Jane,
Here is a consideration;
An inexpensive Cyber Home DVD player I got at Sam’s club for $30 or $40 will show jpgs as a slide show. I was surprised one day when I put a CD with jpg images in, hit play and the slide show started. It also plays mpeg video clips, like those you can download from the imternet. And also plays DVD movies of course.
I tried the same CD’s with jpg’s and mpeg’s on other peoples DVD players and they would not work. The more expensive players could not recognize the files.
Pete
An inexpensive DVD player I got at Sam’s club for show jpgs as a slide
show. >
Wanted to clarify this: The jpg’s were NOT saved as a "slide show". They were just jpgs that I had saved to a CD and the DVD player goes from one to the next automatically.
Pete
Hi Pete, This sounds just like what I want!
We have a Wall Mart and an independent appliance/electronics store nearby, and I will go over there and see. Maybe they would let me try one of my picture cds just to see if it works.
Thank you!
Jane
Pete,
We were talking about slideshows on VCDs and DVDs here the other day. One concern I had was that the picture quality on a VCD was rather poor. My question: how good a resolution do you have looking at the .jpeg files on your DVD player? Is the quality comparable to a PC video screen?
Juergen
Hi Jane.
I assume that I can make slide shows?
What kind of slide show are you talking about? If you’re thinking PSE pdf slide shows you won’t be able to view those on a DVD player (I don’t think). You can, however, make slide shows with iDVD very easily that will play in virtually any current DVD player.
The simplest way is to create an album in iPhoto that contains the images you want in your show. Select that album and then click the iDVD button. iPhoto will processes the pictures and then automatically create the show in iDVD. You can then add transitions and music if you want, choose a theme and a bunch of other stuff to customize your DVD. It’s really very simple. Then all you do is burn the DVD and like I said it should work in just about any newer DVD player. I’ve yet to run into one that won’t play DVD’s that I create.
I finally broke down and spent $49 at Target about 6 months ago for a DVD player. It’s a Samsung P241 <
http://www.target.com/gp/detail.html/ref=br_1_1/601-7402829- 3512156?%5Fencoding=UTF8&asin=B0001H4AAS> and handles a wide range of DVD formats/options. It’s not fancy but it works just fine.
Joe
question: how good a resolution do you have looking at the .jpeg files on your DVD player? Is the quality comparable to a PC video screen?
Juergen,
No comparison at all to a computer screen. The 19" television I viewed tham on has lines visible from 4 feet away. The images on the CD I just checked are small, 867X597 px, about 4"X6". (I’ll experiement with a larger jpg if I get some time).
But for allowing a group of people to see your "vacation shots" it is acceptable. Much better than 6 or more people huddled around my monitor in my office even though that quality would be better 🙂
Pete
The way I used to do it long ago, was to open Graphic Converter, select the folder of the untouched full resolution pictures right out of camera(or scans), then take the powerbook into the living room, hook it into the VCR and from there it went to the TV, I think it is a 25 inch screen. Then hit "start slide show". The pictures looked perfect even up close.
This was before I even heard of Photoshop.
I dont understand why they looked so good on the TV.
Jane
US TV’s (non-HD, of course) only offer 640×480 resolution. I’m not sure why, but TVs seem to "fuzz" the pictures better than a computer monitor does, so you don’t see jaggies on a TV even though they have terrible resolution. If you look closely at a JPEG on a TV, you’ll suddenly realize there is no real resolution to speak of–it’s a giant blur, close-up.
As you can see from the other posts here, Jane, there are several different ways to go about it, depending on what your goal is. If it’s just a quick dump-from-the-camera-and-show-the-relatives-while-they’re-st ill-at-your-house thing, then just dumping the JPEGs on a CD-R and letting the DVD player create the slide show on the spot is very convenient. (Just about all new DVD players can show JPEGs nowadays; many brand name older models cannot, though.)
OTOH, if this is something you want to spend some time on, and want to have nice transitions and background music, Joe’s suggestion of iDVD and/or iMovie is the way to go.
Lou.
Hi Lou, This is what I should do, follow Joe’s instructions to a T. I love iPhoto, and I have many things on this new Mac that I have never used. So this is a great start!
I do remember that the Graphic Converter full rez slide shows from my powerbook to the VCR worked really well. The TV screen was very sharp.
What we really want the DVD thingie for is to entertain 3 grandkids all under the age of 5, with nice things like Finding Nemo, and other decent stuff that is available on DVDs.
Our family with the 2 grandkids, refuse to have a TV in their house, and rely on us to provide good stuff(educational channels are OK)when they are here.
So thank you all for the DVD info, I know now what to purchase, and will bring along one made on this Mac to see, in store, if it will work properly.
And also any suggestions for decent and not violent stuff for 6 yrs and under will be appreciated. My husband and I don’t watch much TV, so its a bit difficult for us to make decisions. Weather Channel, news, History Chan, and educational is mostly all we see. Thanks,
Jane
Suggestions for the under sixes: most of what my kids watch ( age five and seven) is on the free to air ABC channel (Australian public owned TV) and I’m not sure how much is available in the US. Of the American shows for pre schoolers – Sesame Street of course for the younger ones (although my nearly 8 year old will still watch it in a supercillious sort of fashion) Bear in the Big Blue House is pleasant and the younger kids seem to really like it; Blues Clues is very good too. I believe the Wiggles has made it to the US (an Australian show which features lots of music, a rose eating dinosaur and a Pirate with a sword made out of feathers…). My two girls really like another Australian show called Hi-5 which is aimed at a very slightly older audience than the Wiggles – the same emphasis on music but the presenters are younger and the tunes are poppier. Once they get to school age then it gets much harder as they seem to want to watch the teen-orientated shows like Lizzy Maguire (which seems mainly inoffensive, although I find it rather painful to watch – they have played the DVD of the movie very very regularly – again they like the musical aspect of the show). There’s a lovely UK program shown here on Nickolodeon (I think) from time to time called Art Attack which gives lots and lots of kids (and grown up!) ideas for art and craft projects, and its very entertaining.
Neither of mine are happy watching Disney cartoons on the whole – both of them get too wound up in what is happening to the characters and find the bad stuff that occurs before the happy ending too worrying. What they find less threatening is watching all the extras on the DVDs – the "making of" documentaries and the movie commentaries for things like finding Nemo and Shrek (if you don’t like mild vulgarity then the latter movie may not be considered suitable for littlies!) And they both spend quite a lot of time with their father watching basketball and (aussie rules) football and golf and soccer and athletics and swimming etc etc. And they like ballet and dance and gymnastics and ice skating on TV or DVD when they can find it, and in the older one’s case she is even showing an interest in opera – anything with music and dance. It depends a lot on the interest of the kids.
Hi Susan and Joe, Thank you for the start! I have written down the DVDs and will buy them soon. And the TV programmes, I will have them found as for the time and stations, and also written. This is great, as the oldest one, Henry, has taken an interest in some of the nature shows too. We have Discovery, Animal Planet, Travel Channel, as well as several Public Broadcast stations, and I can look ahead to see what is offered(as some stuff on AP can be scary), then write down a schedule for them.
Jane
