Playing a slideshow at the service: TV, laptop or USB

Ask the venue first

Before you decide how to play the slideshow, find out what the venue has. Funeral homes, churches and halls differ, and a short call or visit saves guesswork. Ask:

• Is there a TV or a projector, and can everyone see it from where they will sit?
• Does it have an HDMI input, and is there a cable long enough to reach a laptop?
• Will the TV play a video from a USB stick?
• Is there a computer that runs PowerPoint, and can you try your file on it beforehand?
• How does the sound work: through the TV's own speakers, or through a sound system, and who looks after it?
• When can you come in to test, and who will be there on the day to help?

Ask, too, whether they have a way they usually do it. If they do, it is often the simplest choice. If you are still making the slideshow, ask these questions before you make the final file; how to make a memorial slideshow goes through the rest.

Four ways to play it

Each of these ways has a format that suits it. If you make the slideshow here, it comes in the formats venues most often ask for: a single file that opens in any browser and works without internet, for a laptop connected to the television or projector (press F for full screen); an MP4 video, for sharing and for venues that only take video; a PowerPoint, for funeral homes that use one; and a folder of numbered images, for digital frames. There is more about each on the memorial slideshow maker page.

A laptop connected by HDMI

A laptop keeps the slideshow in your hands: you can start it, pause it and start it again yourself.

Connect the laptop to the TV or projector with an HDMI cable, then choose that HDMI input on the TV with its Input or Source button. If the laptop has no HDMI port, it needs an adapter, such as one from USB-C to HDMI.

Play a file that is saved on the laptop and works without internet. Venue Wi-Fi can be slow, busy or protected by a password nobody has on hand, and a slideshow that streams from a website depends on it. Keep the laptop's charger plugged in throughout.

If the TV shows an empty desktop rather than the slideshow, the laptop is treating it as a second screen. On Windows, press the Windows key and P together and choose Duplicate; on a Mac, open System Settings, then Displays, click the TV, and choose to mirror under Use as.

A USB stick with an MP4 video

Many TVs can play an MP4 video from a USB stick, with no laptop at all. Plug the stick into the TV's USB port and choose it from the TV's menu or its Source button.

Not every file plays on every set. The TV makers' own support pages say that the formats a TV can play vary by model, and that some files will not play, so try your stick in that TV before the day. If the TV does not show the stick at all, the way the stick is formatted may be the reason. Samsung, LG and Sony all list FAT32 among the ways a stick can be formatted for their TVs, so a stick formatted that way, or a different stick, may work. Bring the laptop as well, in case the TV will not play the file.

PowerPoint on the venue's computer

Some funeral homes play slideshows from their own computer, in PowerPoint. If the music came as a separate file, add it in PowerPoint first, with Insert, then Audio, and set it to play across all the slides. Then send the file ahead or bring it on a USB stick, and open it on their computer before the day to check that it plays as it should, with the music if there is any.

To make it repeat, choose Slide Show, then Set Up Slide Show, and check "Loop continuously until 'Esc'".

A digital photo frame

A frame is small, so it suits a table at the reception or a place beside the guest book rather than a whole room. Copy the photographs onto it by its memory card, a USB stick or its app, whichever it uses. If the frame has a shuffle setting, turn it off, and check its order setting: some frames sort by the date a photograph was taken or received, and some show the newest first.

Sound

An HDMI cable carries sound as well as the picture. If the TV stays silent, the laptop may still be sending its sound to its own speakers:

• On a Mac, open System Settings, then Sound, and choose the TV under Output.
• On Windows, open Settings, then System, then Sound, and choose the TV under Output.

A projector may have small speakers, or none. If so, ask whether the venue's sound system can take the laptop's sound, and who will connect it.

Check the volume from the back of the room, with the volume on both the laptop and the TV turned up to a sensible level. A full room soaks up sound, so set it a little louder than seems right when the room is empty.

Keep the screen awake

A laptop left alone turns its screen off after a while, and it can do so halfway through a slideshow. The day before, with the laptop plugged in, change its settings:

• On Windows, open Settings, then System, then Power & battery (Power & sleep on Windows 10), and set the screen and sleep times for when it is plugged in to Never.
• On a Mac, open System Settings, then Lock Screen, and set "Turn display off on power adapter when inactive" to Never. On an older Mac, the setting is "Turn display off after", under Battery or Energy Saver in System Preferences.
• Screen saver. Turn it off, if one is set.
• Do Not Disturb. Turn it on, so that messages do not pop up over the photographs. On Windows 10 it is called Focus assist.

Televisions can switch themselves off too. Some turn off after a period in which no one presses a button on the remote. On Samsung TVs, the settings are called Auto Power Off and Auto Power Saving, under Power and Energy Saving, and other makers may have similar settings.

Then let the slideshow run for longer than it will need to on the day, and check that nothing goes dark.

On the day

Arrive early, well before the first guests, to set everything up and to play the first minute with the sound on.

Give one person charge of the slideshow. It can be a friend or a cousin, so that the closest family are free to be with each other. That person knows how to start it, pause it and start it again, where the backup is, and whom to ask at the venue if something goes wrong. If the slideshow is to play as guests arrive, they start it before the doors open.

Bring a backup

Keep a second copy on another USB stick, carried by someone else, and a copy on a phone. If one stick fails or is left behind, there is another. A copy in online storage can also be downloaded to the venue's computer if everything else fails.

Different formats back each other up. If the laptop will not connect, the MP4 on a stick may play on the TV directly.

And if something does go wrong on the day, the service does not depend on it. A slideshow can be shown at the reception instead, or shared afterward. If you post it online, use music you have the right to use.

Looping through the reception

At a reception, a slideshow can play on a loop while people talk:

• On a laptop, a slideshow file that starts again on its own needs nothing more. If you play the MP4 instead, turn on the video player's repeat or loop setting.
• In PowerPoint, the "Loop continuously until 'Esc'" setting above keeps it going.
• On a TV playing from a USB stick, look for a repeat setting in its video player. If there is none, a laptop is the easier way to loop.
• A digital frame goes on through its photographs until it is switched off.

Lower the music at the reception, or turn it off, so that people can talk. How long a loop to aim for is in how many photos for a memorial slideshow.