Inserting movie stays blank the first time

[Sven Smolders]

Hi All,

I try to insert a movie in powerpoint 2003. The movie is placed in the same
directory as the presentation. It is an mpg movie. links are made relative
with fixlinks.

However, when I come to the slide with the movie and click it (set up like
this) the movie object becomes black. When I go back a slide and again to
the movie slide, click it again it works O.K.

Any smart brain who can solve this?

Best regards, Sven Smolders

 

[Sven Smolders]

Just to verify that fixlinks was completely able to fix the links:

- Was the movie added using Insert, Sounds and Movies, from file?
Yes

- Does a fixlinks report indicate that link is good (and pathless)?

Yes, for example: Media object: something.mpg is now path-free.

What happens if you copy both the presentation and the movie file to
C:\TEST
and run the presentation from there?

Both movies and presentation are in the same folder. When I put them in a
Path shorter than 128 the result stays the same. Even when I put them on a
USB-stick.

Are you starting the presentation by using File, then choosing one of the
files
on the most recently used files list? That will often cause problems with
links. Instead, try File, Open and browse to your PPT file.

Yes I'm opening the presentation like this, so that the home directory is
set to the presentation path.

I solved the problem by using a windows media player object instead of
inserting the movie. I can use a relative path directely in this component.
I've added a slide before the movie slide with a pic on it of the first
movie frame. When I click this picture the presentation moves to the next
slide and the movie is played. This solves the problem but isn't very clean.

I'm still wondering why the movie only plays when you go to the slide, and
click the movie, the second time. If I close the presentation and start it
again, I again need to do these actions to play the movie.

Thank you for your help.

Best regards,
Sven Smolders