Media, backgrounds and presentations (PDF, PowerPoint, Keynote)

Media (⌘5) is where your church keeps its backgrounds, videos, music and presentations. Everything you upload is also visible on your church's other computers and apps. To upload and delete files you need an internet connection and the Media: Edit permission.

Shortcuts are written for Mac: on Windows and Linux, press Ctrl instead of ⌘ and Alt instead of ⌥ (⇧ is Shift).

Uploading

• Click Upload in the Media view or on the Media bar in Show. You can also drag files onto the window in those two views (Drop to upload). In Show, a file dropped on the plan goes into the plan instead.
• Supported files: images (JPG, PNG, WebP, GIF), video (MP4, MOV, M4V, WebM), audio (MP3, WAV, OGG) and presentations (PDF, PPTX, PPT, ODP, KEY). Video playback depends on your system, so test a new file before Sunday, especially MOV and M4V on Windows and Linux.
• One file can be up to 200 MB (a presentation up to 100 MB). Your church has 10 GB for media (200 MB before verification).

The filter at the top shows Images, Videos, Audio or Presentations.

Backgrounds

• Click an image or a video — that's Use as background (it gets the IN USE badge). A video background loops without sound.
• Built-in backgrounds (e.g. “Blue wave”, “Cross in light”, “Stained glass”) come with the app. You don't need to upload them, and they work offline.
• ☆ Make default — the app will start with this background on this computer (★ Default).
• Keep offline on a file — downloads it to this computer, so it works without internet, and the button changes to offline (a click removes the file again). It's a cache, not a permanent copy. When the cache goes over its limit (4 GB by default, Settings → Bible & offline), Prepare service removes the files you used longest ago, except the ones that plan needs. Lowering the Cache limit does the same. So check these files after preparing a service.

During the service you change backgrounds on the Media bar at the bottom of Show, on the Backgrounds tab. The ✕ tile means “no background” (or the theme background). A background picked here replaces the theme background — unless the theme has its own background for that kind of content (the default “WorshipPro Standard” theme has one for Scripture). For such an item the theme background stays, and the bar shows “This item: background from the theme”.

Careful: on the Media bar, right-clicking a tile deletes the file (after you confirm, from all devices).

An image or video as a plan item

Drag an image or a video from the Media bar (or straight from your computer) onto the plan in Show. An image shows full screen. A video plays once, with sound. Space plays and pauses. There is also a ⏮ button (From the start) and a volume slider.

Background music

The Audio tab on the Media bar: click a track to play it, e.g. before the service or during the offering. The ⏸ button (tooltip Fade out) lowers it gently over a second and a half. There is also a Volume slider.

Presentations: PDF, PowerPoint, Keynote

A sermon or announcements presentation is a normal plan item. You run it slide by slide with the same keys as songs.

How to add one (always with internet):

• Services → Add: → Presentation — the presentation goes to the end of the plan,
• in Show — the upload icon in the Plan panel (in a running service the presentation goes right after the current item), or drag the file onto the plan (it goes where you drop it),
• in Media — PPTX, PPT, ODP and KEY files become presentations by themselves. A PDF stays a plain document until you click Make a presentation. Then add it to the plan from the Media bar in Show (Backgrounds tab, Presentations group): click the tile or drag it onto the plan.

The server turns the file into slides. Next to the item you'll see “Uploading…”, then “Preparing slides…”, and finally the number of slides and a thumbnail of the first page.

When you add a PowerPoint or Keynote file to the plan (the first two ways above) and PowerPoint (Mac, Windows) or Keynote (Mac) is installed on the computer, the app converts the file in it, so the slides look exactly like the original (Settings → Slides → Presentations, option Convert in PowerPoint/Keynote when installed). In every other case — without those programs, on Linux, for ODP files and for files uploaded in Media — the server converts the file and the look is approximate. On a Mac, the system may ask for permission: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Automation → WorshipPro.

Speaker notes

Speaker notes show on the stage display, in the phone remote and in the presentation preview (click the presentation in Media). They never show in the room, on the stream or on the audience's phones. The server reads notes from PPTX files. Notes from Keynote and older PPT files only come through when PowerPoint or Keynote on this computer converted the file as you added it to the plan. While a presentation is on screen, you set the size of the notes on the stage display in the STAGE DISPLAY panel (Notes: small / medium / large / very large).

What a presentation can't do

• Videos inside a presentation won't play. Add the video as a separate plan item. When the server converts a PPTX file, the app names those slides (the warning “Videos won't play”; in the preview, “Video — won't play”).
• Animations show the final state of the slide.
• Limits: 300 slides, 100 MB, 3 minutes of conversion.
• An older Keynote file saved as a folder (package) can only be added to the plan on a Mac with Keynote. Otherwise, export it to PDF first.

Conversion failed? In Show, click the arrow icon next to the item in the Plan panel (tooltip “Turn the presentation into slides again”), or go to Media → the presentation → Convert again. If that doesn't help, export the file to PDF and upload the PDF.

G during a presentation lets you jump to a slide by number — handy when the speaker says “let's go back to slide 4”.

Prepare service downloads the presentation pages to the computer, so the presentation works without internet.

What's next

• Stage display, messages and timers
• Sunday without internet