In Windows Live Messenger (formally MSN) there is a feature called Dynamic Picture. What it dose is change your display picture to one of 4 different emotions based on emoticons used. For example if you use the smile icon then your display pic will change to a picture of you smiling for 4 seconds then turn back to normal.

All of these instructions are relevant to Windows Live Messenger version 14.

With Webcam
If you have a webcam then this is very easy to setup because you will not need to do any extra work.

Before you begin you need to make sure Windows Live Messenger (WLM) is using the correct camera settings. To do that go to the WLM main window and click the [Show Menu] button, the last button next to the search. You then want to go to [Tools] -> [Audio and video setup...]. The first screen you will see is the audio setup. You can change any of these setting if you want but are not required for this task so just hit [Next]. In the drop-down box select the camera that you would like to use and make sure that it is displayed in the big box below. Click [Finish]. WLM is now ready to use a webcam.

Now you are ready to create a Dynamic Picture. Start by clicking your display picture in the main window of WLM. Now click [Dynamic picture..]. Click the first frame and take a normal picture of yourself. Click the second frame and take a picture of yourself smiling. Repeat for the other frames. You can also change what action is done with the arrows below each frame.

Without Webcam
In some cases you may not have a webcam but still want to have a Dynamic Picture like the rest of the world. Don’t worry it can still be done and you have a few options to get you going. The first option is obvious, get a webcam, go buy one or borrow a friends. Option two, go to a friends that has a webcam. Your display picture will stay with you on all systems. Option three, I will describe in more detail below but involves virtual webcam software and a digital camera.

To start that third option you will need to get some virtual webcam software. This is software that you can install on your computer that can make other programs (like WLM) think that it is a webcam and will allow you to use videos, pictures or even another webcam in anything that requires a webcam. So start of by going to ManyCam and downloading the program and install it on your computer.

Now that the program is installed in your computer you now need to take some pictures of yourself with the digital camera and uplaod them to your compuer in a location that you can easily find them (Make sure the pictuers are not very big or the program will not accept them). When taking the pictures try to keep yourself in the center as best as posible, WLM will trim the sides.

Now that you have the pictures on your computer lets configure ManyCam. Open ManyCam and under the [Effects] tab click [Text over video] and make sure that [Show ManyCam.com Logo] is unchecked, that will get rid of the pesky logo. Under the [Sources] tab click [Still images] and then [Open new file], find your first picture (normal) then open it. You may need to click the picture in order for it to show up in the big box above.

Now go back to WLM and follow the above steps as if you had a webcam but make note of a few things when going so. When selecting camera you should use ManyCam Virtual Webcam. Also note that you need to go back to the still images page in ManyCam to change to the next picture.

That is how to get you started with Windows Live Messenger Dynamic Display Pictures. If you liked this tutorial then please leave comments.