Export Slideshow

Export Slideshow turns a set of photos into a self-contained slideshow folder you can copy to a USB stick, hand to a family member, or upload to a cloud drive and share as a link. Whoever receives it opens it in Rando on Windows or Mac and it plays exactly the photos you picked, in the order you picked.

Nothing is uploaded anywhere by Rando. The export is a folder on your own disk, and where it goes next is entirely up to you.

Available on Windows and Mac

There is one slideshow format, not a Windows one and a Mac one. A slideshow you export on a Mac plays on a PC, and one exported on a PC plays on a Mac, with the same photos in the same order.

Only where you find the commands differs, because each platform puts "make me a file" commands in a different menu:

Windows: Slideshow → Export Slideshow... and Slideshow → Open Exported Slideshow...
Mac: File ▸ Export Slideshow… and File ▸ Open Exported Slideshow…

Everything else in this guide applies to both.

Why you'd use it

Share a slideshow with friends or relatives who don't have your photo library.
Put a memorial or wedding slideshow on a USB stick for a venue to play.
Keep a curated set of photos together, complete with the timing and look you set up.

Exporting a slideshow

Select the photos you want. Everything currently selected in the grid goes into the export, so use the grid, tag filters, or a saved selection to get the set you want first. (On Mac, if nothing is selected, everything currently loaded is exported.)
Choose Slideshow → Export Slideshow... on Windows, or File ▸ Export Slideshow… on Mac.
Give it a Name. This becomes the folder name and the title the recipient sees. On Mac, the name is filled in from the folder your photos came from, and the exact folder name Rando will create is shown right underneath as you type.
Pick where to save it — Save in on Windows (your Desktop by default, or Browse...), or Where on Mac (click Choose…).
Choose the options you want (see below).
Click Export.

A progress bar shows the photos being prepared. You can click Stop at any point; a cancelled export leaves nothing behind — the folder only appears once it's complete.

When it finishes, Rando tells you how many items were exported and how big the folder is.

On Windows, it opens the folder in File Explorer.
On Mac, you get a Show in Finder button and a Share… button. Share hands the finished slideshow (the .zip if you made one, otherwise the folder) straight to AirDrop, Mail, Messages, or anything else in your share menu — handy for getting it onto another Mac in the room without a USB stick. What gets shared is the ordinary slideshow folder, so it still opens on a PC.

The summary tells you about anything unusual as an exact count rather than a vague warning: photos that couldn't be read and were left out, duplicate photos that were stored once, videos that needed a backup frame for their preview image, videos that couldn't produce a preview image at all, and animated images stored as a still frame. If the .zip couldn't be made, Rando says so — the slideshow folder itself is still finished and ready to copy.

Options

The same four options are on both platforms; the Mac sheet groups them under Slideshow: and Include: with shorter labels (Videos, Original photo files, Original file names, A .zip copy, for sharing).

Photos only, or photos and a built-in player

Photos only is the smaller export and the one to use for sharing. The recipient opens it in Rando.

Photos and a built-in player produces a folder that plays on a PC without Rando installed. This option becomes available in a future update.

Include the original photo files

Off by default. The exported slideshow always contains display-ready copies of your photos, which is all it needs to play beautifully on any screen.

Turn this on when you want the recipient to have the full-quality original files as well — for printing, or as a backup. It makes the export several times larger.

Include videos

On by default. Videos in your selection are copied as-is and get a preview image so they appear in the slideshow. Turn this off for a photos-only export.

If a video can't be read on your computer (on Windows that usually means a missing codec), Rando tells you how many videos were affected rather than failing the whole export. Macs can read more video formats out of the box, so a slideshow exported from a Mac will often carry videos a PC would have skipped. That's fine either way: every video in a slideshow is required to have a preview image, so a machine that can't play one shows the preview instead.

Include the original file names

On by default, because file names are often what makes a shared slideshow make sense. Turn it off to leave the file names out of the exported slideshow entirely.

Creates a single .zip file next to the exported folder. This is the easiest thing to email or upload to Google Drive, Dropbox, or OneDrive.

Your slideshow settings travel with it

The export records your current slideshow settings — how long each photo stays up, transitions, background, scaling, whether it loops, the image filter, whether the filename and progress are shown, and the order (including the exact shuffle, so the recipient sees the same order you previewed).

These travel as preferences, not requirements. Rando applies them when the slideshow opens, and whoever opens it is free to change anything they like. Your own Rando preferences are never changed by opening someone else's slideshow — the settings are used for that one show and then forgotten.

An exported slideshow always opens as a standard one-photo-at-a-time slideshow, so your Collage settings are not carried over. That's deliberate: a slideshow someone hands you should never rewrite how your own Collage wall behaves.

Before it writes: space and drive checks

Rando checks the destination before it starts, so an export never fails halfway through a USB stick:

The projected size is shown next to how much space is free where you're saving.
If there isn't enough room, Export is disabled and Rando says how much is needed. Freeing up space, turning off "Include the original photo files", or choosing another destination all fix it.
If it will be tight, you get a warning but can go ahead.
On a FAT32 drive, the "Also create a .zip" option is unavailable when the slideshow would exceed 4 GB. FAT32 can't hold a single file that large, so the .zip could never be written. The slideshow folder itself exports normally — only the .zip is off the table.

If something goes wrong mid-export (a stick pulled out, a drive that fills unexpectedly), Rando fails cleanly and leaves nothing half-written at the destination. A slideshow that was already there is untouched.

Opening an exported slideshow

Choose Slideshow → Open Exported Slideshow... on Windows, or File ▸ Open Exported Slideshow… on Mac.
Pick the exported folder (the one containing bundle.json). If you received a .zip, unzip it first and pick the folder inside.
The slideshow starts.

If some photos are missing

Copies from USB sticks and cloud downloads sometimes don't finish. If some photos didn't make it, Rando tells you exactly how many and offers to play the rest:

3 of 148 items could not be read and will be skipped.
145 items will play.

Click OK (Continue on Mac) and the slideshow plays everything that's intact. Rando never refuses a slideshow that still has photos in it.

If some items are a kind of media your copy of Rando can't play, you're told how many of those there are too, and they're skipped.

If the copy is damaged badly enough that nothing can be read, Rando says so and suggests copying it again — that's almost always the fix. The same goes for a folder that isn't a slideshow at all, or one made by a newer version of Rando than you have.

Missing original photo files (the optional extra) never stop the slideshow. Rando mentions them and plays normally.

Tips

For sharing by link, use Photos only with Also create a .zip — that's the smallest, simplest thing to hand someone.
For a venue or a photo frame, export to the USB stick directly rather than exporting to your Desktop and copying afterwards.
Set up the slideshow the way you want it (timing, transitions, order) before you export, so the recipient gets it exactly as you intended.
Duplicate photos in your selection are stored once, so mixing folders that overlap doesn't waste space.
Rando may tidy up the folder name slightly. Characters Windows won't allow in a folder name, trailing dots, and a handful of names Windows reserves are all adjusted, even when you're exporting from a Mac — because the whole point of an exported slideshow is that it can be carried to a Windows machine. The title the recipient sees is the name you typed.
On a Mac, use Share… on the finished export to AirDrop it to someone in the room. It's the same folder a USB stick would carry, so they can pass it on to a PC afterwards.