FotoMagico Quick Review
I will just start the day off with my new favorite photo slideshow software for Mac users. It is called FotoMagico. I started using this software on a family wedding DVD and really enjoyed the flexibility it offers for motion within a frame. I did build some large slideshows and it caused the application to crash a few times but I easily was able to work around the crash.
Previously, I only used a Windows machine with ProShow Gold for slideshow creation. Now I will use FotoMagico on my Mac instead. My wife and I have built many (20 or more) action DVD’s for her photo business with ProShow Gold. I have really wanted to find something as good for Mac and FotoMagico is probably the closest. I have purchased Photo2Album and compared it as well.
Below is a list of high level likes and areas for improvement for FotoMagico. I have sent my requests to Boinx and they acknowledged my request promptly and said it would be looked at and prioritized by Marketing and Engineering. Cool….
Likes:
- The safe zone for pictures is accurate on every TV I have played the slideshow on
- Tons of export options
- The user interface for seeing motion start and end is easy-to-use
- Integration with iTunes and iPhoto
- Ability to add photos directly from a folder or share
Improvement areas:
- Add the ability to automatically place the slide number on each picture in a show.
- Add a visual representation of the audio file that will allow you to edit the song length and fades to your liking.
- Add the ability to select all images in a show and make a selection to randomize the transitions between each image – Saves were rather slow on large slide shows with a few hundred pictures. This issue might not be a FotoMagico issue as much as it is me doing this work on a 1.5GHz G4 Powerbook 17.
If you have to use Windows, my slideshow creation software of choice is ProShow Gold. For the money, I never saw a reason to upgrade to Producer even creating 20+ shows a year for my wife’s photography business.
I will continue to build slideshows in FotoMagico and I will promptly put them up for others to see when I get a chance.
Curtis
[...] Curtis Almond from Texas previously used ProShow Gold on his Windows machine and switched to FotoMagico on his Mac. [...]
Nice look…
Nice…
You sound like you really know Fotomagico. I am a graphic designer and am using the program to design upscale photo slideshows. I am currently trying to save a 50 image show (all images under 1mb) with 10 song clips. The movie size is 550mb and when I bring that into iDVD, the file size jumps too high to burn to a DVD. Any comments????
Mary,
I went back and looked at the wedding DVD and I have (7) movies that I exported from Fotomagico which is over 7GB.
Here is the process I use:
1. Get all your movies done and then export them in Fotomagico. I choose file export, format = for DVD, Apply Motion blur, and do not open in iDVD for every movie. I choose no advanced options.
2. After I have the export files I drag them into iDVD. In iDVD open preferences and choose Best Quality in the “Projects” tab.
When done iDVD will create a movie that fits on a single sided DVD-R w/o issue.
I hope this helps…
Curtis
Curtis – I updated Fotomagico to 1.8 and the export bug was fixed – thanks! Here’s another question: I am saving a slideshow for a user to play on a PC with a projector for a sales meeting. What is the best export format? When I play a slideshow DVD back on my computer the quality is really low. Should I export with other options? Do I need to get into the “advanced” options? I really want to keep the crisp look especially since it’s playing back on a computer. Any thoughts?
Hi Curtis,
I am preparing my first slideshow in Fotomagico and wonder what is your staging area settings. They recommend TV 4:3 preset which is 640×480. It it the one you use? Please, reply to my email address.
Hi all,
I just discovered this Fotomagico and love it. Very new so any books out there for beginner.
thanks
-Kenley- idezineu@yahoo.com
can i play the dvd on a windows computer after creating it in fotomagic? how is that done?
Ruchiccio,
Yes, you can play the DVD’s on your Windows machine assuming you have a DVD player and DVD player software like WinDVD.