Applying different color keys to one layer in AE In After Effects, I have an image layer that consists a few colors. Underneath I have several other layers (textures). I want to replace each color of the image
above with one of the textures below.
Is there an easy way to apply multiple color keys to this one image - and to link each color key to a different texture layer?
Thank you

You'll have to make as many duplicates of the layer as there are colours. Apply the appropriate key to each copy, and place the layer you want it to reveal beneath it. On the revealed layer use a track matte, and set it to "Alpha Inverted…". This will hide the keyed layer and use its alpha channel (transparency) to reveal the layer underneath it, but only in the transparent areas.
Your layer stack will look like this, but for any areas not in any of the keys you'll also need a copy of the original layer at the bottom of the stack:


How to cutting a video and keep all format and metadata I want to cut long videos into several smaller parts without changing any format and metadata from the original video.

I used these commands

  ffmpeg -i input -ss 00:00:05 -t 100 -c:a copy -c:v copy output

  ffmpeg -i input -ss 00:00:05 -t 100 -metadata "major_brand=mp42, minor_version=0" -c:v copy -c:a copy output

  ffmpeg -i input -ss 00:00:05 -t 100 -map_metadata 0 -c:v copy -c:a  copy output

  ffmpeg -i input -ss 00:00:05 -t 100 -map_metadata 0 -b:v 460k -c:a  copy output

but still get different results from the original video.

Is there another command that I can use for cutting the video with metadata results identical to the original one ?

Thanks

FFmpeg only allows you to alter/override the major brand, not the minor.

Command is

ffmpeg -i input -ss 00:00:05 -t 100 -brand mp42 -c:v copy -c:a copy output

MP4box will allow you to override both.

mp4box -brand mp42:0 file.mp4

If you want to change the handler name as well, use

mp4box -brand mp42:0 -name 2="IsoMedia File Produce by Google" file.mp4

(2 is the track index i.e. the 2nd track)


Premiere Pro shifting keyframes during an insert edit During an insert edit all clips (video and audio) shift right except the keyframes (track volume) themselves on the audio tracks. Similar if I select all and move, keyframes are not included. How can I shift the audio track along with its keyframes during an insert?

When I do an insert edit (using the shortcut '.' key) in CC 2018, I do not see this problem.

Make sure the Source Patching on the audio tracks is selected correctly, otherwise the audio tracks won't move when you do the insert?  Apologies if this is teaching you to suck eggs - maybe a screen recording would better demo what's going wrong?

Before insert edit

After insert edit (note keyframes have moved)


in iMovie, does adding title at the start of a clip cuts the clip portion from there? I am trying to learn iMovie and I have a question. Does adding title at the start of a clip cuts the clip portion from there?

Scenario:
Let us assume that i have a 50 seconds clip and I want to display a 3 seconds title Before the actual clip starts. if i drag a title from the titles section of the iMovie to the start of the loaded clip, will the initial 3 seconds of my clip be removed or will the clip be extended   resulting a clip of 53 seconds (50+3) ?

If you put the title before the video and put the video after the title, it will extend the length.  If you put the title over the video, it will simply be placed over top of the first few seconds of video and the length will remain the same.


ffmpeg trying to convert AVI to MP4 but not playing I'm trying to convert a video file from AVI to MP4 but it doesn't seem to play, my code:

exec("ffmpeg -i ".$video." -c:v libx264 -pix_fmt yuv420p -movflags faststart ".$withoutExt.".mp4")

Even plain code:

exec("ffmpeg -i ".$video." ".$withoutExt.".mp4")

Any ideas please and thanks in advance.

You should specify the audio codec, e.g. -c:a libvo_aacenc.


C4D - Nothing seems to fix this stupid black screen I am having this ridiculous problem in Cinema 4D. I created a new project with NOTHING in it. Trying to render it gives me a black screen. I tried adding lights, infinite lights sky, turning off OpenGL rendering... but nothing happens!! I have searched everywhere for a solution but nobody seems to have a problem like this. It worked about a day ago. I updated my graphics driver too.. still nothing happens. Also, EVERYTHING is black, not just one object. Remember, this happened in an empty project i just created with nothing in it.

Are you sure it is not functioning as intended?  What do you expect to occur on an empty project?  I would expect that it should still be black even if you add lights as there is nothing for the lights to reflect off of.  If you haven't assigned materials to the objects, depending on the render mode, I'd still expect nothing to show up as it wouldn't be able to reflect any light back at the camera.

Make sure you have lights in the scene, an object (with actual surface geometry) in the scene and materials on the object.  If you're still getting black, you may be able to try different render modes.  I'm not familiar with Cinema4D specifically, but typically there are different render modes available.  This may also be what changed resulting in a change in behavior from what you are used to.  Some render modes behave differently in incomplete scenes than others.


How to import many .MOV files to Sony Vegas? I have a problem with Sony Vegas. When ever I import too many .MOV files, Sony Vegas Pro 13, doesn't accept them, so they are black in the preview screen.

However, if I import only 4 or 5 .MOV files to Vegs, it accepts them and I can see the clips in the preview screen. But when I go over that limit of 4 or 5, Sony Vegas doesn't accept the .MOV files, and now all of the clips are black in preview.

How do I make it so that I can import as many .MOV files as I want to SonyVegas.

I have Quicktime installed and also unchecked the option in preferences>video that says something like close media when other apps are open.

This is a known problem. Quicktime for Windows is 32-bit only, and that presents a memory ceiling for the QT handler/decoder. What's worked for me, including in a current project, where I'm working with hundreds of of 5D MkIII files, is to import in batches. Once done, I have no issues loading or working with the project even if many of those are used on the timeline. I should say that often I'm able to import many clips without needing to divide the import step into batches.

As suggested in the linked forum thread, try rolling back to QT 7.6.2 or Quicktime Alternative, and see if that provides a more permanent solution.


Video Camera with Detachable Viewfinder and Remote Control I am wondering if there is a camcorder/video camera out there with a touchscreen viewfinder that is detachable and can be used remotely via a cable.

I want to be able to control all features of the camera by this screen (zoom, focus, start recording, etc). Additionally a live view of what the camera is recording is needed.

I know that many DSLRs/Video can be controlled by smartphone/tablet but the features are limited and lag is a problem. I do not want wireless for this reason.

Does anybody know a camera that does this?

I am not a professional so the price range has to be around £600-£1000 ($1019-$1700).

Thanks

It is probably pretty unlikely in your price range.  Remote monitors are a common feature on high end professional gear where different features of the camera are actually being controlled by multiple operators and reviewed by a director and cinematographer.  Having a removable, touch, control interface however, is an exceedingly rare need in the consumer market.  The closest you will likely come is a wireless, wifi based control that lets you control the camera and record to the camera itself (so minimal lag on the controls) even if there is slight lag in the video feed itself.

You could look for cameras with a firewire interface and remote control software for a tablet.  That would be lower latency than wireless, but I'm not sure that many new cameras include that kind of support.

You could also consider the more limited option of an HDMI or SDI field monitor and a basic LANC controller or similar.  This would allow you to have a super low latency monitor and super low latency controls, but the controls would be more limited.  It would probably still end up pushing the edge of your price range though.  The monitor itself is generally $100 or more alone and can easily go upwards of $200 for a marginal quality one.


Timing of script pages (I'm making a short film with a friend, and we want to make this as close as possible to a blockbuster film without blowing our budget. We have spent about $5000 on a camera, lenses and two microphones. So we have made an outline of the movie and I've started making the script. I'm using Final Draft 8.)

I've written the first page which describes what happens when the actors and our names appear in the beginning of the movie and the start of the first scene. I figured that all this lasts exactly 1 minute, and the page is only 3/4 full. Should I expand the page, should I start on a new page or should I just continue and end up with a page describing 1.5 minutes?

(Do you know about a good website where you can learn all you need about this stuff? All the websites seems to have their own interpretation about how you should write a script. Some make them for Word, WordPad and so on.. As I said, I use Final Draft 8.)

As a rough estimate, one page of a script equates to one minute of screen time. It is impossible to say exactly how long a page will last on screen because it relies on too many factors.

You shouldn't worry about trying to make each page go for exactly one minute. You'll find that some pages will go over a minute on screen and some will go under. So don't start a new page - that'd be incorrect script formatting and if you give an incorrectly formatted script to a producer you'll have no hope of getting it made.

I've found the best way to learn how to write screenplays (other than professional lessons) is to read screenplays. Here are a few websites that you can find scripts on:

Drew's Script-O-Rama

Screenplays for You

Simply Scripts

Daily Script

I haven't used Final Draft to write scripts before. I use Celtx and it's an amazing program. It's free and it formats the script for you as you go. I highly recommend it.


Create a Video File or PNG Sequence of Writing Out A Word I  was wondering if there is a generator, or something out on the web where you type a word, and it would create a video file of it being written out.

I want to embed the file on a site, so when you go there the first time, it's not just loaded, it autoplays the video, so it starts to write the word and finishes writing the word.

How could I get something like this?

If there is no generator, could I accomplish this in photoshop? I'm not sure what to search

Thanks

Ermm Not sure Video Production is appropriate for this...

It can be done in flash,

Please migrate back to graphic design.

It depends on whether you need to to do this based on a raster image of a finished typeface design or if you are starting from scratch.
For both cases you can use flash like shown in the video you linked or you can use After Effects to have some more control over the look, doing this frame by frame is no that easy if you are after specific timing, instead you probably want to keyframe this.

After Effects is pretty great for this job, it has the so called "Stroke" effect where you can let After Effects draw a line based on a vector shape or "Masks" in After Effects.

You basically draw a vector path and the effect will draw along that path based on keyframes you set, you can also alter the line width of the "pencil" and have overall a much larger control of the look of the "writing".

Here is a small tutorial explaining the basics of the effect:


ffmpeg not creating exact duration clip I am trying to create small clips from video file using ffmpeg3. The type of clip and video will be same i.e. mp4 to mp4 only. Below is command, which is being used for same.

ffmpeg -ss 00:07:00.000 -t 0:00:02.000 -i source.mp4 -codec copy -y output.mp4

The duration for clips generated is not same, they always have additional seconds with them i.e. 4,5 or 6 seconds. I have tried this on multiple videos and behavior is same.

Since, the output and input type is same. So I am not using any encoding or decoding, as it will be time consuming process.

Please share suggestions on same.

The help for seeking using ffmpeg explains the problem.

  Seeking while doing a codec copy

  Using -ss as input option together with -c:v copy might not be accurate since ffmpeg is forced to only use/split on i-frames. Though it will—if possible—adjust the start time of the stream to a negative value to compensate for that. Basically, if you specify "second 157" and there is no key frame until second 159, it will include two seconds of audio (with no video) at the start, then will start from the first key frame. So be careful when splitting and doing codec copy.

If you transcode (not copy) then:

  As of FFmpeg 2.1, when transcoding with ffmpeg (i.e. not just stream copying), -ss is now also "frame-accurate" even when used as an input option.

Your options are:

Accept splits on i-frames and work with the output as-is, based on the options used. This is what you have now.
Recompress:

Fast Input Seeking: The -ss parameter needs to be specified somewhere before -i. The input will be parsed using keyframes, which is very fast.

  ffmpeg -ss 00:23:00 -i Mononoke.Hime.mkv -frames:v 30 out1.mkv

Slow Output Seeking: The -ss parameter needs to be specified after -i. This will be done very slowly, frame by frame. As of FFmpeg 2.1, the main advantage is that when applying filters to the output stream, the timestamps aren't reset prior to filtering (i.e. when burning subtitles into a video, you don't need to modify the subtitle timestamps), but the drawback is that it will take a lot of time until it finally reaches that time point.

  ffmpeg -i Mononoke.Hime.mkv -ss 00:23:00 -frames:v 30 out2.mkv

Adjust the start time forward so that when it ends on an i-frame the total duration is close to the desired duration.

Slow Combined Seeking: For this we specify the -ss parameter before and after -i. This approach uses keyframes to seek until 00:22:30, and then seeks frame-by-frame until it reaches 00:00:30 (00:22:30 + 00:00:01), continue increasing the second -ss option until the duration is short enough; unfortunately you'll lose an exact start and end time and the duration may only be approximately close to the desired amount.

  ffmpeg -ss 00:22:30 -i Mononoke.Hime.mkv -ss 00:00:01 -frames:v 30 out3.mkv

Note: Cutting small sections

  To extract only a small segment in the middle of a movie, it can be used in combination with -t which specifies the duration, like -ss 60 -t 10 to capture from second 60 to 70. Or you can use the -to option to specify an out point, like -ss 60 -to 70 to capture from second 60 to 70. -t and -to are mutually exclusive. If you use both, -t will be used.

  If you specify -ss before -i only, the timestamps will be reset to zero, so -t and -to have not the same effect. If you want to keep the original timestamps, add the -copytsoption.

  Cut from 00:01:00 to 00:03:00 (in the original), using the faster seek:

  ffmpeg -ss 00:01:00 -i video.mp4 -to 00:02:00 -c copy cut.mp4

  Cut from 00:01:00 to 00:02:00, as intended, using the slower seek:

  ffmpeg -i video.mp4 -ss 00:01:00 -to 00:02:00 -c copy cut.mp4

  Cut from 00:01:00 to 00:02:00, as intended, using the faster seek:

  ffmpeg -ss 00:01:00 -i video.mp4 -to 00:02:00 -c copy -copyts cut.mp4

  If you cut with stream copy (-c copy) you need to use the -avoid_negative_ts 1 option if you want to use that segment with the concat demuxer. Example:

  ffmpeg -ss 00:03:00 -i video.mp4 -t 60 -c copy -avoid_negative_ts 1 cut.mp4

  Valid values for the avoid_negative_ts variable are:

avoid_negative_ts integer (output)

‘make_non_negative’

Shift timestamps to make them non-negative. Also note that this affects only
leading negative timestamps, and not non-monotonic negative timestamps.

‘make_zero’

Shift timestamps so that the first timestamp is 0.

‘auto’ (default)

Enables shifting when required by the target format.

‘disabled’

Disables shifting of timestamp.

When shifting is enabled, all output timestamps are shifted by the same
amount. Audio, video, and subtitles desynching and relative timestamp
differences are preserved compared to how they would have been without
Shifting.


How to add a time stamp using ffmpeg to a screenshot capture of a video I am trying to output a screenshot of a video at an specified time and the resulting picture should have a black square with the time that was given initially.

So far I was only able to produce a screenshot using vframes from the example at the documentation on ffmpeg page which is this below:

ffmpeg -i input.flv -ss 00:00:14.435 -vframes 1 out.png

But I would like to add a timestamp in the resulting thumbnail or capture of the video which would show that '00:00:14.435' using arial fontface and a black square as background an yellow as fontcolor. Can this be done?.

Use

ffmpeg -start_at_zero -copyts -ss 00:00:14.435 -i input.mp4
    -vf "drawtext=fontfile=/path/to/Arial.ttf:
          fontsize=45:fontcolor=yellow:box=1:boxcolor=black:x=(W-tw)/2:y=H-th-10:
          text='Time\: %{pts\:hms}'"
    -vframes 1 output.png


What is the difference between Refresh Rate and Flicker Rate? Can anyone explain in detail the difference between Refresh rate and Flicker rate in a CRT ?

In the context of a CRT vs. flat panel, that is a Cathode Ray (vacuum) Tube, you have to consider the following:

1) Video sync as broken down to Vertical and Horizontal scan rates.

2) Phosphor persistence (the length of time the phosphor coating on the inside of the CRT will glow). "Phosphors are available with persistences ranging from less than one microsecond to several seconds."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathode_ray_tube

These two factors will determine the overall picture quality with regard to time.

Refresh rate would be best explained as vertical frames per second, for NTSC it is 60 fps.

Flicker rate includes the refresh rate plus factoring in the persistence of the phosphor.

Long persistent phosphors were employed in radar screens and O'Scopes as to allow objects to last longer on the screen while shorter persistent phosphors were employed in most consumer TVs to reduce motion blur.

"Flicker occurs on CRTs when they are driven at a low refresh rate, allowing the brightness to drop for time intervals sufficiently long to be noticed by a human eye..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flicker_(screen)


Best way to dub the voice in a very low budget or no budget film I am in the middle of making of a short movie. I have tried dubbing in ordinary mike and later clearing the noise in adobe auditions. But it is not working for me. Can I know the best trick to dub clear voice without using any expensive gadgets. Your advice will help me in my low budget short. Thank you :)

It sounds like you are using your laptop's microphone, and that your main problem is the lack of a quality mic. If you own an iPhone, especially iPhone 5 or later, I would recommend you use the voice recorder app, and email the audio files to yourself using the Share button. The iPhone's microphone is surprisingly good for audio. High end Android phones also tend to have good mics. Using your phone means you don't have to purchase any additional equipment.

If it helps, this guy measured the frequency response of the iPhone 3GS back in 2009, and it's a pretty safe bet that the newer models use mics of either the same or better quality.

Fun fact, the iPhone 5 actually has three microphones. The voice recorder app only takes input from the mic along the bottom edge.

Also make sure you're recording in a very still, closed-off room. If you are editing in Adobe Premiere Pro, syncing the audio to the video afterwards shouldn't be a huge problem!


Finding frames in video that match an image I'm trying to find frames in a video that match a certain input image.  I'm currently using this command:

ffmpeg.exe -i video.mp4 -loop 1 -i image.jpg -an -filter_complex "blend=difference,blackframe=99:32" -f null -

This spits out the frames whose difference between the input image is less than 32 for 99% of the pixels.  The problem is the process doesn't appear to stop.

Sample output (exited manually - video is only 8mins long):

[Parsed_blackframe_1 @ 0000000003421660] frame:6498 pblack:100 pts:3326976 t:216.600000 type:P last_keyframe:6496
[Parsed_blackframe_1 @ 0000000003421660] frame:6499 pblack:99 pts:3327488 t:216.633333 type:P last_keyframe:6496
[Parsed_blackframe_1 @ 0000000003421660] frame:9839 pblack:99 pts:5037568 t:327.966667 type:P last_keyframe:9832
[Parsed_blackframe_1 @ 0000000003421660] frame:9840 pblack:99 pts:5038080 t:328.000000 type:P last_keyframe:9832
frame=18321 fps=495 q=-0.0 Lsize=N/A time=00:10:25.26 bitrate=N/A speed=16.9x
video:8731kB audio:0kB subtitle:0kB other streams:0kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead: unknown
Exiting normally, received signal 2.

Is there a way to tell ffmpeg to stop once it reaches the end of the file, or is there maybe a different way to achieve what I'm trying to do?

I'm using version ffmpeg version n3.2.9-1-g519a54c

The blend filter can be told to terminate with the shortest input, which in your command, will be the video.

-filter_complex "blend=difference:shortest=1,blackf...


How to Record Screen in 4K on 1920x1080 monitor? (OBS Studio) Is it possible to record in 4K when you have 1920x1080 monitor?
I am currently using OBS Software.

If so, please let me know how?
In my obs setting the Base Resolution and Output Resolution at maximum show 1920x1080

The easiest way I think would be to set up a virtual machine. I use VMWare Workstation 12. However Virtualbox is free. Youd have to install your OS and screen capture software (such as Bandicam which I use and recommend) on the Virtual Machine.

But you could run the VM at 4K resolution and use it to record at 4K even on a 1920x1080 host machine without issue provided you have enough RAM and CPU power to do so. (Most machines should).

Another upside is you could minimze the virtual machine while its capturing and still use your computer without interfering with your screen capture.


4:3 source going to a 16:9 projector At our church we have an older 4:3 projector we'd like to upgrade.  Funding does not currently allow us to go with a 16:9 screen, but we don't want to be stuck with a 4:3-only projector if we're going to be going widescreen in the next 2-3 years.

So I thought we might get a 16:9 projector now, use it to project our existing 4:3 song slides (1024x768), then upgrade the screen in the future and do full 16:9 projecting.

However I'm unsure what the video quality will be.

Can 16:9 projectors project in 4:3 at the same quality that a native 4:3 projector would?  (I know that computer monitors have their native resolutions, and anything else looks fuzzy.  Not sure if the same is true of projectors)
If a 16:9 projector is filling a 4:3 screen with a 4:3 projected image, will the lamp show faint bars going off the sides of the screen?  (i.e. does it project several black pillarboxes on the side?)

our existing 4:3 song slides (1024x768)

The real resolution of a slide depends on the program and file format they are in. If the slides are in PowerPoint or similar, they have no native resolution, they have a proportion.

If they are JPG files or a video, yes, you are stuck with the resolution.

A projector has indeed a native resolution, if it is a 16:9 of good quality it could be full HD 1920x1080 or simply HD 1280x720px, in some cases 1366x768px.

A JPG of 1024x768 will be resampled but I really doubt this would be an issue. In any case it is better to store the slides as a real slide, and not as a "photo".

Regarding if a projector will "projet bars" depends on the model and on the graphics card of the computer sending the data. Most likely the computer will also send a 16:9 signal, and the bars will be given by the application, not by either the computer or the projector.

But if your computer sends an old SD signal, the projector might squish or squash the image.


share desktop to laptop to stream from laptop I want to to stream from my laptop to lessen the stress on my desktop but I don't know how to share my desktop screen with my laptop to be able to stream my face as well as my game-play but I don't know how to do so.

Any help is appreciated.

Well, you could use the normal tools to get video off your desktop.  Instead of having it go to twitch (or whatever), it would go to your laptop.  You'd use a high quality / bitrate, with minimal CPU usage settings.  x264 is probably still the best codec, since ethernet driver CPU time will start to matter if data rates are TOO high.  So you need a lossy codec, and x264 --preset superfast --no-cabac --crf 15 is probably the way to go.

On your laptop, you'd have something set up to receive the stream and feed it through ffmpeg, with the output of THAT going to twitch (I assume).  So you'd have your laptop set up to decode the stream from your desktop, run it through x264 with the best quality setting it can manage in realtime.

You could maybe use something like inetdto listen on a socket and run ffmpeg when a connection is received, with ffmpeg's stdin and stdout connected to that socket.  (You'd actually need a wrapper script I guess, to get ffmpeg's output directed to twitch, or whatever you're streaming to.)  Also, instead of full-blown inetd, you could use a single-socket simpler program like maybe just netcat.

If your laptop isn't running Linux or OS X, this probably still works with a Windows build of netcat, but you'd have to be careful that piping that much data around doesn't cause performance problems on Windows ports of Unix tools.  (don't use cygwin).

To get your face in a corner of the video, attach a camera to your laptop, and have ffmpeg read from it, as a 2nd input stream.  Use some combination of -filter_complex scale,overlay to combine your streams.  (get the filters worked out by testing with file inputs, like 10 sec clips of 2 different videos.)

As far as other ways to get video off your desktop for encoding somewhere else, VNC exists, but it's probably not viable for actual video.


Converting iCop Encrypted DAV to AVI or MP4 I work for a newspaper. Late last year there was a car chase leading to the death of a couple of people. We've recently ... persuaded ... the police involved to release the dash cam footage.

Unfortunately they are using the iCop software, and the footage they released is encrypted and can only be viewed through the shared viewer that they sent along with it.

We want to convert this to an AVI or MP4 format, so we can edit and upload to our website with the story about the accident. Does anyone have any experience working with this video format? I've Googled heavily, and I have used a multitude of other converters that work with DAV format, but unfortunately I believe the encryption on this one is causing the file to not convert properly.

My company software Amped FIVE supports the conversion of hundreds of proprietary DVR formats, including the DAV. I am not sure we ever encountered an encrypted DAV, though it may be worth a try. Feel free to contact me to evaluate your file.

I fully agree with you that screen capture is the last resort.


How to recover a video that has no time index? I have a wmv video file that was recorded using widows media encoder. However, while recording, the computer lost power and the video is was not "completed". The video will play in most player, however, it reads that it is 0:00:00 minutes long. So when I try to seek the video the player either freaks out and crashes or it won't do anything.

I tried loading the video in Vegas Pro, but it didn't work. Vegas Pro sees it as an infinitely small clip, rather than the whole thing. So I can't edit it either.

I was able to convert it to an Mp4 in handbrake, but now that I have to do some editing on that, I'm going to lose significant quality. I would rather not have to do this and just be able to find the index file.

What can I do about this? Is there a program or feature in some program that can reanalyze the video and give it a proper time index (if that's what this is called)?

I've had some success with ASFTools and Steeper WMV Repair. Both of these are older tools (Steeper is from 2005) so may not be able to handle later versions of WMV, but they're worth a try.


Melt transitions from command line I have a source video file (@60 fps), and a "list" of frames of interest. I'm trying to get a "compilation" of 6 seconds clips (3 before, 3 after the said frame), add a fade in between them and output said video.

This is what I'm currently using:

  melt test1.mp4 in=2340 out=2700 -mix 120 test1.mp4 in=4140 out=4500 -mix 120 test1.mp4 in=5220 out=5580 -blank 1500 -consumer sdl

The transition between the first and second clips is done correctly, the one between the 2'nd and 3'rd however is NOT processed.

Any ideas?

As a side note, I will have about 10-15 clips per movie, so I plan to move this to either a textfile or xml scheme later, but I'm trying to make this work from the command line for the time being.

Edit:

Ok, so I figured it out. Turns out you need to apply the "-mix" flag to the SECOND clip, and it will mix between the previous and current clip.

  melt test1.mp4 in=2340 out=2700 test1.mp4 in=4140 out=4500 -mix 120 -mixer luma test1.mp4 in=5220 out=5580 -mix 120 -mixer luma -blank 1500

This now works correctly, and adds a fade between the first and second clip, as well as between the second and the third.


What is the camera used by the scientists at the beginning of Titanic? In the film Titanic [1997], the scientists (and mostly Bill Paxton's character) use a white camera as seen in these screenshots:

It looks like one of the Canon camcorders but it's not obvious what the brand and model are.

For what it's worth, that's a Canon L1 Hi-8 camcorder. The L2 was very similar in overall shape, but had a significantly different button layout.


How do you export higher resolution 360° VR footage from Adobe Premiere? We have recently purchased a 6-lens 360° 8k camera. It is fantastic. However, I have only been able to find instructions on how to export video at a max width of 4096. This is half the size that we can record in. So if we can only export at 4096, what is the point of shooting 8k? Is there a way to export at the full resolution from Adobe Premiere?

Any feedback, suggestions or links on how to make use of the 8k footage would be appreciated. Thank you!

I did find this YouTube tutorial if anyone else is interested. It provides the best settings for exporting 8k video from Premiere.


Find out video's resolution & duration Any easy way to find out a video's resolution & duration?
I know one way is to parse the ffprobe's output. But,

I don't know how consistent the output is among different video files.
and most importantly, I hope to avoid such parsing entirely.

I've tried

ffprobe -print_format json ...
ffprobe -print_format compact ...

But neither seems to be what they are supposed to be

-print_format format  set the output printing format (available formats are: default, compact, csv, flat, ini, json, xml)

Use MediaInfo?
About:
https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo
//
Downloads:
https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo/Download
But you need to install it.
On Windows (haven't tested on mac), it shows up as option on rightclick


Removing background for YouTube video I would like to remove the background completely in a video I want to record for YouTube, because I don't want others to see my messy house or where I am because it would just look too bad. What tools do I need to accomplish this task, in terms of hardware and OSk requirements on Windows and software, and is it easy do this?

Thanks.

Easiest way is to use a greenscreen. This can be done with household items, but will be a lot easier with equipment of about 150$.

You hang a green cloth behind you, light it up good and evenly.

Then in an editing/streaimng software you simply use the Grenn Screen/Key/Chroma Key tool.

There are cameras which can do it too, but those are expansive and don't work as well.


Are there any wearable IP cameras? I'm trying to find a wearable camera (to mount on a helmet, or on the shoulder) that support live-streaming video over a WiFi-network or the mobile phone network (HSPA or LTE) to a custom video streaming server. Are there any such cameras that you know of?

I have considered using something like a GoPro HD Hero 2 with an Eye-Fi SD-card. That I believe would make it possible to upload the video to an FTP-server, and then I could provide on-demand streaming of the files that are uploaded. However, it would be really nice to allow live-streaming, and in that case the FTP-server setup wouldn't be a good option.

I use the Contour cameras, with a small transmitter-box connected to the camera. If you want decent quality footage, you should avoid cameras with built-in wireless streaming, as most really do not have the capability to transmit in full quality.


Auto-Orient to Camera creates unwanted Z orientation I have eight icons arranged in a circle, a Null object in the centre, and a camera that's parented to the Null. Each icon is set to be a 3D layer, and Auto-Oriented towards the camera. The camera is Auto-Oriented to Point of Interest, and parented to the Null, so that I can adjust the Z rotation of the Null to have the camera orbit the circle (producing the effect that the circle of icons is carouselling around).

Everything else is perfect, but the icons on the sides are somehow inheriting quite a dramatic Z orientation / rotation. I've attached a screenshot below to illustrate what I mean.

I tried this expression, but it made the problem worse, and I don't have the expression skills to adapt it to my needs.

How can I have each icon always face the camera, but remain fully level without manually adding keyframes to compensate?

I don’t know why it’s happening, but could you precomp each icon, and correct the rotation inside each precomp?


Does My Business Model Break Youtube API TOS? I understand from reading youtube api tos that selling youtube content is prohibited.

But here's how my business works:

I sell a physical product, let's say CDs.
On the cover of the CD is a QR code and a serial number, when you scan the QR code you will download my app.
Inside the app there are a few unlisted youtube videos, but they are locked.
In order to unlock it, you need to put the unique serial number that is on the back of the CD.

Why I make this model is to make sure that the people who watch my video have bought my CD. Now does this model break the youtube api tos or not?

https://developers.google.com/youtube/terms

Thanks

It is probably okay, see section 2 (bolding is mine):

The following commercial uses are permitted provided that You comply with all other terms and conditions of this Agreement:

the sale of an API Client

To get a definitive answer you should consult a professional legal counsel, so that the counseling that you get is backed by professional liability.


Small Kitchen studio setup I have a small apartment kitchen that I'd like to be able to convert (at will) into a small studio.  The idea is to capture myself cooking.  I'd like your thoughts on the type of cameras to purchase, unique mounting options and lighting.

Ideally I'd like to be able to take all video sources and bring them into my computer (Mac) and edit via Final Cut.

Space is at a premium and with that, what would be my best option for digital cameras for the following purposes:

Overhead shot of stove
Active camera I can look at to speak and give direction
Overhead shot of cutting board

Secondly are Mounts. I'd need something that could 1) support the camera in question 2) be long and flexible so I can position a camera above the stove

Do I have to be concerned with heat/steam interfering?  Any tips on thwarting such problems?

Lastly, lighting.  I have no clue, I guess I'm looking for affordable and not too bulky.

I will answer this in a few parts

Cameras:
I assume you are looking for some kind of a web release for what ever media you are recording and I assume you want to go high def. For this most if not all of the current DSLR's from the big makers (cannon, nikon, etc) will shoot in both 720 and 1080 (i and p depend on the camera but for what you are looking to do I would say either will suffice). When it comes to video my only requirement is that the camera has an external mic input (I know the Nikon D series has them). The on board mics on DSLR's are not that great and an external one is a must. This would be your main camera.

Go Pros are GREAT and come with a wide variety of mounting options. They are also in waterproof cases (I have used mine in the pool a few times with good success) so I would think they could stand up to some puffs of steam although continuous steam will be an issue for any camera.

You can also troll ebay or tag sales etc. for used DSLR's for your overhead shots. You can usually find them cheap and be less worried about them breaking form steam/heat

Mounting:
Good tripods area easy to find. In this case I would look for something hefty but on the smaller side. I have a small Slik 504 that is small but really steady and has a smooth head. I also have a MeFoto for when Im on the road. These are much smaller than the Slik's but REALLY well made (all aluminum) and will not have a problem holding your DSLR.

Lights:
Theater/Video lights can be pricy as can their mounting hardware. For this I will offer a simple home brew hack. Go to home depot and pick up the double halogen with stand work light. They are constantly on sale and fit the bill really well. they are bright, cheap, and come mounted to a stand. They usually are capable of pivoting in all directions as well.

Steam solution:
I dont know much about this issue but one possibility is to mount a mirror over the stove and shoot the mirror. This puts the camera out of the line of steam and out of harms way. You can also get one of those shower mirrors that does not fog up in high steam environments.

Hope This Helps...


Premiere: Make music sound like it's coming from huge speakers? The problem with my clip:

It was recorded on a fashion show and my recording for some reason stopped, but I quickly restarted it, so approximately 2 seconds are missing. On the visuals, not much was happening at that moment, so a cut is not that noticable luckily.

BUT: music was playing in the background, so it doesn't matter how I cut, in the audio, you obviously hear the cut. My solution for this problem is to download the original song, bring it to Premiere, put it in place between/under the 2 pieces of clip.

QUESTION:
I need this audio to sound like it was recorded "on-set", like the song was played on a huge speaker in a 10m x 20m hall. I tried the audio effect highpass, but with that, it sounds like it was played on a phone, since it eliminates lower frequencies. I tried a few other filters, but since I'm not really into that topic, I couldn't make it convincing.

Thanks for the help.

I've had good luck by sampling a bit of the video's audio from another point, and splicing that in.  The tone will be dead-on consistent.  You just have to find a point in the song where it basically repeats itself (or close enough).  If you lost verse lyrics, this gets much more problematic fast.  But if you lost chorus, or instrumental bridge, intro, or outro, you could make a patch that manages to not distract.  It the song was well-known, a forced splice will be more evident, but might not seem your doing (you know?).  At the other extreme, if the song is house music, you're golden: no one will know what it was supposed to do for those two seconds.


How do I make a professional slide show type video? My wife reads little kid books on YouTube like this. It displays each page in a scrolling pan as she reads it. Our video creator is not longer working with us, so I need to learn how to do it. She had a Mac. I have Windows 10. I'm a software developer, but I don't speak this jargon so I don't even know what to search for.

I need help.

This video is very simple to do.

Record voice.
Use a proper camera/phone that takes high resolution images (so that when you zoom in the software, it will retain the quality), then take a photo of each page of the book.
Import images and sound into the software.
Do those effects in video which are basically (tilt, pan, zoom-in, zoom-out) mix between them and adjust speed accordingly.

Note: its always better to record sound first, and animate based on that, so that you know how long is each shot and when to cut.
What software: Personally I only use After Effects and Premier Pro, they are not free but there is a Trial. Check this article for PAID and FREE editing software and try some of them: The best video editing software 2018: paid and free

Basically the effects/transitions mentioned above can be done with any of those softwares, a couple of tutorials should make it possible.


BT.1120 Video Standard Specifications? I have a camera that states this under the video output specification.

Ive tried finding out what it means but can't does anyknow know ?

This is a document from the ITU :

http://www.itu.int/rec/R-REC-BT.1120-8-201201-I/en

that specifies Digital interfaces for HDTV studio signals.
This kind of signal is commonly carried on an HD-SDI physical layer.


Move mask inside precomposition in After Effects? I have a movie in after effects. I created a color key, applied a simple choker and then added a mask.

When I move the mask point, it is offset by the simple choker value - so I thought I would precompose the whole thing, so I can apply a second mask that isn't affected by the simple choker.

However, when I do that - the mask that was applied to the movie is not moved "inside" the precomp. It gets moved outside the precomp, and is still affected by the simple choker.

How do I solve this?

So, it was a simple thing:

Instead of "Leave all attributes" when pre-composing, I needed to switch to "Move all attributes".


VLC 3.0 (Vetinari): Unable to play 360 videos I installed the last VLC version (3.0.0 (Vetinari) on Windows 7 64 bits) which supports 360 video playback.

In order to do some tests I downloaded the following 360 video from Vimeo:
https://vimeo.com/215984568

But VLC is unable to play the 360 video correctly; the video contains all the 360 degree video information but it's showed at the same time (on Vimeo the video plays OK). The result is the following:

I think that maybe the video could be reencoded with ffmpeg to be more VLC friendly.

The media info of the downloaded 360 video is this:

The problem comes from the video which should have the metadata projection=equirectangular. To fix it:

Install Python 3
Download Spatial Media
Unzip Spatial Media
Go into the folder (where there is a subfolder spatialmedia)
Copy the path of the folder
Launch cmd on Windows (by searching cmd on your system)
Go on the folder by typing cd and the path of the folder
Inject the spherical metadata by typing py spatialmedia -i<yourVideoOnTheDisk><aVideoName>

Open the created file with VLC. It should be launched as a 360° video. You can remove spatialmedia and uninstall Python.


Does the screen resolution override the source resolution? I'm trying to figure out what is more important - the screen resolution or the source resolution?

OK, so a Full HD 1080p file might be able to be played on a small HTC One mini screen, but due the the screen only being HD (1280 x 720) is there any scaling back? Or is there no scaling back and it plays the normal file but can only actually see the 1280 x 720 resolution? (I guess it also depends on the playback application...?)

On a screen that size, can anyone actually tell the difference between a 1280 x 720 HD and a 1920 x 1080 Full HD movie?

Further to this, what's the difference between a screen resolution of 1280 x 720 on a 4.5" screen than to a 50" screen? The pixels are bigger on a 50" screen so it looks 'worse' (Or pixels are smaller on a 4.5" so it looks 'better')?

They both matter.  What really matters is the combination of the two.  Scaling always produces a loss of quality unless you are using an even multiple of the resolution.  This is because interpolation must occur during a scaling operation that isn't an even multiple or divisor of the original resolution.  This is due to the fact that some pixels must contribute to two different new pixels.

That said, it is even more complicated when deciding what to shoot with for your camera if it is coming from a camera.  The actual imaging sensor has a native resolution itself and will internally apply scaling to fit to whatever size you need.  In some cases, like DSLRs, all formats actually end up getting scaling applied since the actual sensor is much higher quality, but that also means the down-scaling can be more accurate if implemented properly.

If you know that you will only ever use output in a given resolution, start with that resolution as early as possible to make use of any source side optimizations that may exist rather than going to an unnecessary intermediate format that will only be scaled again (resulting in another interpolation).

If you are targeting multiple output formats, then use whatever the highest quality format you can is (even if it exceeds the maximum format you intend to output) since the more information you have, the more accurately you can downscale later.

The exception to this would be if the majority of your usage will be on the highest quality format that you will be distributing, then go ahead and use that quality for source since you will gain a little quality at that level at a cost of a little quality on the lower end videos.

As for the side question about screen size, yes, it can make a difference, but angle of view is what matters.  A 50 foot screen two miles away is still going to have less visible resolution than a similar pixel count screen that is 4 inches across and 3 inches in front of your face.  I touch on this in a little more detail in this answer.


After Effects - Recreate a "distortion" or a special Radial Blur effect / Slowly pitch sound down I would like to re-create an effect from the game Dishonored.
The FX happens when I teleport or when I slow down time, the screen gets some radial blur and a strange kind of distortion at the edges. While that happens, the game sounds also get pitched down slowly, depending on how much radial blur is on the screen. Here's a video showing the effect:

Click me...

Here's an another video, showing the game slowly slowing down, and the radialblur&distortion increases, sound slowly pitches down.

Click me...

You can recreate this effect with the CC Radial Blur effect set to "Fading Zoom" together with the Ripple effect or the Turbulent Displacement effect.
Apply these effects to an Adjustment layer above your video layer and add a round mask in the middle with some feather to have the blur and distortion only on the sides of the screen. Use separate Adjustment Layers for each effect to fine tune the strength of both effects with separate masks.

You also want to set the size wave size of the ripple effect to something like 60/30 to have it closer to the look in Dishonored and to not have it so uniform. Setting it to asymmetric might be a good ideas as well

To get even closer you can apply some other distortion effects available in After Effects, just play around a bit. The Turbulent Displacement effect is also a great alternative to the Ripple effect, might even be closer to the look in the game. It has a far less uniform displacement.


Stretch or Change Timing in After Effects I am new to After Effects. I downloaded the free file for the Month of May from VideoHive and have been playing with it. Some of the text is displayed just a bit too short for my linking. I do not want to change the look of the effects but take everything and make it a half second to one second longer. Basically take the length from 35 seconds to about 55-60 seconds without messing up any of the transitions or effects.

Is this possible?

The solution will be found in the Timeline. Scroll through the items in the timeline until you find the track for the text object you want to change. The duration of the text on screen is defined by starting and ending keyframes on the object's track.

Moving the last keyframe on the object's timeline will extend the duration of an object, so clicking and dragging the last keyframe for the text will extend how long it is on screen.


Detect GoPro camera model from MP4 I have raw video file named GP010661.MP4, which seems to be taken with GoPro. Is there a way to detect the exact GoPro camera model and mode used for this video?

This is the the output of ExifTool:

ExifTool Version Number         : 9.46
File Name                       : GP010661.MP4
Directory                       : .
File Size                       : 3753 MB
File Modification Date/Time     : 2014:11:27 09:37:20+03:00
File Access Date/Time           : 2015:02:19 09:22:46+03:00
File Inode Change Date/Time     : 2015:02:19 09:22:46+03:00
File Permissions                : rw-r--r--
File Type                       : MP4
MIME Type                       : video/mp4
Major Brand                     : MP4 Base w/ AVC ext [ISO 14496-12:2005]
Minor Version                   : 0.0.0
Compatible Brands               : avc1, isom
Movie Header Version            : 0
Create Date                     : 2014:11:27 11:19:55
Modify Date                     : 2014:11:27 11:19:55
Time Scale                      : 90000
Duration                        : 0:17:25
Preferred Rate                  : 1
Preferred Volume                : 100.00%
Preview Time                    : 0 s
Preview Duration                : 0 s
Poster Time                     : 0 s
Selection Time                  : 0 s
Selection Duration              : 0 s
Current Time                    : 0 s
Next Track ID                   : 3
Track Header Version            : 0
Track Create Date               : 2014:11:27 11:19:55
Track Modify Date               : 2014:11:27 11:19:55
Track ID                        : 1
Track Duration                  : 0:17:25
Track Layer                     : 0
Track Volume                    : 0.00%
Image Width                     : 1920
Image Height                    : 1080
Graphics Mode                   : srcCopy
Op Color                        : 0 0 0
Compressor ID                   : avc1
Source Image Width              : 1920
Source Image Height             : 1080
X Resolution                    : 72
Y Resolution                    : 72
Compressor Name                 : .GoPro AVC encoder
Bit Depth                       : 24
Color Representation            : nclc 1 1 1
Gamma                           : 2.2
Video Frame Rate                : 59.94
Matrix Structure                : 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1
Media Header Version            : 0
Media Create Date               : 2014:11:27 11:19:55
Media Modify Date               : 2014:11:27 11:19:55
Media Time Scale                : 48000
Media Duration                  : 0:17:25
Handler Type                    : Audio Track
Handler Description             : .GoPro AAC
Balance                         : 0
Audio Format                    : mp4a
Audio Channels                  : 2
Audio Bits Per Sample           : 16
Audio Sample Rate               : 48000
Movie Data Size                 : 3933436091
Movie Data Offset               : 1474560
Avg Bitrate                     : 30.1 Mbps
Image Size                      : 1920x1080
Rotation                        : 0

The reason I need it, is that file chokes on my Ubuntu 14.04 with VLC and I couldn't even watch it. It took few days to recode the videos, and I do not want to run into the same problem again. If I know the camcoder model and mode, I can to ask people to use different camera or settings.

MP4 files don't have as much data as .JPEG or .CR2 files so there is probally no way to know. Your cpu is that fast and GoPro footage is hard for the computer to play.


Apple Quicktime cannot open a video that has been brightened using ffmpeg? I changed the color level of an video ("ORIGINAL_VIDEO1.MP4") that had previously played well in Apple Quicktime. After brightening,
ffmpeg -i ORIGINAL_VIDEO1.MP4 -vf colorlevels=romin=0.4:gomin=0.4:bomin=0.4 -c:a copy BRIGHTER_VIDEO_1.MP4

BRIGHTER_VIDEO_1.MP4 can no longer be played in Quicktime and it says something about the video missing elements. All the while, VLC plays it perfectly. Is there something I am doing wrong?

Pixel data in videos is typically stored as YUV, whereas colorlevels works upon RGB format pixels, so it tells ffmpeg to convert it beforehand. After the filtering, the reverse conversion to YUV before re-encoding uses a YUV format not compatible with basic players, so one has to force conversion to a compatible format.
ffmpeg -i ORIGINAL_VIDEO1.MP4 -vf colorlevels=romin=0.4:gomin=0.4:bomin=0.4 -pix_fmt yuv420p -c:a copy BRIGHTER_VIDEO_1.MP4


Setting format to H.264 in After Effects I'm currently attempting to render a video for Youtube in Afters Effects CC 2017. However, I can not find the format option for H.264 in the output module settings. How can I find or activate this?

I would not recommend trying to output your AE Comp using H.264. Unfortunately, regardless of the settings, you will get less than desirable results (typically terrible).

The proven workflow / best practice in terms of output is:

Under your Output Module Settings:

Render out using

Format:     Quicktime
Format Options Button -> Video Codec:    Animation
Quality:    100
Options: You can select your Channels as to include or not include Alpha along with RGB. Including Alpha will increase file size.
Audio Output: Check if needed.

Now this will output your composition to a lossless QT Animation file, which yes, will be very large, especially if you include an alpha channel. But the output will be perfect in terms of what you are seeing in AE.

NEXT...

Use AME (Adobe Media Encoder, or import the file into Premiere Pro and Sequence the comp), and render out using export/AME and H.264 using the MP4 option.

NOTE:  There is absolutely no need and I don't recommend using the QT in premiere either. Use H.264 MP4. Again, H.264 and MOV simply are not friendly within the CS suite.

However, after you have rendered out your H.264 MP4 at the desired bitrate and resolution; if you need the file to be QT compatible, or the client specifically wants an MOV file, simply change the extension from "FILE.mp4" to "FILE.mov".

There is absolutely zero difference file structure wise, the MP4/MOV is simply the wrapper for the H.264 codec.

This will give you perfect outputs every time.

Hope this helps.


FPS drops when recording video I have a DSLR camera which can record a HD movie at 60fps. My question is that, sometimes when recording, the FPS seems to drop below 60fps. What caused this problem? I used a class 10/UHS-1 SD card with transfer rate up to 45MB/s.

Are you sure it's dropping frames? I have a canon 5d and it never drops frames, it simply stops recording when it can't keep up.

My guess is the file is fine, but the preview on the LCD is dropping frames.


How to prevent blur(?) footage at the recording stage? My question comes in two parts. First, may I know if my assessment of the quality of the footage in this Youtube movie is correct in the first place.

Compare the frames around 2:07 of this movie:

(2:07)

with

the frames around 1:59:

(1:59)

The quality of the picture in the former seems better than the latter. I am not exactly sure what is the difference, I can't pinpoint. But this was my first reaction when I was watching the clip.

After close examination for a while, I can only guess that the former seems to be a bit more blurry, have softer edges, and seems to be a bit darker as well.

Is my analysis correct, and am I missing anything else?

Secondly, how could the quality of the latter been improved at the recording stage? Is it something that could have been set in the camera, or should a better camera been used, and if yes, what exact specifications in the new camera should be sought?

My guess is the former uses a production video cam, but the latter uses perhaps an action cam like the GoPro. But must we always have such suboptimal footage from action cams, or could a better setting be used?

(NOTE: I did not participate in the production at all in the clip, so I do not know whatsoever what cams were used etc.)

If I understand correctly, your question is "why is the footage of this camera blurry".

The answer to that would be: It is out of focus. Cameras have a focal point and everything straying away from that (spatially) will get blurry. You can see that the back-windows is in focus, meaning that the lens has its focal point further back.


Sony Handycam HDR-CX210 Creates JPGs Frequently While Shooting Video I have a Sony Handycam HDR-CX210, and I shot 10 minutes of footage continuously tonight. When I imported it into my PC, the Handycam's memory also included 80-ish JPG images that were stills from the video.  Is that a feature I turned on accidentally?  Or is that standard (to create periodic thumbnails or something)?  I don't need those stills, and they take up memory (1.5 MB each x 80 = 120 MB).

The only function which does this is called Smile Shutter. Please have a look at the official manual at page 110.

You can disable it under:

Menu > Camera/Mic > Face > Smile Shutter


Media Player for playback of 1000 fps video at 24 fps I have searched everywhere, and I could not find any media player (for Windows) capable of playing back 1000fps video at 24fps.  Can anyone suggest software?  I'm not willing to any greater price than free.  I tried Windows Media player and VLC media player.  VLC can get close, but not quite 24fps.  It must be able to play back the video at between 22 and 26 fps as well as normal speed. I know professional high-speed playback software exists, I just can't find it.  An alternative solution would be to suggest software that can convert video to play back at 24 fps.  A third alternative: is it possible to modify the binary data in a file to change the playback rate?

You can use the free command-line tool ffplay, which is part of the ffmpeg project.

ffplay in.mp4 -vf setpts=N/24/TB,fps=24

You can change the value 24 above to any arbitrary value. Just remember to change both instances in concert.


How to work with R3D and RMD files? FFMPEG? I am getting collections of files of the types

A0123-random-name.RMD
A0123-random-name.R3D

Googling tells me R3D is a raw RED file and RMD is Red Meta Data - data about the processing to be applied.

Can ffmpeg work with these combinations of files? If so, what is an example command line?
If not, what other software can I use to convert these files?

R3D files are essentially just a custom container that holds video encoded in JPEG2000 and PCM audio. Though ffmpeg only supports the RED container until version 3, not the newer version 4 (see this).

You can convert RED version 3 files the same way you would convert any other video with ffmpeg.
F.e. to h264 use the command below. Doesn't make much sense though to use h264 for further editing, you will have to use an intermediate codec and or container that your software supports:

ffmpeg -i input.r3d -vcodec libx264 -preset slow output.mp4

The usual way though is to use the free REDCINE-X tool provided by RED:
https://www.red.com/downloads?category=Software&release=final

It allows you to transcode your r3d files into pretty much any desirable format as long as its supported by V4W (Video for Windows, e.g. all codecs installed on your system). Or QuickTime on Mac.

Redcine is also the only useful way to do something with the RMD files.


Video tool with text to speech and video editor (synchronize feature) I need a video tool in which has the following features. Could you please help to find the best vendor who offers the below features at the best rate.

Convert text into speech.
Screen recording feature with high resolution.
Video Editor (synchronize the audio and video file).

Thank you.

For audio/video synchroniziation check out Pluraleyes.
https://www.redgiant.com/products/shooter-pluraleyes/
If you are a student at a film school they offer better prices.

I recommend reading the manual carefully and watching the vendor's video tutorials before going for the trial version and then deciding on the purchase.


Automating QC to find corrupt video files I have a hundred of visually (!) corrupt video clips in H.264 'hiding' within a larger set of files.
As they have been re-transcoded, all of them are now technically OK and will play fine, but will have green flash on every other frame.

I have noticed that if I run a file through QCTools then I can identify them by the 'temporal outliers' value, as every other frame is drastically different from the previous one (because of those green flashes).

I would like to point QCTools to each file in this large set, but only:

process a small portion of it - there is no time to go through every file in its entire duration
fetch only one value - temporal outliers

I have looked through the help of the QCTools CLI version and could not find a way to do this. Does anyone have any other ideas on identifying these files? Is there still a way to do this with QCTools?

Since QCTools wraps the ffmpeg/ffprobe and uses the signalstats filter, here is how to achieve what I wanted:

ffprobe -f lavfi movie="Bad.mp4","signalstats=tout" -read_intervals %00:01 -show_frames

-show_frames outputs the frame summary into STDOUT. It contains the value that I need:

  TAG:lavfi.signalstats.TOUT=0

-read_intervals allows me to process only a small part of the file to get signal stats from only a small portion of the file

We can also check how QCTools does it by looking at the source code here:
https://github.com/bavc/qctools/blob/master/Source/GUI/BigDisplay.cpp#L844-L845


How to film a strobe light The above picture sums up my problem. I'm struggling to work out what settings to put my camera on to work with my strobe light. I vaguely understand the problem; that the camera takes pictures row by row, so the lighting has changed by the time it gets to the bottom half. But I can't work out how to fix it. I would have thought that a very fast shutter speed would help, but apparently not.

The camera is a Fujifilm X-E1 and the strobe light is a cheap model with a rotary dial to change the speed. It doesn't have DMX control.

What you're seeing is an inherent problem with sensors that use "rolling shutter". There are tradeoffs in sensor technology among speed, sensitivity, and size, and using a sequential line readout with continuous exposure is a popular choice that's a good compromise for many situations. Unfortunately yours isn't one of those.

What you need is what's known as "total" or "global" shuttering, where the entire frame is exposed at once and read out as a single image. Instead you have a sensor that essentially exposes each line of the array at different times.

So I'm afraid the answer is: use a camera / sensor that employs a different technology. I hope for your sake someone has a solution that allows you to use your existing setup, but I don't expect to see one.


Final Cut Pro 10 Change clip appearance of some clips in timeline Is it possible to change the appearance of some clips in your timeline and not others?  Basically sometimes I only care about the main video and want to shrink any overlay pictures etc I may have to be as small as possible to save space, can I do this somehow?

I am pretty sure you cannot change the clip hight for a certain timeline independent. What might help a bit is when you give your stacked clips different Roles and then click the 'show subroles'. What will move the audio to the bottom under the main timeline and will leave you with the clips only. Now click the 'Focus' button for your main timeline. Then all other audio tracks will get minimized to a narrow line. However, this does not help with the clip high.


video bitrate - how large should my video be? I created a video in movie maker from more videos I took using my canon 550d, but the file produced is an 11 minutes 806MB video. This is huge. Now, when I create the video using movie maker, it asks me for the bitrate and resolution.

What are the recommended setings?If I create a video from 10 pieces that have a bitrate of X, can I create a video which has a larger bitrate?

The bitrate that you choose determines the quality of your video and the file size. The standard units for bitrate is bits per second, or bps. Sometimes bitrates are expressed in Kbps (kilobits per second) or Mbps (megabits per second). Do not confuse Mbps and Kbps with MBps and KBps. A lowercase 'b' refers to bits, an uppercase 'B' refers to bytes.

From your question it seems you are more concerned about size than quality, so I recommend that you pick what is a reasonable file size and deduce the bitrate that achieves that size.

For example, let's say you want your file to be 200MB. First convert this size to bits:

200 x 1024 x 1024 x 8 = 1,677,721,600 bits

You also said that your video is 11 minutes, which is 660 seconds. So now we obtain the bits per second:

1,677,721,600 bits / 660 seconds = 2,542,002 bits per second (approximately)

From the above, you know that if you pick a bitrate of 2,500,000 bps (same as 2,500 Kbps or  2.5 Mbps) then your file will end up being about 200MB in size.

So now what's left is to pick a resolution and frame rate. Once you know your bitrate, you have set an allocation of bits for each second of your movie. To get the better quality you should now pick the smallest resolution and slowest frame rate that works for your needs, as that will assign the maximum number of bits to each frame, giving you the best possible quality.

  If I create a video from 10 pieces that have a bitrate of X, can I create a video which has a larger bitrate?

You can use any bitrate you like, but if your source clips were encoded at some bitrate X in the camera, going to a higher bitrate will just waste space without increasing the quality, since you can't add detail that was not in the original recording.


Special effects in 90's movies How were special effects added in movies like The Shadow ( 1994 ) when CGI wasn't around?

In the following trailer during 00:37 - 00:39 there is a face transition. It's speculated that it was combination of makeup and morphing.

Any idea how this was achieved?

Oh, but you're very wrong that in 1994 CGI wasn't around. The very film you use as an example had a very extensive VFX and CGI credits list.

In 1993, Flame was already around being used on Silicon Graphics stations. It evolved into the software currently owned by Autodesk, and still one of the mostly used VFX suites in Hollywood productions.

One year before that, Jurassic Park was already in post production, with lots of CGI and software specially made for that film.

CGI has been around since the 70's


How would I silhouette someone's face? I am not sure that a silhouette is the best word. I am doing a cinematic scene in which the "Mystery character" is sitting in a chair, and I want his face to look blacked out/"silhouetted" so you can't see his facial features.

I do have adobe After Effects, in case I can do it in the editing process.

A silhouette is often created by having a person with zero lighting on him/her, positioned in front of a brightly-lit background.  However, you'd need to do camera tests to confirm that the contrast is high enough so you don't see the person's face.

You can emphasize this in Adobe After Effects by creating an oval (face-shaped) mask that is black and partially/mostly opaque, with fuzzy edges.  Position this over the mystery person's face and animate it to follow their movements.

There are many other options for hiding a mystery person's face.

Have the person's back to the camera.
Only shoot the person from the shoulders down, so their face is not in the shot.
Only show the shadow of the person's face, on a flat surface that is lightly colored (white, yellow, etc.).
Similar to the previous idea, the mystery person could be behind a white sheet, with a bright light even farther behind the person, so a silhouette of the person appears on the white sheet. Make sure to reduce or eliminate light on the same side of the sheet as the camera; if there's too much, the shadow will be washed out.
Position the person behind a sheet of shower glass or something similar so they are visible but indistinguishable.
Just put a bag over their head.


Recording Video Games and uploading to YouTube System Specs:
-GTX 660 Windforce 2GB
-i5 3570k Ivy Bridge
-2 x 4GB 2133Mhz RAM
-Processor HydroCooled (H100i)
-My HDD is old and 500GB
-Case Corsair 500r(Awesome cooling)
-Nevermind about the internet connection

Generally , what is better?->
Q#1: I play many games and want to upload gameplay/do livestreams. For recording:
nVidia ShadowPlay/DxTory/FRAPS? If I decide to livestream , should I use the game's own streaming machine or use something like XSplit or OBS?

Q#2: Videos are usually big.I heared from a friend that he does some stuff in video editors and QuickTime so video size gets reduced (preserving quality). Also , youtube recommends something about Quicktime's settings.

Q#3: How many FPS should I record?

1) Each software has its own advantages and disadvantages, there isn't a right answer.  If you have ShadowPlay support, the hardware leverage is nice.  FRAPS is good at dumping a really high quality video quickly, but it needs lots of memory and high speed disks to deal with the amount of data it dumps.  I've not personally worked with DxTory, so I can't speak to that, though I believe it offers a slightly more balanced level of data rate (can use slower hdd) but at a cost of CPU performance.  I could be wrong on that last part though.

2) There are two things you can do to help reduce the size.  You can edit the video in a video editor such as Premiere or Windows Movie Maker in order to remove portions of the video that you do not need.  This trims file size by reducing the amount of time the video covers.

You can also use what is known as a video encoder, such as Quicktime, Adobe Media Encoder or ffMPEG.  A video encoder stores the video in a more compressed way that allows for smaller files size while minimizing the quality loss.  Using a format like 2-pass VBR h.264 will produce very high quality files with a minimal size, however it is time consuming and CPU intensive to produce such files, so the live encoding tools can not use that level of compression.  Running the slower encoding will produce smaller files as it can take the time to find more ways to save space.

The Youtube recommendations that you talk about are the preferred encoder settings that Youtube wants a source file to have, however Youtube itself will still transcode (make additional encodings) the file for streaming at different resolutions and speeds.

3) Your preference.  Video standards tend to be either 30fps (NTSC TV (America/Japan)), 25fps (PAL TV (most of the rest of the world)) or 24fps (Cinema, used frequently by everyone).  Choose based on what your system can handle and what you like the most.  If you can't manage 24fps, then an even multiple tends to work best since frames will match up at the higher rate. (For example, 15fps on a 30fps video will result in each original frame being used twice, so the computer doesn't have to guess at any frames [called interpolation].)


Video & Audio Kit on a Budget My group has a budget of ~£1000 to spend on high quality recording equipment so I need to do a little background research before I go off and advise them about what to buy.

The aim is to be able to record high quality video with good sound. Often is the case that the sound lets the videos down. So I'm assuming that we'll need a separate sound kit.

Therefore, I am in the market for:

A video camera which records at least HD quality video and manual zoom (as well as automatic) - ~£600
A sound recording kit which either attaches to the camera, or is totally separate in which case the sound will be synced later on. - ~£200
Perhaps some lighting so help with indoor scenes - ~£200

What kinds of products do you recommend I look into? I'm relatively new to professional quality video recording so any advice is greatly appreciated.

On the audio side, I've been extremely happy with my Sony M10. It takes two batteries and MicroSDHC cards. With a pair of fully-charged eneloops, it can fill up a 16GB card and the 4GB internal memory at 24/44.1 and still have some power left. Audio quality is good, but the close-set omnis don't give you a lot of stereo separation. You will also need to manually sync your audio with your camera.

Given your budget, does it make more sense to rent gear than purchase?


Premier Pro Audio Quality Poor and Muffled After Export I’m currently exporting a video on Premier Pro using the default YouTube 1080 HD settings. Usually, my videos export with no problem, but with this video, my exported audio is extremely muffled, even though it’s crystal clear as I’m editing. For more context, the video clips I’m using are mp4s that are screen recorded from my Mac.
Any ways to troubleshoot this would be appreciated!

I think this is likely to be due to out of phase audio in one of the stereo channels.  Below is a copy of my answer from here: Premiere Pro audio muffled and distorted on export
(I have tried to flag this as duplicate, but cannot because the answer wasn't accepted).
This might be because you are exporting a stereo audio file which has one channel phase reversed, and then it is being played back in mono.
If you have an identical signal going to the left and right channels, but one of them is phase reversed, it means the waveform is inverted (upside down). When you listen to either channel on its own, it will sound normal. When you listen to them both in stereo (Left channel to left speaker, right channel to right speaker) you may notice it sounding odd. Some people describe it sounding like the location of the sound is "inside their head".
But when you play back a stereo recording like this in mono (left channel and right channel both mixed together to a single mono output) the signal will completely cancel itself out.
If the two channels are almost identical, but have tiny differences, only the differences will be audible. This often happens with lossy file formats (like mp3/mp4 files), where the mono version of the phase reversed playback sounds tinny and lacking in all bass.
To test it out, try adding a channel mixer effect to the master output of you mix, and inverting one channel. Then export again and see if it fixes it.


Motion and shape tracking in After Effects CS5.5 My footage consists of someone with black sunglasses moving his head tilting slowly back and forth. The glass of the sunglasses is visible in the footage. In the beginning the head is tilted back, the glasses are turned up from the camera, so only a small portion of the glass is visible. The more the head tilts forward, the more the glass approaches being parallel to the camera.

I want to track the shape and movement of the glass. So the movement would be saved to the position/rotation path and the shape to a mask shape. I have tried this using After Effects, but I only managed to track the motion of the area movement.
How do I track the changing shape of the glass as well?  I also have access to Mocha and Boujou.

I would suggest as a starting point to use Corner Pin Tracking, found on the tracking panel of AE.

Track each side of the sunglasses separately and when done, you should have two solids that move with the area of the glasses. Add a mask to each one, and rotoscope the actual shape of the glasses.

I think this would be easier than rotoscoping from scratch. These two solids can then be used as track mattes or precomposed etc.


How to keyframe zoompan filter in ffmpeg? I am trying to animate an image position and scale on top of  background video. Moving between frames, say, 1 and 15. And scaling from frame 24 to frame 42.

overlay filter does its job moving the image at a time well.

I'm lost with the zoompan filter. Here's my current filtergraph:

video.avi >----------------------------------->|-------|
                                               |overlay|-> out.mp4
image.png >-> scale >-> zoompan >-> zoompan >->|-------|

Scale up the image 10 times for jitter-free zoompan. The first zoompan is set to z=1 and enabled till start of zoom (frame 24). Second zoompan increments zoom by a step to reach from 1 to 2.3 in 18 frames (24..42). I would add third zoompan to keep the image at 2.3. If second one is prolonged further it starts looping the zoom-in effect.

ffmpeg -i $FOOTAGE -loop 1 -i $IMAGE -filter_complex \
"
[1:v]
  scale=10*iw:-2
  ,zoompan=
    z=1
    :d=1
    :s=500x100
    :enable='lt(n,24)'
  ,zoompan=
    z='min(zoom+1.3/18,2.3)'
    :x='iw/2-(iw/zoom/2)'
    :y='ih/2-(ih/zoom/2)'
    :d=19
    :s=500x100
    :enable='gte( n, 24)'
[name];
[0:v][name]
  overlay=
    x = '1005 - 250 + 80 - min( 80 * n / 15, 80)'
    :y='406-50'
    :enable='lte(n,130)'
" -t 7 -y  -hide_banner out.mp4

How can zoom an image between certain keyframes somewhere in the middle of the sequence? I.e. zoom goes from 1 to 2.3 between frame A and frame B.

With loop added, you are generating a video stream from the image. Now, zoom is applicable within the processing loop of a single frame, and pzoom for video streams. Also, zoompan doesn't have timeline editing support, no enable won't work. So,

ffmpeg -i $FOOTAGE -loop 1 -i $IMAGE -filter_complex \
"
[1:v]
 zoompan=
    z='if(gte(in,24),min(pzoom+1.3/18,2.3),19.3/18)'
    :x='iw/2-(iw/pzoom/2)'
    :y='ih/2-(ih/pzoom/2)'
    :d=1
    :s=500x100
[name];
[0:v][name]
  overlay=
    x=1005-250-3*n
    :y=406-50
    :enable='lte(n,173)'
" -t 7 -y  -hide_banner  out.mp4


How to change clip speed in Lightworks 14 The new interface for Lightworks 14 has reorganized the control for clip speed to somewhere else.  You used to click the Advanced button at the bottom right of the timeline to make the speed controls pop up, but the Advanced button appears to no longer exist.  How can I change the speed of a section of video in the timeline?

Ah!  Okay, so apparently you now right-click on the clip and select "Speed.." from the context menu.  The location of the mouse pointer when you right-click doesn't seem to matter.  Not sure if the location of the current playback point still determines the stable point during the speed change.


can't import AVI type 1 to premiere CS6 Bs''d

Hi!
I used to work with premiere pro CS4.1 now I'm working with CS6, I moved to project folder to        my new computer, but when open it I get an error "damaged or un-supported file"
The AVI file works fine in CS4(at the old computer) and in media player in my new computer.

Thanks you all for your answering :)

My old system works poorly so it not good idea to export in it. I'm not sure I want to use AME because I need a very good output and if I will do so I will lose generation and/or quality

here is some details:

the file codec is dvsd (DVC/DV Video)

Complete name                            : D:\Natural Health B 2 B.avi
Format                                   : AVI
Format/Info                              : Audio Video Interleave
Commercial name                          : DV
Format profile                           : OpenDML
File size                                : 12.4 GiB
Duration                                 : 1h 1mn
Overall bit rate mode                    : Constant
Overall bit rate                         : 28.9 Mbps
Recorded date                            : 2011-06-21 17:57:45.000

ID                                       : 0
Format                                   : DV
Duration                                 : 1h 1mn
Bit rate mode                            : Constant
Bit rate                                 : 24.4 Mbps
Encoded bit rate                         : 28.8 Mbps
Width                                    : 720 pixels
Height                                   : 576 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Frame rate mode                          : Constant
Frame rate                               : 25.000 fps
Standard                                 : PAL
Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0
Bit depth                                : 8 bits
Scan type                                : Interlaced
Scan order                               : Bottom Field First
Compression mode                         : Lossy
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 2.357
Time code of first frame                 : 00:59:16:07
Time code source                         : Subcode time code
Stream size                              : 12.4 GiB (100%)
Encoding settings                        : ae mode=manual / wb mode=automatic / white balance= / fcm=manual focus

the file codec is dvsd (DVC/DV Video)

Usually DirectX comes with a DirectShow DVSD decoder. But maybe this decoder has some issue with your file(s).
Could it be you've had at some time software by Pinnacle, Sony, MainConcept, etc on your old system installed, whose DVSD decoder could have been used by Premiere Pro instead?


Use ffmpeg to create a video from a few images I trying to create a video using FFmpeg from a few images. I tried several ffmpeg commands but I can't repeat each image for several frames, instead, each image is one frame size and the video result is too short.

The idea, in general, is to obtain a video like:
Firs_image during X seconds, Second_image during X seconds, Third_image during x seconds...

There is any command to accomplish this?

Use

ffmpeg -framerate 1/X -i img%d.png -r 25 -pix_fmt yuv420p out.mp4

e.g. for each image to show for 2.5 seconds,

ffmpeg -framerate 1/2.5 -i img%d.png -r 25 -pix_fmt yuv420p out.mp4


Enhance Video/Audio Quality of Old Movies I managed to get my hands in a few very old video files (really!) whose quality, audio and video, are not so great. I checked the technical details of the file and this is what I've got.

In overall the scenes of these video files are looking like this. Not so vivid, blurred, shaky...

Now I know there's no magic bullet to make this video from trash to HD, we can't wring blood from a stone, but i do know that it is possible to apply filters, re-encode and others nice little tricks to improve the experience.

However I don't know which filters I'm looking for or softwares to do the job so here I am, asking for some guidelines 9otherwise it would fit the subject as too broad) to have a kick start of this personal project.

There are some filters you can use, specifically speaking in regards to Premiere Pro editing, that can enhance old video/film content. These include applying some basic color correction, adjusting gamma, saturation, and using a 3 way color corrector or a filter plugin like Colorista to enhance the color balance per RGB channel.

There is also "Magic Bullet's" Instant HD filter, which is part of their Shooter Suite.

The filter does a slightly better job than simply scaling to frame size (dropping a small resolution video onto an HD sequence for example. It applies some sharpening, and contrast enhancements; however, the rendering time is intense.

FOR THE BEST OUTPUT:

When I need to get the best output possible, this is the workflow I follow:

Using PPro or Adobe Media Encoder; export your video file as a JPG or preferably (if you have the HD space) TIF sequence.
Go into Bridge, and open one of your JPG/TIF files using right click "Open in Camera Raw". Adjust your color, sharpening, clarity, vibrance, you can also, from with "Camera Raw", add "reduce noise" which can greatly help.

The ability to enhance the frame from within Camera Raw is far more powerful than what you will get out of the box with Premiere.

Then click Done to apply the "Develop Settings".
Right Click - > Develop Settings -> Copy Develop Settings
Select all the frames (TIF/JPG) that are your exported sequence (there will be 1000s.
Right Click -> Develop Settings -> Paste Develop Settings

NEXT

Use the Image Processor in Photoshop, it's under File -> Automate.
Choose all the files you've applied your Develop Settings, and Check "Resize to 1920 H by 1920 W.
Now run the Automation App.

It might take a while, but you will end up with a folder filled with enlarged JPG/TIF files, with your develop settings applied.

Lastly, go back into Premiere -> Import -> JPG File number 00001, and check the box at the bottom "Image Sequence".

It will import all your frames as a video file.

This is the best way to get the best results. But plan for overnight runs for the process of Automation of the Photoshop files from original to enlarged.

Hope this helps.


Render srt subtitles to video? I have subtitles in .srt file format, and I need to render them on top of video file (prefereably mp4). I have tried handbrake and mediacoder so far, with no luck. What should I do?

With a recent version of ffmpeg (requires the subtitles to be in a separate file, due to current libavfilter limitations):

ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -filter:v subtitles=subtitle.srt -c:a copy -c:v libx264 -crf 22 -preset veryfast output.mp4

If your SRT subtitles are muxed into an MKV container, you can extract them like this:

ffmpeg -i input.mkv -map 0:s:0 subtitles.srt


What detailed research exists on the effects of aspect ratio on perception? I'm interested in the effects of aspect ratio on perception in video, whether it's movies or else, looking for detailed research. Could anyone recommend books, courses, research papers on the subject?

I've looked on google scholar but aspect ratio is a broad subject that has different meanings in different fields, thus I couldn't find anything relevant.

The most relevant keyword to add to your search is psychophysics, which is "the analysis of perceptual processes by studying the effect on a subject's experience...".

More directly, there's this SMPTE paper Searching for the Perfect Aspect Ratio.
The paper visits some of the research conducted on different aspect ratios and its take-away is

  The research for this paper found no clear indication of a preference
  for any particular aspect ratio for moving images nor any
  physiological reason to favor one over another.


What is the name of this type of treatment in video/audio? I ran into an expression a couple of months ago to describe videos which involve audio that is very present, as a way to heighten the senses. An example of this can be found here:

I'm looking for the name of that expression... It was something like high sensory experience or something similar but I've looked up a bunch of different names and couldn't find it. Would anyone know what I am talking about? It's often used in the context of filming people who are working with their hands and I know there are playlists of these types of videos around on YouTube.

It's also known as having an solid understanding of microphones and recording techniques, as well as sound audio editing principles. These types of videos are a great example of how awesome sound recording can enhance picture, and examples of the reason no filmmaker should skimp on sound. It's easier to mess up good sound for dramatic effect (say, adding EQ for distortion or making it quieter and adding reverb to make it sound farther away), but near impossible to clean messed up sound to make it usable.


Dynamic saturation exaggeration What is this type of processing called?

In some popular songs with a very strong bass beat, the strength of the bass beat is exaggerated by momentarily "turning down" the rest of the sounds while the bass beat hits.

Yup, don't know why datageist didn't expand, but it's called ducking.  The song or part of it 'ducks' out of the way of a signal, usually a big ol' kick.

You can insert a compressor into the signal chain of the track to be ducked, with a side-chain key input (as J.K says): meaning that the kick's amplitude/level will cause the mix to be compressed, i.e. reduced in volume.


what could prevents MPC-HC from opening and playing mov file? ... and the strangest thing is that the very same file plays back just fine on a different (but very much identical) Win 10 system.

The file is a .mov prores video file. Both system have prores codec installed.

I reinstalled MPC-HC and reset all to default.

The file is playing in QuickTime Player (v7.7.9).

ProRes is only one of codecs using for encoding / decoding video into / from the .mov files container. You need other codecs, too, to be able play back all .mov files.

The Quick Time Player is the native player for the Apple's .mov files, so it has its own codecs for playing back them.

For Media Player Classic you need the appropriate codecs to be installed in your operating system (Windows 10).

Probably the simplest and most reliable method is to download and install the free K-Lite Codec Pack - the decision between its different versions (Basic, Standard, etc.) is up to you, all versions will cause that all media players will be able to play back all .mov files (and almost all others, too).


Video Archiving Tool I'm collecting some video and audio files.

I need a tool to create a searchable archive from them that will be able to store video /audio path, meta data (Name, Director, description,...) and tag them.

Is there an application for this?

Based on research I did for a client here's what I found out.

Canto Cumulus is a desktop app that has a good rep but is relatively
expensive.
iDive is a Mac based app that is relatively cheap but may
not have everything you need or want.
Imagine Products has some good
integrated solutions. I've used their ShotPut Pro software. Their
customer service is very good.
I've purchased and implemented CatDV.
It is simple and has a number of automation features. Basically drag
and drop.

You didn't mention platform. I'm on Apple so my solutions are Mac-centric.


Cannot mark my video with CC SA licence because Youtube Content ID found 3rd party soundtrack which itself is CC SA licensed It seems, I'm in a catch-22 situation. I took a song from Free Music Archive website. I was careful to find a song which does not contain No-Derivatives rule. The licence of the song says:
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 International License.

My video is not being used for commercial purposes, so as far as I understand, I'm good to go as long as I add the same licence to my video, right?

And here is the problem. When I uploaded my video, Youtube immediately recognized the correct author and title of the song and said that my video contains a song from a 3rd party, thus I might have trouble:

  Your video has copyrighted audio that may affect its availability. You may be able to fix this by removing a copyright-claimed song below.

I decided to ignore it and just change the licence setting for my video from Standard Youtube Licence to Creative Common licence to comply with the Share-Alike rule of the soundtrack. Surprise! Youtube seemed to ignore the licence setting. When I looked for more info I found that I cannot change licence for videos which have been marked suspicious by Content ID:

  You cannot mark your video with the Creative Commons license if there
  is a Content ID claim on it.

This means, that I cannot mark my video with proper licence to comply with the song author's licence, thus I'm violating the licence because Content ID doesn't let me change it.

What should I do? Is it enough to just add a note in the description: "Please ignore the licence setting - this video is actually licensed under CC SA NC licence"?

Of course, I could find another song, but what if Youtube Content ID will recognize every song from Free Music Archive and again mark my video as suspicious and prevent me from setting the correct licence for it?

What's even more strange is that Youtube says:

  Ads may appear on your video due to the presence of this song.

Hm, isn't Youtube itself then violating the NonCommercial rule of the song author's licence by adding ads to it?

I am not a laywer, but my limited understanding of the situation is this.

I see two issues here:

When you upload a video to youtube you need to grant them certain rights. As Youtube is without any doubt a commercial plattform, beyond others you have to grant them the right to commercially use your video.
Unfortunately, as your soundtrack is CC NC, you didn't have the right to do so yourself. That's why Youtube is correct in complaining about the song.
"SA" means you have to share your work also as CC SA NC. As Youtube doesn't allow you to select that exact license, it's technically impossible for you to comply with that condition.
(When you select CC-BY in Youtube, an additional license claim anywhere else, e.g. in the video description, would probably not legally binding)

So after all - if you want to upload a video to Youtube, it must contain only material that

has been created or licensed by you
is under CC BY license
is public domain or CC-0


Video editing software that will follow a subject in a cropped area of the video Is there any free video editing software that will follow a subject through a cropped area of the video? A friend of mine is trying to make a video for a nonprofit and is using iPhoto but when she crops it, at certain places in the video it ends up cutting off her head. Is there software that will allow you to specify a certain object or outline in a frame of the video to remain visible while it crops?

You have two options:

Keyframes:
Most a bit more advanced video editing programs have key frames, with them you say at time X, crop to Position Y. The computer will automatically fill the motion.
Depending on the scene, this method needs a lot of work tho.
Tracking:
Another way is to track the subject. That's about what you said in the question. You specify an area and the computer follows it. A freeware with this feature would be DAVINCI RESOLVE or Hitfilm. But both software require some basic knowledge of video editing.


Oprtical Flow artifacts on cuts in Premiere I rendered a video using Optical Flow (it includes lots of Time Remapping). Basic cuts look as if there was a short glitch-like transition between them.

Frame of first shot
[1

Frame between two

Did you apply the Optical Flow to a nested sequence that contains a transition?  This looks to me like Optical Flow trying to invent new frames to fill in the slow motion and getting confused by the fact that a transition is blending two different videos.  You should apply your time remaps to the base clips and then do transitions on top of the already adjusted clips.


White balance auto-adjusted half way through recording Unbeknownst to me at the time, the camera I was using to record a talking head (so fixed environment and lighting) seems to have drastically altered its colour temperature part-way through recording. I put my hand in front of the lens at one point, and as well as refocusing to the hand (thankfully temporarily) the camera appears to have shunted everything toward blue from that point on. The talking head goes from warm and 'naturally skin-coloured' to beyond pallid.

It was recording to an Atomos Ninja in ProRes 422 HD, which I understand 'bakes' white balance directly into the recorded data as opposed to storing it as metadata like RAW.

Q1: Am I correct here, or is it actually possible to retrieve per-frame colour balance settings from a ProRes .mov file? If so, this would be my preferred option as I can then 'objectively' reverse it. I've tinkered with ffprobe but it doesn't yield anything useful-looking.

Q2: If I am correct that the colour shift exists in the video data itself, what's the best post-recording correction method? Working in my favour is a) the background never changes so before/after can be compared on a per-pixel basis, and b) The shift occurs at a single time, with the colour stable before and after. So only one correction need be applied, and I know when.

I'm using MATLAB (this is computer-vision related), which at first glance offers white point, grey world, and PCA-based correction.

For visualisation here's two frames from before and after the camera auto-corrected, with pixels plotted in RGB space. Right now I'm thinking of computing some rigid transform in RGB space to overlap one with the other, but this question is asking whether there's a more 'standard' solution.

A1: Links like these mention that ProRes 'bakes in' the white balance (as opposed to storing it as separate metadata): blackmagicdesign.com forum ; reduser.net forum ; reduser.net forum ; cinematography.com forum ; bmcuser.com archive

(I am surprised this is not more obviously stated on the web anywhere - it seems to be assumed knowledge)

A2: I did end up computing the least-squares solution that brings the 'bad' pixels over to the 'good' ones in RGB space. This gave me a 3x3 transformation matrix that could be applied to each pixel of the bad frames. After this their colour looked very much like that of the good frames.

In MATLAB this is as simple as reshaping one's image matrices into long 3xN lists of pixels (A = the bad frames, B = the good frames) and computing M = B/A, i.e. solving MA=B for M.


How do you zoom in (animated) on a portion of your canvas? I'm using After Effects to create a Motion graphic and I would like to make the animation zoom in on a specific point, do something and then zoom out again.

To clarify what I exactly try to achieve: I'm animating a browser and I would like to zoom in on the URL bar, type an URL and then zoom out and work on just like before zooming.

One option is to scale all the visible layers, so it looks zoomed, but that's a strange way to achieve the zooming effect, I think.

What's your advice?

Here's what I would do...

Create a camera
Create a null object
Set the parent of the null object to be the camera
Make the null object a '3D' object
Use the null object's properties to zoom and move the camera around, e.g. use the 'z' position to zoom

You could do this with the camera by itself, but the null object is sometimes easier to deal with. Ease in and out of the keyframes for a smooth animation. I hope this helps!