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Music is key to creating an emotional connection with your
audience. We now have the ability to add up to 10 tracks,
though one or two will probably suffice for most projects. The
first step is to make sure you have the music in one of the sup-
ported file formats (.mp3, .m4a, or .m4b), and the rights to
include said music based on where you’re going to display the
slideshow. There are a number of affordable outlets for licens-
ing music files such as Triple Scoop Music and Song Freedom
(to name a couple), but do your research before sharing your
slideshow with the public.
Click the switch on the new Music panel to enable audio to
be included. Once enabled, click the plus sign (+) in the panel
to navigate to the music files and select them. The Music
panel will display the duration of each track as well as the total
for all tracks. You can re-order the tracks within the panel by
dragging and dropping them into the desired order. Select a
track and click the minus sign (–) to remove it from the project.
control playback
The Playback panel got the most attention in this latest ver-
sion. Some of the sliders were given more intuitive names,
which is great. The most notable new features are the ability
to Sync Slides to Music and the Pan and Zoom function. You
can check Sync Slides to Music if you want the slide transi-
tions to be based on the beats in the music instead of a set
time interval. Note: When checked, any included video files
will only display the poster frame in order to keep in time with
the transitions, so not a good option if you want video clips
to play.
The Fit to Music function (see above right) has been
improved, and does a better job of actually fitting the slideshow
to the music duration. Set the Crossfades time first, then click
the Fit to Music button to set the Slide Length. If your slideshow
does include video, you’ll want to experiment with the Audio
Balance slider to find the right mix of audio from the video clip
and your music soundtrack.
The new Pan and Zoom function, more commonly known
as the Ken Burns effect, can add a little (or a lot of) motion to
your stills as the slides transition through. This setting requires
experimentation to decide if it’s right for your slideshow, but
my experience says less is more as you cannot set it per slide.
You can use the Draft or Standard setting on the new Qual-
ity drop-down menu at the bottom of the panel as you’re
experimenting with settings to speed up playback.
When the slideshow is ready, you can play it from inside
Lightroom with music or you can output it as a video, PDF,
or a series of JPG slides. Video is the only export option that
includes the music. I find exporting as a video gives me more
playback options even if I’m going to run the slideshow from
the same computer. It’s nice to have choices. ■ALL IMAGES BY ROB SYLVAN