Using sound is awkward

[jschrader]

Using sound is awkward

by jschrader » Sat Feb 01, 2014 4:33 pm

PTP is giving me the creeps again because the implementation of sound features seems to be incomplete, unlogic and very confusing.

But I'll generously forget all about that if you can present a solution for a very basic tour feature that I wasn't able to build for my tour with RC2.

In a tour with several panoramas I want to play a different narrative sound on each panorama.
The sound must be paused at the start of the panorama.
The sound must start at the click of an individually designed and placed button.
The sound must pause on a second click of that button.
The button therefore should have two states.
The sound must stop if another panorama is opened.
In an ideal world there also would be a slider with a proper indicator how long the sound is, how much one has heard so far and full controls (start, stop, pause, etc.) but for now I'd already be happy if it would work with just the button to start/pause.

Please can someone tell me how to do that?

All I could find so far is an individual background sound for panoramas.
But that starts as soon as the panorama is opened. There's no option to trigger it on an individual event. (Why not? I have a customer that requests all sounds to be muted at the start to allow the visitor to decide when he wants the sound to start, which is totally right).

Also if I use the sound button in the control bar to mute the sound it won't pause but start the sound from the beginning, which is inconvenient and annoying.

Hours later:
With the plugins menu I now was able to create a button that seems to play sound on individual panoramas.

BUT:
- the button has only one state
- the button doesn't pause the sound, instead he stops and starts it from the beginning
- the sound will not be stopped when leaving the panorama, one doesn't hear it, but when you get back it's still running
- the sound is directional without the option to change parameters (which is unbearable with a narrative because it will chang volume while you look around and in some parts cannot be heard at all).

Oh, and did you know that there is a bug in the interface to create background sounds?
Open background sound, pick a file from the computer and as you see, by default "endless sound" is not checked and one loop will be played. Now click on another panorama-thumbnail in your tour overview and click again on the one with the sound. Now endless sound is checked

[mediavets]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by mediavets » Sat Feb 01, 2014 5:39 pm

[quote="jschrader"]PTP is giving me the creeps again because the implementation of sound features seems to be incomplete, unlogic and very confusing.

But I'll generously forget all about that if you can present a solution for a very basic tour feature that I wasn't able to build for my tour with RC2.

In a tour with several panoramas I want to play a different narrative sound on each panorama.
The sound must be paused at the start of the panorama.
The sound must start at the click of an individually designed and placed button.
The sound must pause on a second click of that button.
The button therefore should have two states.
The sound must stop if another panorama is opened.
In an ideal world there also would be a slider with a proper indicator how long the sound is, how much one has heard so far and full controls (start, stop, pause, etc.) but for now I'd already be happy if it would work with just the button to start/pause.

Please can someone tell me how to do that?[/quote
I don't know of any way to do that via the GUI of current version of the software.

You could get somewhere close to it IF the Toggle button plugin was pano-specific but it's not it is tour-wide (as are all current plugins).

[Destiny]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by Destiny » Sun Feb 02, 2014 1:16 am

Not sure the full story but there are complicated issues with the krpano player regarding playing sounds/audio, so I would guess WIP.. As you know, PTP uses the krpano player.. There are other options to add external players, which can auto play, stream and action via controls...

Destiny..

[jschrader]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by jschrader » Sun Feb 02, 2014 8:26 am

Krpano handles that perfectly well, I've been doing it manually for years.

The main problem with PTP seems to be the absence of basic functions and a lack of logic for sound handling.
Unfortunately creating useful interactive content needs a bit more than just linking panos.

[benji33]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by benji33 » Mon Feb 03, 2014 9:16 am

jschrader : Thanks for report.
A report is done on sound interface and must be improved.
Your observations will be added into.

[jschrader]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by jschrader » Mon Feb 03, 2014 7:24 pm

When?

[benji33]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by benji33 » Tue Feb 04, 2014 8:36 am

Not before a 2.X.

[jschrader]

Re: Using sound is awkward

by jschrader » Tue Feb 04, 2014 10:44 am

What a pity.
You were on such a good way with PTP 2.0 to become a useful tool to create rich media content.
On top of that I now have to see how to get along with my project and the clumsy editing of PTP code