bunch of PC programs, too, including Easy Media Creator, which ships with a slideshow maker. I don't know how good its reputation on the PC side is but it might be worth looking into. Or I guess it's even possible that your DVD/CD burner shipped with a copy.
posted by bcwinters at 8:12 AM on June 15, 2005

About four years ago for a span of a year, I made a dozen presentations for the President of my organization using Macromedia Director. What I created sounds very similar to what you would need.

I pulled the software off a p2p and taught myself the basics. I created light exe. files (as opposed to mov. or avi. files) from the short presentations so he could travel with them and play them on any hosting hardware. The format of the movies was basically a generic Power Point display: images and text layers transitioned with different fading effects and an mp3 playing in the background. I used a mix of jpegs and bmps, but compressed the final presentation to find a happy balance betweeen size and quality. It was the best program for me at the time, but I can’t compare/contrast it with the others mentioned here because I don’t have experience.
posted by naxosaxur at 8:34 AM on June 15, 2005

Ugh, do not be tempted to try this in Flash or Swish. I've done it twice, and while I was able to make it work, due to varying runtimes, getting the A/V to sync was a nightmare.
posted by CaptApollo at 8:49 AM on June 15, 2005

What you want is Microsoft Photo Story. It's a free application that does exactly what you're describing. Check it out here. The output is .wmv, so not sure if that's a deal-breaker for you or not.
posted by jimmereeno at 10:06 AM on June 15, 2005