Making movies

[Lucifers_Ghost]

Hey everyone,

Im assuming this is the right forum to put this in. If not, mods .. please move it and my apologies.

For xmas, I would like to make a few DVD's for family members as a "stocking stuffer." Basically, I want to make a "powerpoint presentation" (or something like that), with a pictures .. maybe some small movies with music joined in the background, to put on a dvd to have it played in a standalone dvd player.

Now, I know I cant use powerpoint because I dont think a dvd player can play that file type. Any advice on what route to take? Programs to use?

Not a step by step guide ... just a little bit of nudging in the right direction would be great.

Thanks a ton.

LG

[jlietz]

Hey everyone,
Now, I know I cant use powerpoint because I dont think a dvd player can play that file type.
LG

Actually, you can use powerpoint as your starting point, especially if you are already comfortable with the program. Once you have the powerpoint presentation done, you can use a "powerpoint to dvd" type program to convert the presentation to DVD. I don't know if this is the best solution, but if you already know how to use powerpoint, it might make sense. I did this once with a program called PPT2DVD by Wondershare. It worked pretty good, but wasn't free. Someone else might have a better solution.

[guns1inger]

The PowerPoint to DVD programs are, for the most part, pretty ropey. If they do manage to translate your slides, the quality is often questionable at best.

I would suggest you look at Microsoft Photostory as a good starting point. Get the DVD profile from Papa John's site to get the best quality. Unfortunately you can only output WMV from photostory, but it is easily converted to DVD afterwards. Photostory allows you to do effects/transitions/narration/background audio and is very easy to use.

[Rudyard]

Im not sure if photostory allows you to add video so if you are looking at using video as well as photos I would recommend ulead video studio for a program that is very easy to use and can pan&zoom photos along with mixing in videos/text/music.

Its not free like photostory but is very reasonably priced for what you get and will be very useful for any video editing you may want to do in the future.