Creating a captivating slide show that you can enjoy for years to come is not difficult, but by taking a few steps prior to having it created can go along way. Here are some hints that we use while creating our own slide shows.
1. Know your Audience: Knowing who your intended audience is an obvious, but sometimes overlooked step in the process of developing your slideshow. For instance, if you're showing your slide show at your wedding reception, perhaps you'll want to include some pictures of the guests, not just pictures of you and your fiancé.
2. Choose Quality Photographs: While recent advances in digital photo restoration have allowed torn and poorly developed photographs to be brought back to life, there is only so much that the software can do. Pictures that look great printed (correct lighting, framing, developed properly) will also look great when scanned. Pictures that are extremely dark or grainy, will perhaps improve somewhat, but will still not appear the best.
Please note when you are using post-it notes to label the order of your pictures, write the number on the note first, then apply the note to the back of the picture. Do NOT write directly on the back of the pictures as the ink may bleed through to the front, ruining your photograph! Also be aware that if you apply the sticky note to the back to the pictures and then write on the sticky note the impression of the pen/pencil may show through to the front of the picture!
3. Choose a Variety of Photographs: Even though you may love all the pictures of your cat, your audience may not want to sit through all the pictures of her. Instead of showing 10 pictures of cuddly Buttons, choose 2 or 3 of the best. Using a variety of photos can keep your audience interested.
4. Landscape pictures show better than Portrait pictures: This is because the standard 4:3 dimensions of television monitors, photographs that are in landscape mode (vertical) as opposed to portrait mode (horizontal) show better on a TV. While portrait photographs certainly can and SHOULD be used, you should be aware that there will typically be a black border that appears around the photograph. It's best to use these sparingly throughout the slide show and not clump them all together.
5. Give some thought to the music: Choose music that has meaning to you, music whose lyrics go well with the pictures. Also, pay attention to how long the music you're choosing is. If you're only showing 30 pictures, you may not want to choose an 8 minute song. Your project manager can help you with your song choice, to ensure that your music length matches the number of pictures you have to create a smooth flowing slide show.
6. Consider the order of your pictures: Sometimes chronologically ordering your pictures has an awesome effect. For example, Mother's Day DVDs often picture the subject from childhood to present day. Pictures of children especially are very effective when arranged according to age, so the audience observes the child growing!
7. Add motion to your slide shows: Slide shows developed on PowerPoint and other consumer level software typically just allow for static photos that go from one picture to the next. Consider having your slide shows created with the "Ken Burns" effect that Pan and Zoom on each photograph. This can help bring your pictures to life.
8. Add transitions to your slide shows: Transitions such as fade in/fade out are an effective way to move from one photograph to the next. Priceless DVD Show automatically adds transitions to your slide show, please let us know if you have a specific transition you would like us to use.
9. Shorter is sometimes better: After you've determined who your audience is, you can determine how long the attention span for the montage will be. We've found that video montages between 8-12 minutes in length are ideal for wedding receptions. This usually works to about 3 songs and 75-100 pictures
10. Test! Test! Test!: If you're planning on showing your video montage or slide show at an event like a wedding reception, try and test ALL the equipment prior to the big day. Make sure the projector or television, DVD player or laptop, and sound is all working.