Hi, I created a theatre stage with screen in 3DS max. I want to center my 320x240 (or higher) video file where the screen should be.

Now, I have tried to layer a fixed background photo of my theatre stage with curtans but unless you're set at 1024x756, the video file is offset. Like if someone has a 800x600, instead of the file centered on the screen to look like its actually apart of the screen, its sitting somewhere off to the side on the curtain or on the stage somewhere. Doesnt matter what resolution you have it set at, if it isnt 1024 it wont align.

Also, If you do logon with a 1024 res but arent on Internet Explorer but rather Netscape, Operah or Firefox, the video file again is offset in the left top corner.

This sucks. also, if you have the right settings and are in IE but move out of full screen mode, it will shift all over the place if you move the bottom right corner of ie.

does this make sense? What im asking is this. Short of rendering my movie over the background image, how can I layer the movie over the background photo and center it so no matter what resolution it is in, it will center and stick/fixed perfectly with every browser and every resolution?

can you give me a html code or java code to do it?


embed src=file.wmv is not going to work. i even tried iframe and it didnt work.

feedback please. I dont own dreamweaver.

Also, < p align=center or align=middle doesnt help either.

Do you have this page uploaded so that we could take a look? Perhaps if we can review the source code we might think of a solution.

edit--insert---
First thing that comes to mind is to do it with tables (I am tragically old-school...sorry). Create a table to fill the screen (width=100% height=100% valign=center). Fill that table with one data cell (again, 100% width & height) -- center the cell contents. Within that cell, create a new table to contain your viewing display. Make a single datacell table -- set the theater image to be the "background" image for the specific datacell, then drop your video playback code on top of it inside the datacell. You should be able to center the cell contents in order to align the video playback horizontally. To align vertically, you can use a transparent gif set to a specific pixel height as a spacer above the video display.

I'm sure someone will have a much better solution, but I haven't updated my HTML knowledge in about 5 years.

You could make it a popup window, and then have that window be a specific size and non-resizeable.

Or you would have to use "absolute positioning"

http://www.boutell.com/newfaq/creating/windowsize.html
http://www.quirksmode.org/js/findpos.html
http://www.felgall.com/jstip10.htm

Well, I guess either way you'll need to use absolute positioning.

I'm a table guy too...I write for people with slow computers on dialup. You can make a table that is fixed width (just use pixel numbers rather than percents for the width and height properties of the table, tr, td tags. Learn colspan and rowspan as well...They will allow you to make very complex layouts with a minimum of fuss. If you post a link to the page, we can all take a stab at recoding for you and see who makes the cleanest code (I'm not judging this one ;) ).

http://www.htmlreference.com

If you post a link to the page, we can all take a stab at recoding for you and see who makes the cleanest code (I'm not judging this one ;) ).



Is that a challenge?;)

yep:evil:

Do you have this page uploaded so that we could take a look? Perhaps if we can review the source code we might think of a solution.

edit--insert---
First thing that comes to mind is to do it with tables (I am tragically old-school...sorry). Create a table to fill the screen (width=100% height=100% valign=center). Fill that table with one data cell (again, 100% width & height) -- center the cell contents. Within that cell, create a new table to contain your viewing display. Make a single datacell table -- set the theater image to be the "background" image for the specific datacell, then drop your video playback code on top of it inside the datacell. You should be able to center the cell contents in order to align the video playback horizontally. To align vertically, you can use a transparent gif set to a specific pixel height as a spacer above the video display.

I'm sure someone will have a much better solution, but I haven't updated my HTML knowledge in about 5 years.


sure... front page

www.paskday.com

just a test video

PS, I want it to loop :yes: (without extra bandwith if possible)

Here's mine:

http://webpages.charter.net/knightscape/test/test.html

bring it bophe!

King: use a quicktime file.. they can be set to auto loop, and it will download to the local HD rather than just streaming.

KingG -- it seems you have embedded the theater curtain image into your video file. Any chance you could break out your graphic and video and upload them separately?

video didn't play for me at all actually...I just made the curtains around a blank WMV player.

KingG -- it seems you have embedded the theater curtain image into your video file. Any chance you could break out your graphic and video and upload them separately?


thats what I did, I rendered it in 3DS max as an entire scene. Before that I just had used a java script from a free software i got from globat.com

As for quicktim, isnt that a MOV format? not everyone wants to download quicktime. But most people can use wmv since its built into windows (not sure if mac users can see it)

I want my files to stream, i dont want a "Wait and load" situation.


i will see if I can find the code i used before. and then I'll post it. :)

Here's mine:

http://webpages.charter.net/knightscape/test/test.html


thats cool Knightly, but as was mentioned. I forgot its one big render. its not layered (wmv over curtain pic)

im going to have to reset it to the way it was before.

Hey knightly and john.

the background photo is this one

http://www.paskday.com/2/thr1024.jpg for the 1024x756

http://www.paskday.com/2/thr800.jpg for the 800x600

and the lay over video file to use is

http://www.paskday.com/2/3.wmv

so if you can formulate either the 800 or 1024 photo and have the video set in the center of the screen and not move around if someone has to minimize the screen a bit, i would appreciate it very much


if you could somehow type it out in here or paste it and try and bold font highlight where my files go in the code, That would help out. Dont try and explain it in detail, Im not very knowledgable when it comes to html or java or any kind of code.

I wish i knew how to use dreamweaver, i understand it is a drop and load kind of platform.

Thanks you guys.

I'll chop this up and throw it into the frames sometime tonight or tomorrow. You probably won't be able to get the shadow on the top to affect the movie underneath, but the rest will be there. I use TextEdit to write the html code, I learned by using view>page source in the browser and figuring out which commands do what (back when the web was unheard of, just some little kitschy thing on the internet that had just come out). The code is much more complicated now, but it's still possible to learn that way. I use http://www.htmlreference.com alot.

edit:and the video doesn't play for me, codec used is too new (probably).

I'll chop this up and throw it into the frames sometime tonight or tomorrow. You probably won't be able to get the shadow on the top to affect the movie underneath, but the rest will be there. I use TextEdit to write the html code, I learned by using view>page source in the browser and figuring out which commands do what (back when the web was unheard of, just some little kitschy thing on the internet that had just come out). The code is much more complicated now, but it's still possible to learn that way. I use http://www.htmlreference.com alot.

edit:and the video doesn't play for me, codec used is too new (probably).


wmv? or did I up the avi if so, its a techsmith for camtasia.