Enhanced Slideshow in Lightroom By Joan Dolson, February, 2016
Introduction This document outlines the steps used to create an enhanced slideshow in a demonstration presented to COPS
members.
Preparation 1. Import and “develop” your images and videos in Lightroom. (This was not covered in the demo).
2. In the Library module, create a collection of your photos and video clips for the slideshow as described
in part 1 of the demo. (See the “Creating a Slideshow in Lightroom” document).
3. Order the slides and clips.
Slideshow Workflow 1. In the Library module, fill in the metadata fields that you wish to display in the slideshow. These are
under the Metadata heading in the toolbar on the right in the Library module. Empty fields will not
show, so you don’t need to fill in every field on every slide. Here are some suggestions:
a. Sublocation: If this is a travel slideshow, you may want to fill in the location in this field for this
first slide at this location. This could then serve as a header slide for a short series at that
location.
b. Title: This field can be used to put a title on certain slides to display different information. Since
the various text fields can be positioned in different locations on the slides and in different fonts
and colours, you can use the different fields to display text in certain locations on the slides.
c. Caption: This field can be used for captions on certain or all slides.
d. Rating: You can give each slide a star rating and make that appear on the slides.
2. Go to the Slideshow module and view the slideshow templates provided under the Template Browser
heading in the toolbar on the left:
a. Caption and Rating – Displays the slide with a border and a grey background. Shows the rating at
the top right and the caption field below the slide. It’s best to have a caption for each slide
otherwise the caption at the bottom will show empty quotes (“”).
b. Crop to fill – Will crop the slide to fill the entire screen. Note that this preset will not handle
portrait orientation slides. Rendering will freeze on the first portrait orientation slide, so you will
need to eliminate those from your show for this preset.
c. Exif metadata – Displays the slide on a black background with the default Lightroom ID plate
above the top left of the slide, the creator field contents at the bottom, the image date at the
top right and the camera settings at the bottom left. The ratings will be shown in the top left
corner of each slide. This type of slideshow would be best for critical review of your photos.
d. Simple – Displays the slide on a black background with the ratings in the top left corner of the
slide. Similar to the simple slideshow produced in part 1 of the demo.
e. Widescreen – Similar to simple except the images are sized to fill widescreen.
3. Choose the template that you wish to use as a starter.
4. Further customize your slideshow with the panels for setting on the right hand side of the interface in
the Slideshow module.
a. Options
i. Zoom to fit frame zooms to fit the entire frame this the photo. Does not seem to work
properly with portrait orientation and may not render.
ii. Stroke border puts a plane border around the photo. The border thickness and colour
can be controlled. The border snaps to the image and does not crop or leave black
areas.
iii. Cast shadow creates a shadow around the frame with various adjustments to customize
the appearance.
b. Layout
i. Show guides can be used to show or alter the placement of the image in the slide frame.
This is useful for positioning your image to one side so that you can place your text fields
and ID Plate outside the image for professional portfolio displays. Deselect the Link All
box to allow offset positioning.
c. Overlays
i. Identity plate allows you to select or create an identity plate to put on your slideshow.
You can also create an ID Plate from the edit menu, which will allow you more
positioning controls.
ii. Watermarking allows you to select or create a watermark to show on every slide.
iii. Rating Stars displays the stars from the ratings metadata field on the slide.
iv. Text overlays allows you to display other metadata fields or custom text on every slide.
For the metadata fields, text will only show on the slide if the metadata field contains
text. Fields that show <empty> in the slide editor, will not show after rendering. The text
overlay settings selected will apply to the particular overlay selected. To place a new
text overlay, click on the “ABC” button in the overlay tools and select the overlay. Move
the overlay to the position you want and adjust size, colour and font as you wish.
(Mouse clicks in green below).
d. Backdrops
i. Colorwash allows you to specify a color to the backdrop that displays outside the slide
and you can make a gradient from one side to the other.
ii. Background image allows you to select a background image to show outside of the slide.
e. Titles
i. Intro screen with another identity plate and customizable color.
ii. Ending screen with another identity plate and customizable color.
f. Music: Add one or more mp3 music tracks. Best to choose music which will run the length of the
slides with default playback settings – 6.5 seconds per slide. Don’t forget to include the intro and
ending screens.
g. Playback
i. Automatic lets Lightroom set the playback.
ii. Manual allows you to fit the slides to the music so that the visual and the audio ends at
the same time. You can also sync slides to music so that the slides change on the beat.
Doesn’t work will with video clips.
iii. Audio balance allows you to favour the sound from video clips or the music.
iv. Pan and zoom will apply some movement to the slides.
v. There are options to repeat the slideshow or use random order.
vi. There are also options for the playback quality.
5. Save the show as an mp4 video selecting a video preset suitable for the display device.
a. As video
b. As pdf
Results The resulting slideshow from this demo is named “Cuba-Demo” and is posted on the COPS website under
Members → Resources http://copsphotography.org/members/links-and-resources/
All of the text overlays include text indicating what type of field or overlay was used for the text. Examples:
Watermark: Demo for COPS is a watermark
Id plate Joan Dolson is an ID plate
Sublocation: Havana comes from the photo sublocation metadata field in the Library module
Caption: Moocher comes from the caption metadata field in the Library module
References Adobe Lightroom Help → Slideshows
https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/topics.html#dynamicpod_reference_13
Additional Resources Adobe Photoshop Lightroom CC - Advanced Video Slideshows https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/how-
to/slideshow-with-music-pan-zoom.html
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom CC - Build a Slideshow with Still Images and Video Files
https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/how-to/building-slideshow-still-images-video.html
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Help - Work with Video in Lightroom
https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/help/video-lightroom.html