Captions behind Images?

[Xennon Profile Private message]

Hi all,
I'm new to this forum and Proshow Producer and am at the very beginning of what appears to be a steep learning curve. I apologize if my query has been posted before but I couldn't find anything via search so maybe it's safe to ask ...

My query is - Can you place captions anywhere OTHER than on TOP of everything else? ie. can they be layered and interlaced with image layers in any way? I have a show project that begins with a kind of sliding door revealing content beyond and I would like for my intro captions to be *revealed* as the doors open but can't seem to work it out.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

[bonalymac Profile Private message]

Create your caption as a png image in Photoshop or similar, then you can treat it just like any other layer

[debngar Profile Private message]

Try this:

"Caption Underneath Layers"
http://www.photodex.com/share/debngar/69bd4mg4

The process is doable all in Producer but not necessarily for beginners. The tutorial uses a bit of masking which is another whole skill in itself to learn.

[psychogramma Profile Private message]

If the only image you want to be "behind" is the sliding doors, you can cause your caption to appear as the doors are opened using keyframes. Set your start point for the caption at a point in the slide when the doors are open.

Cathy

[Xennon Profile Private message]

ahhh Just as I suspected, it can't be done with actual captions but CAN be done using images of captions. This is how I thought the solution would go - it's a pity the designers didn't free up the caption layers in order to do this.

Thank you to all.

@ debngar - great little tute.

@ Cathy - That was my 1st approach, but, this method only worked when the sliding doors were completely open (or at least wide enough for the caption to fit) and it felt like something was missing while I waited for the doors to open. Fortunately, to hold interest long enough, I animated the image behind the door slightly but the effect was far short of what I intended - a gradual reveal of the text as the doors slid open.

So it seems the image/masking option is (atm) the only real option to at least give the visual result I'm looking for.

[im42n8 Profile Private messageWebsite]

It's surprising that you can't do many things with the existing captions situation. Blurring would be nice but no can do. So, creating a graphical caption allows you to do things you'd otherwise not be capable of doing.

I like to apply blur to them and also use them as masks. This allows you do do things like move a blurred and semi-transparent colored layer (usually white) across the front of the text (sorta like a reflection of light coming off the caption...). Or, with some judicial use masking of the graphical text, you can make it look like the outline (or outside edges of the text) is being reflected upon but not the rest of the text. Impossible to do w/o using the graphical text, unfortunately.

Hopefully someday in the not too distant future Photodex will give us more options in this area. It could really enhance some of the shows (captions and, in particular, title pages).

Dale