Computer Genealogy Specialists

Working With Photos In PAF 4 & 5

(Article 21)

Photographs add a nice touch to a family group or pedigree. They spark interest to know more about how he or she lived, what they were like, and what they did with their life. PAF 4 and 5 both have the ability to show photographs in the Family-View (for the primary individual), in the slide show, and in the scrapbook display. Photographs can also be printed in several reports including the family group report, individual summary report, pedigree report, and the scrapbook report.

PAF (Personal Ancestral File) does not store photographs within a pedigree database. PAF allows you to create pointers to photos wherever they are stored on your computer. PAF keeps only some basic information about where to find the photo and how to display it. Included in the information it keeps is what portion of the photo will be displayed (for the screen display and slide show), the caption (title) and a two sentence description. The caption and description are used in the scrapbook display and printed reports.

The slide show and scrapbook functions in PAF, although interesting, are only basic functions with limited user options. If you are trying to tell someone's story, this is better done in a slide show product like Microsoft PowerPoint or Presentations. If you are trying to document someone's life on paper, this is better done in a word processor like Microsoft Word or WordPerfect. There you have full control over the size and placement of photos, including picture frames. There the text can be full-featured with bold, italics, and underlining, centering, font-sizing, text-boxes, spell-checking, and grammar-checking.

The ability to add photos to family groups, pedigrees, and individual summaries is by far the most useful part of PAF's ability to use photos. The slide show and scrapbook features are interesting but limited additions. Things to know about PAF photos:

PAF does not have the ability to communicate with your scanner or photo editing software. Therefore, you do not scan photos directly into PAF. Photos must be scanned first using other software and made display-ready, stored in a convenient folder, and then PAF can point to the photos and display them.

PAF does not have the ability to enhance the photos it displays with improved brightness, contrast, color balance or remove any blemishes such as dust and scratches. These functions must be done using a photo editor like Adobe Photo Deluxe or Microsoft Picture It.

PAF does have the ability to select a portion of the photo you want to display and to flip the photo left-to-right and top-to-bottom, and to rotate the image. Selecting the portion of the photo to display is useful when the photo includes a couple and you want to display only one individual.

PAF cannot export a photo to another location or change its format (BMP to JPG). Since PAF does not store photos but only points to them, it must use the photo in the format that is presented. Currently PAF can display 26 photo formats including the popular BMP, JPG, TIF , and Kodak Photo CD.

To add a prepared photo to PAF, highlight the individual in your in PAF database, then select from the menu-bar Edit and Multimedia (or click on the camera in the tool bar). In the Multimedia Collection window click on the Add button, then the Browse button. In the Open Photo File window, find the folder and photo file you want. Click on the photo file to highlight it and click on Open. The Add Multimedia Object window appears where you can add a caption (title) and a description (two sentences) to the photo, then click OK. The photo is now in the list (Multimedia Collection window). Click the Preview check box if you want to see a thumbnail preview of the photo. Click the Make Default check box to use this photo on screen displays and printed reports. Click Show to see a larger version of it. Click Modify for other display choices. Check the slide show and scrapbook functions to see the results of your choices. Click Close when finished with photos.

For a printer friendly version of this document contact CGS by email and request this document by number and title. It will be returned to you by email as soon as possible.

21 Working With Photos in PAF 4 & 5