If you are reading this on your own “˜personal’ computer, you will agree that computers are indeed that – personal. Screensavers for many are maybe a thing of the past, once being needed to prevent phosphor “˜burn-ins’ on CRT and plasma monitors. Today we use it mostly for visual appeal.
And that takes us to the download pages of the many screensaver sites out there. The one problem? They aren’t too personal or one never knows which one could be a malware pushing host.
How To Make An Animated Screensaver For Mac
To have the best of both worlds, why not make some of our own? Here are some ways to make your own screensaver without all the coding mumbo jumbo.
The Easiest Way To Make A Screensaver
It’s right there in Win XP and Vista!
Win XP
- Arrange your desired screensaver photos in a folder of your choice (or use the default My Pictures folder).
- Right click anywhere on the desktop to access the Display Properties applet. Select the Screen Saver tab and then drill down to Screen saver – My Pictures Slideshow – Settings.
- Configure the settings according to the options given and your first self made screen saver is ready to roll.
Vista
Vista makes it even easier to organize your photos through the Windows Photo Gallery feature. Within it are the tools to turn your pictures into a screensaver.
- Click on File – Screensaver – Settings.
- Choose Screen Saver list, and then select Photos.
- The Settings for the screensaver allows you to further customize the screensaver –
- You can show only pictures with a particular tag : Type the tag in the With this tag box that is associated with the pictures.
- Display only pictures with a particular rating : Click a star rating on the With this rating or higher list.
- Apply a slide show theme to your screen saver : Select one from the Use this theme list.
- Play your pictures and videos in random order : Check the Shuffle contents box.
The PowerPoint Way
We all get those high impact motivational PowerPoint attachments in our inbox sometime or the other. We can turn these into engaging screensavers quite easily with the help of PowerPoint 2007. I have one which shuffles around motivational quotes whenever my computer goes inactive.
- Open the presentation that will become your screensaver in PowerPoint 2007.
- Click on Office Button – Save As – Other Formats to open the Save As window.
- Through the Save As window, select an empty folder or create a new one to hold the PowerPoint images.
- Enter any file name you want. In the Save As Type dropdown scroll down to select any of the image formats (GIF, JPG, TIFF, PNG, BMP). Click Save.
- PowerPoint gives an option to save every slide or the current slide only as an image. Select one to click OK in the next dialog box to finish this part of the process.
- The screensaver can then be activated using the Display Properties – Screensaver tab as mentioned earlier.
Note: This method though fails to retain any animations, transitions and embedded rich media present in the original PowerPoint slide.
The Picasa Way
Picasa is one of the best free photo management apps out there and it has a nifty feature which allows you to set screensaver properties.
- Open Picasa and click on the Tools menu.
- Select Configure Screensaver. The system’s Display Properties applet appears with the Screen Saver tab active.
- The Settings button takes us into the configurable part of Google Photos Screensavers. Set the photo transition styles (collage, wipe, fade, pan and zoom etc.) from a dropdown, the photo duration (between 0 to 24 seconds) with the slider and photo captions with the checkbox.
- Google Photos Screensaver gives us many sources – Picasa collection, online Google Web album, public photo sites with photo feeds and specific folders to choose from. The Configure button for each source allow for individual settings.
- Click OK to save your changes.
The Flickr Way
You can get photo feeds from Flickr using Google Photos Screensaver. Another option is to use an open source tool called Flickr.NET Screensaver. This small application gets photos from Flickr and displays them as a screensaver. It enables you to select a wide range of photos, including your own, your contacts, and your favorites or from a group or global tag.
You can also get photos that are locked as private through an authentication which checks your permission to view a private Flickr album. The download is small at 423 KB and all it requires is .Net Framework 2.0 to install and run.
- The application can be run from the Display Properties applet. Choose Flickr in the dropdown list of the applet and to configure the Settings.
- Choose from the three – Per User, Per Group or Everyone, to source your photos. A few sub-options help to narrow down your choices.
- The Options tab is where you can play around with most of the screensaver display and duration settings. For instance, the three Drawing Methods (Plain, Postcard, and Moving) control how the photos will be rendered on the screen.With 3 Billion plus images to choose from, that’s a lot of stock for your screensaver.
The Flash Way
If you want rich and animated content for your screensaver then Flash is the way to go. And InstantStorm fits the job. This free Windows only software helps you to create Flash based screensavers as executable files.The user just has to choose the SWF file, configure the options and compile it into an executable file for installation as a screensaver. An integrated settings dialog designer allows you to customize the content of the screensaver’s settings dialog which is accessed through the Settings button in system display properties. Screensaver preview and settings dialog preview allows you to check out your work before you compile it into an executable.InstantStorm is compatible with Microsoft Windows 95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000, XP, 2003 and Vista.Even though I am among those who believe that the best screensaver is to power off the monitor, I have never resented a self-created and personal screensaver for myself.If you’d rather leave all the work to someone else, why not download one of these awesome screensavers for Windows10 Awesome Free Screensavers for Windows10 Awesome Free Screensavers for WindowsCool screensavers can make your PC look awesome when it's not in use. Try these awesome free screensavers for Windows 10.Read More?
A screensaver pops up on your computer screen after you have left the machine idle for a specified amount of time. The screensaver can be something as simple as a photo slideshow or it can be a video or animation. Installing a screensaver on your computer doesn't require a degree in computer science.
Step 1
Right-click in any empty location on your Desktop and select 'Properties' from the menu that appears. Glass alchemy user manual.
Step 2
Click on the 'Screensaver' tab in the 'Display options' window. Then, click on the the drop-down menu under the word 'Screensaver.'
Step 3
Select a screensaver you'd like to use from the list of available Windows screensavers. When you find one you think you like, click on the 'Preview' button. It will then give you a full-screen preview of what your selected screensaver will look like. Simply move your mouse or press a key on the keyboard to stop the preview.
How To Make An Animated Screensaver Windows
Step 4
Set a specific amount of time for your computer to wait after being idle before it launches the screensaver. Do this by clicking the up or down arrows next to the word 'Wait.'
Click the 'Apply' button and then click on 'OK.' You've now added a screensaver to your computer.
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It’s amazingly easy to set a beautiful picture as wallpaper in Windows operating system. The task can be accomplished by right-clicking on the picture file and then clicking Set as desktop background option.
Even though setting non-animated pictures as wallpaper is a simple task, Windows doesn’t support using animated picture or video as background out of the box. For Vista ultimate edition, Microsoft did release a feature called DreamScene to set a video file as desktop background but the feature isn’t officially available for Windows 7 and later versions of Windows.
Even though it’s pretty much possible to get DreamScene feature in Windows 7 with the help of third-party utilities, the feature doesn’t support animated GIFs out of the box. The DreamScene feature is compatible with only .MPG and .WMV formats.
So if you have a downloaded a cool animated GIF picture and want to set it as desktop background or wallpaper in Windows 7, there are two ways out there to set GIF file as desktop background.
The first method involves enabling DreamScene in Windows 7 and then converting GIF file to DreamScene compatible WMV file. Follow the given below instructions to enable the DreamScene feature, convert GIF to WMV and then set GIF (now WMV) as desktop background.
Use animated GIF file as wallpaper
Download ea sports cricket 2015 game khattakgames.com. Step 1: Download DreamScene Activator. Extract the zip file to get the DreamScene Activator.
Step 2: Run DreamScene Activator as administrator by right-clicking on it and then clicking Run as administrator option.
Step 3: Click Enable DreamScene button to enable DreamScene. The tool will automatically restart Windows Explorer to make necessary changes.
Step 4: Next, download the GIF file that you would like to use as wallpaper in Windows 7. If you already have the file, jump to the next step.
Step 5: Visit this GIF to WMV online converter, browse and upload the GIF file, convert the file to WMV format, and then download the same on to your PC. Note that you don’t need to enter anything under Optional settings.
Step 6: Finally, right-click on the downloaded WMV file and then click Set as background to use your GIF (now in WMV format) as your desktop background. You can pause the DreamScene by right-clicking on it and then clicking Pause DreamScene option.
And if you’re looking to set GIF picture file as desktop background without converting the same to WMV, you have very few free tools to choose from. Many of the tools that are available on the web are not clean from toolbars, extensions and other form of viruses. Out of the all the tools we tried and tested, BioniX Wallpaper Lite is the only free tool that doesn’t include browser toolbars and extensions.
BioniX Wallpaper Lite is a free software designed to manage desktop background in Windows. The tool comes with a tool called Wallpaper Animator to set animated GIF as desktop background. After downloading, installing and running BioniX Wallpaper Lite, navigate to Tools menu to access the Wallpaper Animator. Browse the GIF file that you would like to set as desktop background and then click on the GIF file in the added list to use it as wallpaper. The tool lets you adjust the animation speed and set the wallpaper style.
Good luck!