User Guide Ulead Systems, Inc.
First English edition for Ulead Photo Explorer version 8.0, October 2002 Copyright © 2002 Ulead Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication maybe reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or storing in a retrieval system, or translated into any language in any form without prior written permission of Ulead Systems, Inc.
What's Inside Welcome to Ulead® Photo Explorer .............................................................................................................. 5 Things you can do in Photo Explorer ......................................................................................................... 5 What's new in this version .......................................................................................................................... 8 System requirements ....................................
Viewing images .......................................................................................................................................... 33 Using Photo Explorer Viewer ................................................................................................................... 33 Switching between folders ................................................................................................................. 33 Advancing through the images ....................................
Welcome to Ulead® Photo Explorer Ulead Photo Explorer makes digital photography fun on the PC. It combines tools for acquiring, viewing, organizing, adjusting, and printing digital images in a single easy-to-use interface. Photo Explorer is a must-have companion for digital camera, scanner, and video camera users, or for anyone who needs to manage and share digital images and other media. Things you can do in Ulead Photo Explorer Here's an overview of what you can do in Ulead Photo Explorer.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Browse thumbnails Ulead Photo Explorer displays files as thumbnails, allowing you to visually browse through images and media files. Preview images and other media View images Instantly preview images, video and audio files in Photo Explorer without actually opening them. Display images in larger views by switching to Viewer mode or by opening images in Ulead Instant Viewer.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Print images in various layouts Create slideshows Output single-image prints, greeting cards, or print images in different photo sizes. You can also print an index sheet of thumbnails for your image collection. Assemble images, video and audio files into a multimedia slideshow. Apply cool transition effects to your slideshow. Output Web thumbnails and Web slideshows Share on the Internet Create Web photo albums and Web slideshows ready to be uploaded to the Internet.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide What's new in this version Archiving files, CD cataloging, and burning slideshow discs are some of the exciting new features in Photo Explorer. Photo Explorer also offers many enhanced features that make file browsing, image transfer from digital cameras, image editing and conversion, as well as creation of projects for the Web more intuitive.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide #4 Generate thumbnails for individual folders Scan a folder to generate thumbnails only for that folder (and its underlying subfolders). #5 Rating for images Rank images from your most favorite to the least favorite by setting a rating for each image. In a way, rating images allows you to categorize them without the need to move or rename the files.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide System requirements Before installing Photo Explorer, make sure your computer meets these requirements: • Intel® Pentium® III or faster processor • Microsoft Windows® 98, 2000, XP • 64 MB RAM (or more) • 35 MB available hard drive space for program files • True Color or HiColor display adapter and monitor (recommended) • 800 X 600 minimum display resolution • Windows compatible pointing device • Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.
Ulead Photo Explorer at a glance Ulead Photo Explorer has a Browser that lets you browse, preview and manage the files and folders in your computer, and a built-in Viewer which gives full-size view of images. Another separate program, Ulead Instant Viewer, can also be used for viewing images. Photo Explorer Browser Just like Windows Explorer, Photo Explorer's Browser shows the hierarchy of drives and folders in your computer at the left hand side and displays the files in a selected folder at the right.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Photo Explorer Viewer Photo Explorer has a built-in Viewer integrated with the Browser. You can use the built-in Viewer to: • Get a full-size or full-screen view of images. • Navigate through images using the keyboard, toolbar buttons, or menu commands, or let Viewer automatically step through the images. • Copy, rename or delete an image file. • Copy an image for pasting onto your desired image editor. • Rotate, flip and edit images, and then save the changes.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide About file format types Ulead Photo Explorer supports quite a number of file formats. Many image formats can be edited in Photo Explorer, and most of the popular video and audio formats can be previewed. Photo Explorer provides a proprietary file format for creating multimedia slideshows. Photo Explorer can also output in HTML and create auto-run CDs.
Customizing Photo Explorer When using any application, it is important for you to set up a work environment that's comfortable and convenient for you. Photo Explorer provides many options that can change the look and feel of what's on-screen to suit your needs. You can also make Photo Explorer as your default image viewer and editor, or configure other programs to open and edit your images.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Customizing toolbars For quicker access to your favorite Photo Explorer commands, you can add them as buttons on the Browser and Viewer toolbars and even arrange their order. Take note that the toolbar in Photo Explorer's built-in Viewer is customizable. As for the Ulead Instant Viewer, toolbar buttons are fixed and cannot be changed. To add toolbar buttons: 1. Select File: Customize Toolbars. 2. From the Select toolbar drop-down list, choose a toolbar. 3.
Browsing and previewing files With the convenience of thumbnails and the familiar Windows Explorer functionality, Photo Explorer makes it simple and easy to work with multimedia files. Displaying files in thumbnail or list view When you select a folder from the Folder Tree, multimedia files are displayed as visual thumbnails in the Browse Pane on the right hand side of the Photo Explorer window. A thumbnail is a small replica of the original image file or an icon representing a specific type of file.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Speeding up thumbnail display If you have a large number of multimedia files in a folder, it may take Photo Explorer some time to generate thumbnails for the files and display them on-screen. Instead of regenerating thumbnails each time the same files are accessed, Photo Explorer stores them in a cache folder. The next time you access your files, Photo Explorer simply loads the thumbnails. The process of saving thumbnails is known as thumbnail caching.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Displaying embedded thumbnails in digital camera images Since many digital cameras can now automatically create thumbnails when taking photos, you can customize Photo Explorer to just get the thumbnails from the JPEG (Exif ) image files instead of generating them. For such images, select the Use thumbnail from JPEG (Exif ) file option in the Preferences dialog box under the Camera and Exif category. This will give a considerable improvement in thumbnail display speed.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Browsing for files If you have a lot of files or a complex folder structure in your computer, finding the file that you want can be a tedious task. It may take you some time to locate a file, especially if you click each folder and inspect what's inside in each. Photo Explorer's powerful browsing features give you quick results for locating the file that you want.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Previewing files When you select a file in Photo Explorer, a preview of the file contents immediately appears in the Preview Pane. To change the viewing size, drag the borders of the Preview Pane. The types of files you can preview include: • Image files -- Zoom in to get a larger preview, or zoom out to see a more complete view of the image.
Working with folders and files Photo Explorer does more than just organize folders and files in your computer. Archiving files into zip folders and reading contents of zip folders can be directly done in Photo Explorer. What's more, images and media files contained in CDs can be cataloged for faster and convenient browsing. The Folder Pane The Folder Pane, found on the left-hand side of the Photo Explorer window, is where you access disk drives and manage folders in your computer.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide • Camera tab The Camera tab displays Exif information of a selected image. Exif is the information that is included in images taken with a digital camera. The Camera tab appears in the Folder Pane when you select File: Photo Properties. See page 28 for details. About virtual folders Photo Explorer provides virtual folders that can be accessed and browsed just like any normal disk folder.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Creating a list of favorite folders If your files are organized into many folders, you may not be able to remember all their locations. For easier access to frequently visited folders, you can add them to the Favorites list and then quickly recall them. To add a folder to the Favorites list: 1. Select a folder in the Folder Tree. 2. Select Favorites: Add to Favorites. (Or, right-click the folder and select Add to Favorites.) 3.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide In addition, here are special ways of handling files in Photo Explorer: • Select Edit: Find or click the Find tab in the Folder Pane to perform a file search. You can search for files based on file name and location, description or date (date of file creation or date images were taken with a digital camera). Search results will be placed in the Find Results folder and displayed in the Browse Pane.
Working with digital cameras and scanners Images can come from different sources. With Photo Explorer, photos that were taken with a digital camera can be transferred to your PC. If you have a scanner device, you can also transform photo prints or documents into images directly in Photo Explorer. Once you have all your desired images, easily rename the files and resequence them based on your own numbering scheme.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Digital Camera Wizard Getting images from a digital camera can be much faster and simpler if you use the Digital Camera Wizard. Use this tool to get images from a digital camera, or retrieve images from a flash memory card that's inserted in a memory card reader. To get images using the Digital Camera Wizard: 1. Select File: Digital Camera Wizard. 2.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide • Delete files after successful transfer Select to remove all images from the memory card after a successful transfer of images to the specified destination folder. Note: Automatic deletion of images from the memory card is possible if your device supports this functionality. Tip: File: Clear Memory Card also deletes images under a specific folder in your digital camera or removes everything in your memory card drive.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Or, to scan several photos at the same time and automatically slice them into separate image files, click File: TWAIN Acquire - Acquire Now (with Auto Slicing). 7. Follow the instructions on the dialog box to transfer images to your computer. Note that the instructions may vary based on different device type, brands, and models. Note: Photo Explorer offers WDM driver support for "push-model aware" scanners.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide To make it easier for people to understand the focal lengths of digital cameras, manufacturers often quote the camera lenses on a "35mm equivalent" scale since this is more widely understood by photographers. For any digital camera, there is a certain multiplication factor that converts to this scale. (For example, 5.55 is the conversion factor used by the Canon S10 digital camera.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide If you previously rotated a digital camera image using other software or the earlier Photo Explorer 6.0 version, you may see a mismatch between the rotated image and the embedded Exif thumbnail. To make the Exif thumbnail consistent with the image, click the Thumbnail tab in the Modify Camera Information (Exif ) dialog box and select the Replace original with regenerated thumbnail option.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide • Add/Replace -- Extend file names by inserting additional text to the file names. Or, rename parts of the file names. File name list before and after renaming files • Crop -- Make file names shorter by removing text from the file names. • Repad -- Add one or more zeroes to a file name when the length of its numeric counter is inconsistent with other file names. (For example, if you have file names File001, File002 and File3, the last file name will be changed to File003.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide If.... previous and next file names have equal number of counter digits... previous file name has lesser number of counter digits than the next file name... previous file name has greater number of counter digits than the next file name...
Viewing images Get a larger, clearer look of your images. Display your images in Photo Explorer's built-in Viewer or the Ulead Instant Viewer. Using Photo Explorer Viewer If you want to display full-size images one at a time and edit them whenever necessary, use Photo Explorer's built-in Viewer to open your images. Double-click an image file to open it in the built-in Viewer. Selecting View: Open Viewer or clicking the Open Viewer button on the Browser toolbar also opens the file.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Advancing through the images When stepping through images, use the following View menu commands or keyboard shortcuts to go from one image to another. Another way is to click on the available toolbar buttons. View Menu Commands Shortcuts Description Auto Advance Ctrl+A To activate the Automatic Advance action. Full Screen Ctrl+U Switches to the Full Screen mode. First Image Home Moves to the first image.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Viewer Pane Shortcuts Description Shift+Click Zooms in. Shift+Click+Drag Zooms in a specific area. Shift+Scrollwheel Zooms in or out. Ctrl+Scrollwheel Zooms in or out. Shift+Space Switches back to previous zoom level. Z+Click Zooms in. Z+Right-click Zooms out. Z+Shift+Click Zooms out. Z+Click+Drag Zooms in a specific area. Z+Shift+Click+Drag Zooms out. Z+Scrollwheel Zooms in or out. Ctrl+Shift+0 Fit to window. Shift+Right-click Fit to screen.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Using the Ulead Instant Viewer Ulead Instant Viewer is very much like Photo Explorer's built-in Viewer, except that it allows image viewing only and does not provide any image editing tools. Use the Instant Viewer when you want to visually compare full-size images. A separate window opens to display each image.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Viewer Pane Shortcuts Description Right-click Displays the context menu. Scrollwheel Go to next/previous image. Zooming in and out To zoom in or out of an image, use the following View menu commands or keyboard shortcuts. You can also click on the available toolbar buttons to change the viewing size of an image. View Menu Commands Shortcuts Description Fit to Screen Ctrl+F Switches to the Fit to Screen mode. Zoom In/Out "+" / "-" Zooms in/out.
Editing images Images, especially those that came from a digital camera or scanner, often need some adjustments. Photo Explorer provides tools for you to do quick touch-ups to your images. Image editing tools Photo Explorer has all the basic tools that can help you adjust your images. You can access these image editing tools from the Photo menu of the Browser and built-in Viewer (or by clicking the corresponding toolbar buttons).
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Adjusting images Sometimes, images from a camera may appear too dark or their color did not come out right due to inadequate lighting conditions when taking them. Images may also appear crooked, especially when the camera was not held in the upright position. You can fix such basic problems by selecting Photo: Adjust Image. What's special about Photo Explorer is that image adjustments can be applied to multiple selected images.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Removing red eye After taking photos with a camera flash, you sometimes see a red-eye effect on the images. If you have such images, Photo Explorer can quickly correct this problem. Select Photo: Remove Red Eye to remove the red-eye effect from an image. You can either decrease the level of red, or replace it with a more natural color. Click the Help button in the Remove Red Eye dialog box for more information.
Printing Once you are satisfied with your images, it's time to print them out. Photo Explorer offers a variety of formats for printing images. Fun prints you can create With a variety of layouts and printing options available, creating prints with your images can be much fun in Photo Explorer. Select File: Print to choose the type of output that you want.
Working with video Sending video greetings or fun videos by e-mail can be entertaining for your distant family and friends. With Photo Explorer, capture short video clips, trim them or transform them into smallersize file formats, and then send them by e-mail. You can also capture a single image or a series of snapshots from video.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide • Frame size -- Select the desired video dimensions. 320 x 240 is typical. Smaller sizes are good for use on the Web or for sending by email. 5. Select the Capture audio option to capture both video and sound. Click the Audio Format button to choose sound quality. 6. Click the Record button to capture. 7. Click the Save button to save the captured clip as an *.AVI video file. 8. Click the Live button to change back to the live video display.
Slideshow and other cool stuff In Photo Explorer, you can make fun projects using your multimedia files. Combine images, videos and sounds to create impressive slideshows. Decorate your Windows desktop by creating wallpapers and calendars using your favorite images. More so, make your own screen savers. Creating a slideshow Photo Explorer's Slideshow Storyboard is where you bring together images, videos and sounds, and plan out their sequence in the slideshow.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide duration affects images only. Video files play according to their actual clip duration.) 6. To add description, sound annotation, or set varying durations for each image, select images individually and click the Slide Options button. 7. To specify descriptive information about the selected image, type your text in the Description window. 8. Select Enable sound annotation to add sound to the current image.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Adding background music To add background music starting at a certain image in the slideshow, select music file(s) in the Browse Pane then drag the file(s) onto the desired image in the Slideshow Storyboard. Or, drag the selected music file(s) onto the music track beneath the starting image.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Packaging files The multimedia files which you selected to include in a slideshow may have come from various folders. If you want to distribute your slideshow (by e-mail, for instance), it would be easier to share the project and media files by first collecting and copying them to the same location. To copy the slideshow files to the same location: 1. Click the Package button on the storyboard toolbar. 2. Enter the slideshow project file name (*.UES).
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Burning slideshow discs After composing your slideshow, you can burn slideshow discs using your disc burner in either of these formats: Photo Explorer slideshow CD (for PC viewing), or slideshow disc of VCD, SVCD or DVD format (for TV viewing). For PC viewing The CD that is created for PC playback will contain the Photo Explorer slideshow project file (*.UES) and the image, video and sound files that are used in the slideshow.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Other fun projects you can create Photo Explorer allows you to create interesting projects for your desktop: Wallpaper Use your favorite image as your Windows desktop wallpaper. Here’s how: 1. Select an image file, then click Tools: Wallpaper. 2. Select Enable wallpaper. 3. Choose to display the image at the Center of the screen, or show several duplicates of it by specifying Tile options.
Working on the Internet With Photo Explorer, you can share your images and multimedia files over the Internet. Upload images to iMira.com, order photo prints online, send files by e-mail, or include image collections and slideshows on your Web page. Photo Explorer also allows you to easily retrieve image, sound and video files from the Internet. Photo Explorer finds all your desired files from a selected Web site and quickly downloads them to your computer. Sharing images on iMira.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide Creating thumbnails for the Web If you want to create your own image gallery and post it on the Internet, an easy way to do it is to use the Internet: Output Web Thumbnails command. This command generates simple Web pages in just a few minutes, complete with an index of thumbnails and pages for displaying images. The basic steps for creating Web pages and thumbnails are given below.
Ulead Photo Explorer User Guide 3. Click each tab (except for the Thumbnail Page tab) in the Web Page Output dialog box to select layout options and add background music. 4. When you are satisfied with the results, click OK to generate the HTML files (or a self-extracting EXE file). Tip: For details on Web page layout options, click the Help button on the Web Page Output dialog box. Scanning the Web for images Photo Explorer makes it fast and easy to download files from the Web.
