Creating Projects with Adobe’s Photoshop Elements 4
First you must have edited and decent pictures before you start in on this part of Adobe’s Photoshop Elements. There’s no sense in burning a CD or creating a slide show with your family photos or favorite pictures unless they look good. Use the editor or quick editor features to edit and put those finishing touches on whatever group of pictures you want to create into one of these many great photo projects.
I’ll explain how to set up a slide show, many of the things you do in one of these types of project creations works almost the same for the rest. This part of Photoshop Elements has been made for an easy to use way to create these different types of projects.
Using the project creation page double click on slide show, a page will pop up with some settings of the slide show. The setup menu has several different settings that are shown on the small picture in the corner of the menu. The first is for the Static Duration, it is how long your picture will stay on the screen during the slide show. This does not include the time between the pictures when it is in transition.
Next is the type of transition or how it will go from one picture to the next. This transition type is shown when you click on each one in the small picture of the menu. The type of transition will be the same for each transition of your slide show.
The next will be the transition duration, how long it takes to switch from one picture to the next. This would normally be shorter than the static time. You can play around with these settings to see what looks the best for your slide show. There are some settings that you can include with each photo of your slide show or for some of them if you want.
The first one is called Apply Pan & Zoom to all slides. This means you can start with the whole image of each picture and then during the static time that the picture is on the screen you can pan around the photo and zoom into a part of the image. This could be used if you have a group photo with your child and wanted to tighten in on only your child. There are other times and uses for this feature. If you select to use this you can have each photo in your slide show do the panning and zoom or just set the beginning and end the same. The window that you set these features is easy to use and has a few features like use the start and end as the same, swap them or add another pan into the same photo.
The next several features are Include Photo Captions as Text, Include Audio Captions as Narration, Repeat Soundtrack Until Last Slide and cropping in both landscape and photo orientation. These will bring up other windows in your creation window work area for each feature. For the captions it will add either text or narration to your photos and the repeat soundtrack will help you setup a soundtrack to play during your slide show. The program allows you to record your narration right onto the slide show, but you have to have a microphone working on your computer to use this feature. You can also add wave files or audio to your slide show and have it run from the beginning to the end. Things like music or recording sounds that you download or record can be used and loaded onto the slide show.
Cropping merely allows the slides to automatically match to the orientation you wish to choose for your slide show. This will crop and automatically show the pictures in either the photograph or landscape orientations and show them without any black bars on the sides of the picture.
Once you choose what features in the slide show you want to be able to use, you click on OK and the program will go to the Slide Show Window. You first must add pictures for your slide show, click on Add Media. Then find the pictures in your organizer or in files that you want to turn into a slide show. You can get Photos and Video from both the organizer or from file folders on your computer, you can also get Audio in the same way. Once the pictures are in the creation editor, you need to edit each one according to how you want to display them as well as the order.
You can do various things with all the photos or individually. The various features you choose to be able to edit and use on the first menu are available here in the different side windows and can be used or unused according to your choosing. Play around with each one and use the various features and when you are finished with the editing of this part you can go on in the slide show. At the top of the editing window are buttons for saving the project and outputting the project to the format you want.
This is where you would go to put the slide show onto a disc or just save it, plus there is options to Email it or watch it on a TV if you have one hooked up to your computer. The settings for these various options are pretty easy to understand and are explained on the different pages for each option. Just click on the option you wish to do and follow the instructions and questions for each one.
To make a photo album page, calender or any of the other types of creations in Elements, you simply click on that creation or project and follow the instructions. During the process of creating your photo album pages, calenders or whatever it always gives you the choice to edit each picture along the way and you can go to the editor to do any last minute adjustments to the photo you are using in the project. There are also options like buying a bound photo album or calender over the Internet from Adobe, the program will send the finished project to Adobe and for a fee they will print and finish the project and mail it to you. You can go to their website to find out the prices of this service.
Adobe’s Photoshop Elements is a great program with all kinds of easy to use and convenient features. Creating projects such as photo albums, slide shows and calenders along with the simple greeting cards is easy to do with the features that comes with the program. Editing photos for better image quality and nicer pictures is easy during the process of creating these projects or you can edit them before you start the project. Many of the features are easy to understand and you will have lots of fun creating all kinds of gifts and personal photo treasures for you to share.
