Stop Ripping and Editing DVDs

Over the past eight years, I’ve been asked dozens of times to rip a DVD and re-edit parts of it. I’ve made montages of Braveheart, edited the dirty bits out of Fight Club, and taken the swearing out of The Matrix. The request I get most often, however, is to simply reorder some scenes on a time line and burn to a DVD for easy playback of a few clips.

That’s illegal in a gray area of legality that I don’t wish to traverse. All of it. And I don’t do that stuff anymore.

So what’s a copyright law abiding pastor to do? Well, I can’t help you with montages of 300 or editing the cuss out of Pulp Fiction. But if all you want is to show clips from a movie in a specific order, ProPresenter has your back.

You might already know that ProPresenter can play back a DVD from within the app. But did you know that you can create a playlist of clips from a DVD for playback later? It’s easy! After setting a few in and out points you can construct a list of clips from the DVD and play them back at your convenience. For more detailed instructions and some screen shots, visit this ProPresenter Help document.

NOTE: Even though playing back DVD clips in this manner does not break copyright law, you still need a church video license from CVLI to display clips from many movies. Also, I’m not a lawyer.

ProPresenter 4 is out for Mac (Windows version on the way!)

ProPresenter LogoI got a welcome email in my inbox this afternoon. ProPresenter 4 has been released and with it a bunch of very excellent features that, in my opinion, keeps this app firmly on the throne as King of Presentation Software.

Even more interesting is Renewed Vision’s announcement that they are working on a Windows port of ProPresenter. I know a lot of PC users who will be happy to hear that.

Here are some FAQs that were included in the email:

WHAT WILL PROPRESENTER 4 WINDOWS LOOK LIKE?
We have put a great deal of thought into the user interface of ProPresenter 4 on the Mac, so why ruin a good thing? We are building the Windows version to look and function identically. If you know how to run ProPresenter 4 Mac, you will know instantly how to run ProPresenter 4 Windows.

WILL IT HAVE ALL THE FEATURES OF THE MAC VERSION?
We are working hard to make sure that every feature of the Mac version is implemented in Windows. In some cases, a feature may be less robust on the Windows platform while others may work even better. Some technical realities beyond the scope of ProPresenter may have an impact (video codecs, shared storage, etc.), but we’re going to make sure these are minimal.

WILL I BE ABLE TO USE BOTH IN MY ORGANIZATION?
From the ground up, we have worked to ensure interoperability between ProPresenter 4 Mac and ProPresenter 4 Windows. This means you will be able to move files back and forth, and they will run largely the same way on either platform.

WHAT ABOUT THE ADVANCED AND ALPHA KEYER MODULES, OR THE PROPRESENTER REMOTE FOR IPHONE?
We’re not planning our initial release of ProPresenter 4 Windows to include any modules or iPhone remote functionality. Depending on market acceptance and customer demand, however, we may consider developing them in the future. Be sure to let us know your interest in these additional features.

WHAT IS THE PRICING OF PROPRESENTER FOR WINDOWS?
ProPresenter for Windows has the same pricing structure as its Mac counterpart. Single user licenses will be platform specific and sold for $399. However, a Site License for ProPresenter 4 will work on either platform, allowing unlimited use on any platform for a single campus, making our site license an even better value add. This means for a $799 site license purchase, you can run ProPresenter 4 on either a Mac or a Windows machine. Existing ProPresenter 4 site license owners will be able to download and unlock the Windows version immediately after it becomes available.

WHY ARE WE ANNOUNCING IT NOW?
Because site licenses of ProPresenter 4 will work on both the Mac and Windows versions, we want people to know these benefits before placing their upgrade orders.

WHEN WILL PROPRESENTER 4 WINDOWS BE RELEASED?
We don’t have a specific date for release quite yet, but are working towards Summer 2010. We will certainly have a public beta test for registered ProPresenter users prior to the wide release. Stay tuned to this page for such an announcement in the coming months.

WILL PROPRESENTER 4 WINDOWS EFFECT THE MAC DEVELOPMENT CYCLE?
Above all else, we want to create the most functional products possible. While ProPresenter 4 has a great many features that we’ve been thinking about for years, we still have a great many more ideas we are looking forward to implementing in the future. Because we have completely separate development teams working on the Mac and Windows versions of ProPresenter, we can concentrate on making each platform’s product the very best it can be and developing new features quickly.

Review: ProPresenter Remote

A few weeks ago Renewed Vision released ProPresenter Remote via the iTunes App Store. ProPresenter is a robust song and media presentation app for the Mac. ProPresenter Remote is a companion application that runs on your iPhone or iPod Touch and allows you to view and control the presentation without having to be in front of the computer running ProPresenter. This review gives an overview of the app, feature’s I’d like to see and how your church can use it.

After downloading ProPresenter Remote ($5 from the iTunes App Store) you will need to make sure that your installation of ProPresenter on your Mac is the most recent version (3.5.1 was released along with ProPresenter Remote to add support for the app). Setting up your host computer and the Remote app is a simple process. A couple of clicks in the preferences window on the host computer and a wireless network connection will get you running in a snap.

When you launch ProPresenter Remote you are presented with a list of host computers to connect to. The host computer must be running ProPresenter for it to show up in the list. You are then asked for a password. There are two options for the password and, depending on which password you enter, you will connect as an observer or the controller. Both of these passwords can be set in the preferences window of ProPresenter on the host computer. The two functions of the remote are self explanatory. The observer is allowed to view the song library, song playlists and scripture playlists. The controller interface looks the same, but in addition to observing, a tap on a song slide or scripture slide will present those slides live on the screens. A shake of the iPhone or iPod Touch will give you options to clear the text, background or both as well as an option to clear currently playing audio.

One glaring feature that is missing is the ability to change slide backgrounds remotely. I understand having to generate and load thumbnails for all the backgrounds in a library could take some time but if there was a special playlist on the host application where I could define a small amount of backgrounds to be able to choose from remotely, I would be content.

Another role I would love to fill with this app is that of the confidence monitor. My church in particular does not have a confidence monitor where the lyrics on the audience’s screens are mirrored for the worship leaders to see. The app fulfills some of this role with the observe mode by highlighting the currently displayed slide. However, the Remote app does not automatically move from song to song, it requires a tap on the next button. A solution I imagine working well would work like so:

  • Worship leader places iPod Touch on his music stand or podium in landscape orientation.
  • The screen adjusts to display the current, live slide (sans background) with white text on black.
  • The slide changes as the song progresses.


In addition to a feature like the above, an option to view white text on black in observe mode would be handy as well as options to resize the text for even easier viewing.

In conclusion, this app can be useful for three types of people in your worship service:

  1. The worship team
    Those on stage can use this app as a sort of confidence monitor now. If Renewed Vision ads a feature like I mentioned then it will work even better for this. The worship leader can also use this app to change the slides himself if there is no one else in the tech booth running the show, however he won’t be able to change the background. He’ll also have to take care not to shake the device to much for rick of clearing the screen.
  2. The tech team
    If your volunteer is tired of sitting in the tech booth by himself then this app could allow him some freedom to move about. This might also become handy if he needs to leave the booth to take care of another tech issue. You could also hand the controls over to someone else to act as a second controller in the case that the other controller falls behind for some reason.
  3. The audience
    If you have members of your audience who have a hard time seeing the screens, this app may help. You could put something in the bulletin like, “Can’t see the screens? Grab the app and login with this password to see the words on your iPod or iPhone.” Make sure your WiFi network is open or that you provide the password to use it.