Using XBMC, is there a way to start a picture slideshow and have pre-selected music in a folder or playlist play in the background? I don't need the music to sync to the pictures like a professional slideshow.
I know that in XBMC it's possible to start playing music and then navigate to a folder of pictures and start a slideshow but that's not what I want. I want a one click solution that will start a slideshow of pictures in a folder (pictures we took in a country) and have associated songs for that country automatically start playing in the background. The associated songs could be in the pictures folder or in another folder, or in an associated playlist.
Any way do do this?
I discovered that Windows Media Center has a slideshow with music feature. Is there one in XBMC?
Thanks,
Skylark
I personally think you might be better off making your slideshow set to music as an actual video file (using a program like
windows essentials Movie Maker, with this program, making a slideshow into a video is very simple) and then just play that thru xbmc...I think this is better because as a video file you can share it with more ppl via email and post it on various websites (depending on the file format and size of course)
The way XBMC works now, is probably the way it stays for the foreseeable future.
Default Confluence, let you turn on your music and then the slideshow. Some skin (s mods) do an excellent job in integrating music and screensavers. Besides, it's quite easy to do some tweaking yourself.
(2013-10-07, 19:21)digitaltomj Wrote: [ -> ]I personally think you might be better off making your slideshow set to music as an actual video file (using a program like windows essentials Movie Maker, with this program, making a slideshow into a video is very simple) and then just play that thru xbmc...I think this is better because as a video file you can share it with more ppl via email and post it on various websites (depending on the file format and size of course)
I don't want to assemble and render slideshows. I just want to associate a playlist of songs with pictures in a folder and have the slideshow play with crossfade transitions in realtime. For sharing with others, I'll use Sony's Movie Studio Platinum 12 to assemble those slideshows.
This is mainly for my wife's viewing of pictures we took on a vacation, party, wedding reception or other special event. We have a lot of pictures that we took in the past and it would be too much work to "assemble" slideshows for each folder of pictures. But I am willing to choose some songs for different folders of pictures and let my wife reminisce by just clicking on the folder name and have a slideshow play with the selected songs.
Windows Media Center allows typing a slideshow name, selecting pictures, selecting songs and then it creates a playlist of everything. For playback, just scroll through the slideshow names and click one. The slideshow plays with music in real-time.
Thanks for the thought though,
Skylark
you also can use smartplaylists. But you need a nightly for that.
(2013-10-07, 19:40)Robotica Wrote: [ -> ]The way XBMC works now, is probably the way it stays for the foreseeable future.
That's what I figured. It's disappointing that XBMC doesn't have a simple slideshow with music feature built-in like Windows Media Center does, since I think that's one of the basic things for a media center to do. But it's amazing to see what XBMC can do, so missing a slideshow with music feature is OK. I'm willing to use "Advanced Launcher" to run WMC's slideshow.
It did take days and days of Googling to search for and try different programs that could do real-time slideshows with a playlist of music and I was unsuccessful until someone suggested WMC. Then it took me days to figure out how to launch WMC from XBMC and then I found "Advanced Launcher".
Quote:Default Confluence, let you turn on your music and then the slideshow.
That's too much for my wife to do since she's not a computer person. So I need a "one click" solution for her so she can play real-time slideshows by just selecting them using a handheld remote control.
Quote:Some skin (s mods) do an excellent job in integrating music and screensavers. Besides, it's quite easy to do some tweaking yourself.
If anyone knows of a skin that can make slideshows of user selectable playlists of pictures and music that can be launched with one click, please let me know.
Regarding doing some tweaking myself, could you expand on that a bit?
Thanks,
Skylark
(2013-10-07, 22:44)Robotica Wrote: [ -> ]you also can use smartplaylists. But you need a nightly for that.
Had high hopes but when I googled smart playlist for XBMC, the first sentence of the webpage says:
"XBMC supports smart playlists for all types of media (excluding pictures), ....snip"
http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Smart_playlists
So it appears that smart playlists won't work for picture slideshows.
Thanks,
Skylark
@
Skylark
It is possible to play music in XBMC and play a slide show at the same time.
Just select the songs you want and start playing them then go to the pictures and start the slideshow. I used to use it this way in version 11 and 12. The only catch was in V11 once you got to a video during the slideshow the music stopped and showed the video which would be fine, so you can hear the sound of the video, but it did not restart the music afterwards.
In V12.x this is completely broken, videos just don't mix with pictures in a slideshow.
I just installed the Alpha version 7 (September) and pictures and videos play again together as previously in V11. Unfortunately music stops as well as soon as a video starts. The developers don't seem to get that a "media centre" should play all media together and not just certain types at one time.
They probably too busy developing XBMC to have ever had a chance to come back from holidays
to try to watch pictures and videos in sequence from the camera or else they would have realised that XBMC is missing an important feature.
Temp solution: I have XBMC installed on my old laptop which is hooked up to the sound/TV system. My solution at the moment is to select the background music in VLC player on the laptop, then start the slideshow in XBMC. It is a primitive solution and requires remote access to the old laptop from my new laptop on the couch but it works.
Maybe on day a dev will figure out how to play background music and then a slideshow including videos and photos together.
(2013-10-10, 06:24)juhurus Wrote: [ -> ]@Skylark
It is possible to play music in XBMC and play a slide show at the same time.
Just select the songs you want and start playing them then go to the pictures and start the slideshow.
Yes, that method of playing music first and then starting a slideshow is how XBMC recommends it be done in their documentation. Having to play the music first and then having to go to the pictures to start the slideshow is so primitive. My wife doesn't use computers and won't do manipulations to view anything. So I need to have a one click solution like Windows Media Center provides, where I can select the songs and pictures before hand and she can just start the slideshow with music with one click.
Thanks,
Skylark
Artist Slideshow supports this, although you have to modify Confluence slightly to support AS (I provide the modified Confluence files as a link, see the forum post in my signature). Once you install AS, go to SETTINGS -> SLIDESHOW, select the option that says USE OVERRIDE SLIDESHOW, and then use the field below to navigate to the pictures.
Once that is done, it isn't quite one click, but it's close. After starting the music playlist you want, start the full screen mode for music playback and your music should play with the slides running (the change at 10 second intervals).
All that said, I'm not sure all that is any easier than just starting the music and then starting the slideshow.
(2013-10-11, 04:15)pkscuot Wrote: [ -> ]Artist Slideshow supports this, although you have to modify Confluence slightly to support AS (I provide the modified Confluence files as a link, see the forum post in my signature). Once you install AS, go to SETTINGS -> SLIDESHOW, select the option that says USE OVERRIDE SLIDESHOW, and then use the field below to navigate to the pictures.
Once that is done, it isn't quite one click, but it's close. After starting the music playlist you want, start the full screen mode for music playback and your music should play with the slides running (the change at 10 second intervals).
All that said, I'm not sure all that is any easier than just starting the music and then starting the slideshow.
Hi pkscuot, thanks for helping out.
From your description, it appears that Artist Slideshow works just like XBMC does. IOW, start music and then start slideshow. I bought Windows Media Center yesterday for $9.99 so I'll use it for slideshows. Using WMC, my wife can just scroll through the list of slideshows and start the one she wants with one click for both pictures and music.
The only thing I'm trying to figure out now is how to loop the music playlist in WMC's slideshow. WMC's slideshow loops the pictures forever but doesn't loop the music. IOW, when the last song in the playlist ends, the music stops while the pictures keep looping. It would be nice to have the music loop forever too in case the duration of the music is shorter than the duration of the pictures.
Thanks,
Skylark