Converting Photos to HD Question?

Question

I do not do much video editing so I'm not sure which would be the best way to do this. I am trying to make a HD DVD of about 200ish photos from the Masters. They are of course pics so it would be a slide show. I have Toast 7 and it has an app that came with it, and there is iMovie HD that came with OS X. What would be the easiest way to take the photos that are on my harddrive and convert them to high def and them burn them? I was doing pretty good with the app that came with Toast but it froze up the whole system when I was previewing the movie.
I did have the settings on high def and that is the first time I have heard both of the fans come on since I've had my MBP. Sorry for the stupid question, but I have never done this before.

Answer 1

Does anyone have know how to utilize HighDef on the
Macbook Pro, not just in this example?
Wanting to make it "HighDef" is impossible, because there are no burners for HD-DVD or Blu-Ray (the two competing formats for TRUE hd content.)
However, you CAN make your video 16:9 instead of 4:3 for the aspect ratio. That will make your video fit the widescreen format of an HDTV. I think that's what you have in mind.
Again, the way I do it is using Photo to Movie. Click on File, Make Movie. Then click Quicktime at the top. In the Movie Format dropbox, pick Custom. Then click Video... Choose Best for the quality, then pick 16:9 for the aspect ratio.
I saw in the comments above that you want to use software that came with your mac. Great. Here's how you do it in iPhoto. Select the pictures you want to make into a photo montage, then click Slideshow at the bottom.
In the slideshow, click the Settings button. Under the dropdown box for Slideshow Format, choose 16:9 Widescreen. That will fill the whole screen on an HDTV. Change the duration to somewhere between 6-8 seconds, depending on your preferences. Click OK.
the checkbox next to Ken Burns Effect, click end and enlarge it a little using the slider in the lower righthand corner. Now click preview. You'll see a little zoom effect. If you want it to zoom out, make the start bigger than the end. You can also choose where the picture starts and stops by clicking on it and dragging it around. Pretty cool! When you have the first picture the way you want it, click the right arrown in the bottom righthand corner of the screen and do it for the next one. And so on, and so on, ad nauseum.
Click on the music setting to select the music. I like to set up a playlist in iTunes that contains the songs I want to use. I then click the Settings button and say Fit Slideshow to Music. It will automatically adjust the length of each picture so that the pictures overlay the songs perfectly. If I have 12 min of music (three 4-minute songs) that's about perfect for 40-50 pictures.
When you're all ready, click the Play button and watch it. Fix anything you don't like.
Now when you're REALLY ready, click the Share menu up top, then pick Export to iDVD. Pick a theme in iDVD, burn it, and enjoy! This is obviously brief, but I figured you could get what I didn't cover here from the help files.
Good luck!
17" MacBook Pro   Mac OS X (10.4.7)