Capture modes and layouts

Capture modes and layout assignment#

This is where you define what guests can see and choose during a session. There are three modes, each with the same structure.

A fourth mode can join them: if the AI portraits run as a flow of their own (see Creative features), AI portrait appears between Photo and GIF. It is switched on there; here it gets a block of its own with layouts, display order, default layout, layout selection and print permission. As long as the mode is not running, the block is hidden.

Per mode you set:

• Available layouts — at least one, otherwise the mode cannot be enabled.
• Display order for the guest — the chosen layouts are listed on top with their position, the arrows move them. Guests see them in this order on the selection screen. A newly ticked layout goes to the end.
• Allow guests to choose the layout — with it off, the default layout is always used.
• Default layout — applies when guests may not choose; "automatic selection" leaves it to the software.

For GIF and boomerang there is more: the output format, repeats and whether printing is allowed. The repeats say how often the animation appears in the finished video; GIF and WebP loop endlessly anyway.

The GIF is a photo series: number of photos, pause between photos and display time per picture. Each photo is taken by the photo camera with the real shutter, at full resolution. The pause runs as a countdown so the guests can strike a new pose between the photos

• changing poses or props are the typical GIF effect. The display time decides how long each

photo stays in the finished GIF.

The boomerang is a short clip from the live view: clip length in seconds and playback speed. The capture runs exactly as long as the clip length, with every camera and every webcam. A slow camera delivers fewer frames in that time; the photo booth measures how fast the frames came and plays them back accordingly. If a camera delivers fewer than ten frames per second, the clip runs faster than recorded - at true speed the movement would visibly stutter. The playback speed doubles or halves the result on purpose.

The output format decides what the animation becomes. GIF is the default and works everywhere, including as a mail attachment and on older devices; it also makes the largest file. WebP gives the smallest file with better colours, but older mail programs do not animate it. MP4 video is what guests need to post a capture on Instagram - a GIF cannot be uploaded there. An MP4 is extended to at least three and a half seconds because Instagram rejects shorter videos. Out of the box the boomerang becomes an MP4 and the GIF mode a GIF. Existing events keep their setting; switching is done deliberately by hand.

There is also exclude single shots from data processing - switched on out of the box. In an animation the single frames are steps of the movement; if they travel along into the cloud or into an export folder, the web photo album shows a dozen near-identical images next to every animation, and more personal pictures leave the booth than necessary. Switch the option off only when the single frames are genuinely needed - for later editing, for instance. It also applies to everything handed over after the event. On the photo booth itself the single frames remain - if they are needed after all, switching the option off and running the transfer again brings them along.

Layout details on screen#

Which details of a layout the booth shows guests - separated by the two places where they appear:

• Layout selection screen — title, description and number of captures.
• Capture and info screens — layout title and capture counter, in the picture preview as well.

The selection screen only appears when guests may choose the layout themselves. With the choice switched off for a mode, the three upper switches have no effect.

Layout editor#

Layouts are built in the layout editor — image slots, frames, texts, graphics, backgrounds. It has a chapter of its own; here only the assignment of layouts to modes is set.

Layouts belong to the event. A preset brings its own, and a copy of an event takes over its layouts.