Question about making a Power Point slide show

[ruadisneyfan2]

I'm making my brother a PP slideshow for an upcoming milestone birthday party that my SIL is throwing him at a restaurant. The facility has video displaying capability. My skills have been improving after making ones for my grandmother's memorial, my mother's memorial and my father's Life Story for his 80th birthday.

It's rather long but my SIL still wants this played at the party, not to be the main focus, but just sort of running off to the side.

So, I thought I had all the photos chosen and placed on slides, mostly in chronologic order, with music added appropriately so that as one song ends, the next slide starts a new song. I added around 4 video snips at the end, with my brother at the shore in the water and trying to get his grandson, who was about 4 at the time, to come swim with him. Even with a lifejacket on, he was afraid to get all the way in the water. In the last scene, he finally paddles over to my brother. So cute.

Recently, I stumbled onto some very old slides and home movies from the 60s & 70s that belonged to my parents. I had them digitized and now I'm trying to fit some of this content into my project. It's easy to add the slides as just another photo but I'm at a crossroads as to where to place the video. My brother is an infant in all the videos. I guess once he started walking, they spent more time chasing him and less time with a movie camera. lol

The company that performed the digitizing sent it to me on a dvd and flashdrive in mp4 format, with all the separate films sort of spliced together, and it plays as a single hour-long video to some easy listening music. It's not all about my brother; there is plenty with other relatives that wouldn't be part of my brother's project. So I inserted the video onto one slide and trimmed it down to the first scene approx 1.5 mins. He is 3 months old at my father's college graduation. I put this slide at the end of the first song (which is all tiny infant photos) but it's an awkward transition at the end to more photos and my own music playing again.

Now this leaves me wondering where to insert the rest of the video. These slides and home movies haven't been viewed by my siblings since we were small children in mid 70s so this part is really special to me. Most of the other photos are in my dad's "Life Story" show that I made for his 80th, so a lot of content my brother has recently seen.

Should I put all the video at the beginning, and then start the photo slideshow with my music? Or put it all at the end? There are close to 400 slides right now and that doesn't include all of the video I need to add. If I put it at the beginning, it will end with him learning to walk, and then my still pictures would start with him as a newborn.

I understand it's all a matter of opinion and no real right or wrong solution but I just want it to flow smoothly.
Am I overthinking all of this??

 

[_19disnA]

My opinion is something running in the background at private restaurant party is probably not the right place for that. Perhaps your SIL was just being polite to suggest running it in the background rather they say it might not work. Videos/slides/movies that tell some sort of story are probably best done when it is shown to everyone one time for them to see/hear. Restaurant seating for a private party is usually at long tables so it is likely that some would have to turn around to even see it which would be clumsy when eating.

It is a a LOT of work to put something like that together and then to not have everyone watch seems like you spent all that time for nothing. If it involves sound/music/narration then unless everyone at the party stops talking, they probably won't be able to hear the audio.

I have done some videos for a graduation party and there was a set time we showed it for everyone to watch. My general opinion is that something running for a max of 10-15 minutes is about as long as you can hold everyone's attention. 400 slides would take a LONG time to show and it gets to be a bit like watching someone else's home movies where the subject means more to that family than anyone else. I would try to condense ALL of the content to a max of 15 minutes and show it one-time at someone's home if there is a party being held.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

First, I completey agree with all of your points.

The party was in Feb but here is how it worked out.
My SIL insisted it be played at the party. I knew this would distract people from just enjoying the party and socializing. This is why I didn't show my Dad's slideshow at all for his 80th.

She told me her coworker from IT Dept has a projector, etc. and would set everything up. I assumed (wrongly of course) that there would be a sound system too. I only brought our laptop and flashdrive. No one could hear the music and people only watched a few parts. At one point, my son decided he was leaving (fairly early) so my SIL wanted to get a group photo. That was a mess and took much longer than expected. We paused the video for the photo at a time when it had everyone's attention (our teen years) but when I tried to restart it, it wouldn't re-start so I gave up. No one was really paying attention to it by then anyway and I was tired of dealing with it.

Overall, he enjoyed everything and was completely surprised. I stressed out about the displaying of the show way more than I needed. Part of this is because I was given some really awesome old pictures just 2 days before the party. It took a lot of time to add them to the already finished slideshow, adjust the music start times, etc.
On the morning of the show I was still editing and then ran out time to be able to convert it to a movie. As a movie, it's easy to pause, rewind, etc. If you don't convert to a movie, and just run as a PP program with clicking Play Slideshow, you can't just stop and restart or the music won't play when it's restarted. Oh well.

I made the slideshow for my brother, not really for the party, so I don't mind that I put a lot of time and effort into it.
I was asked to do this a month before Christmas, not really good timing for me! After the party, I converted it to a proper movie and mailed him the flashdrive to enjoy at his leisure at home.
It turned out much better than I expected. This just reminded me to give my niece (his daughter) a flashdrive of it too.

 

[_19disnA]

Glad it somewhat worked out. The other issue in some private room at a restaurant is there might be limited places to setup the projector/screen for best viewing. I just happened to glance at the photo sub-forum and noticed that no one had replied. I don't use this section that often as there mostly doesn't seem to be many topics where you can actually have a discussion. Many people post pictures and then tell us what type of camera, lens or exposure settings they used.

I do a LOT of Powerpoint presentations for various large meetings where I work. Much of what you described is fairly typical. I like to be responsible for ALL of the logistics and will test it out a few days before any large meeting (i.e. audio/music/video/slides/etc.) You can't have different people each own a part of it without someone who is in charge of ALL of the various pieces/parts. Each presenter has to submit their FINAL slides to me a couple days prior to the meeting so I have time to combine them and then test it all out. There are various versions of Powerpoint and some don't 'play nice' with each other. The slide master can clobber the background of other slides and then you have to individually modify EACH slide which takes a LOT of time. No one is allowed to just show up 5 minutes before the start of a meeting and hand me some thumb-drive with their slides. That just NEVER goes well and can create all sorts of issues.

Having the person it was mainly intended for get a copy they can replay in the future was a good idea as well. I did that when I prepared the graduation slideshow a few years ago and gave the parents/grand-parents each a copy. I stored the final 'file' in a format that didn't require special software to replay. That makes it independent of whatever software someone might have (or not have) on their PC.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Yes, I can imagine if I were doing something like that for my job, I would be much more of a perfectionist & in control about all the details.
Thanks.