Audio extraction from video issue I've extract audio from a mov file. The output (m4a) has the same length of the video, but it starts first.

Starting first, audio has a silent space at the end. I tried many different audio/video converter(any video converter, avs, freemake) but the result it's always the same. Any suggestion?

I'm not sure why they are not lining up, perhaps there is some problem with the audio track near the beginning that is causing truncation at the start.  Unless you have meaningful information there, my suggestion would be to remove the silence at the end of the audio file (since it is clear when it goes perfectly silent) and then end align rather than start align.  It appears that would likely give you proper sync.


How to import 3D object to adobe without element 3D I've been trying to import 3D object into adobe after effects. I have element 3D installed but it requests a licence file. And it tells me that my licence file is 'invalid'. Is there any other plug-ins I can use to import 3D objects into after effects?.

yes, After Effects comes bundled with Cinema 4D lite.
https://helpx.adobe.com/after-effects/using/c4d.html


How do I create a random word title? I really don't know what is the best way to phrase this. But basically what I want is to have a single word on the screen, e.g. AUGUST.

So when the title first starts, all 6 letters will be constantly switching to random letters. Then slowly the letter in first position will stop, so in the example A will stop, then followed by U, G, U, S, T. Essentially it is a bunch of randomly changing letters in place that slowly reveal themselves to form a word.

Am working with Final Cut Pro, have Motion but not sure how to use it. Any help is appreciated. Thanks!

I found the answer to what I was looking for in this video, by accident. Leaving it here so others may find it in the future.

I was able to get all letters to generate at once by selecting Custom in the behaviour of how the letters were generated.


Animating an end of a line along a path. (In After Effects) So in the image below you see 4 "frames". This is how I see this animation playing in my head.(sorry for quality). Basicly, what I wanna do is to animate one end of a line sliding on the path of the circle. One end (let's call it B) will be moving on the circle, while the other end (A) will be stationary.

So I kinda know how to change position of a point on a path(and thus animate it), but I don't know how to make it move along some defined trajectory (or path; in this case the circle's arc).

Also, a quick small question: is it possible to import a file from Adobe Illustrator into After Effects such that AE recognises the shapes as paths(I mean the ones that are paths in Illustrator). When I do the import, AE thinks those are just images, you know, general objects, not paths. I wanna do some geometry animation, so It'd be helpful I that kind of import would actually work.

Importing stuff from Illustrator to AE is still a pain. Overlord is a good plugin that makes it a bit easier - it can transfer shapes to and from Illustrator. Also this script helps with putting selected objects in Illustrator onto their own layer.

If you want to move the end of a line around, you could make a null that follows the path of a circle.

Make a circle shape in AE. Make sure its position and its Shape position are 0,0.
Convert the circle path to bezier. Keyframe the path of the circle at the start of your timeline.
Copy this single keyframe.
Make a null at position 0,0
Paste your keyframe data into the position data of your null.
Make a New solid layer.
Add a Beam effect to it.
Make sure the beam's length is set to 100%.
Parent one end of the beam to your null layer.
Move the other end on your circle.


How can you use ffmpeg's afftdn -sn flag to sample noise from a reference noise file? The FFmpeg documentation for the afftdn audio filter says for the -sn flag:

  sample_noise, sn
  Start or stop measuring noise profile. Syntax for the command is : "start" or "stop" string. After measuring noise profile is stopped it will be automatically applied in filtering.

It's a little unclear as to the basic implementation of the start/stop values in the sample_noise -sn flag. I tried:

ffmpeg -i inputfile.wav -af afftdn=nt=c:bn=sn=start=0=stop=1 noiseout.wav

as an attempt to sample the first second of sound as a noise profile, which errors with

[afftdn @ 0x7fefbb800000] Custom band noise must be integer.

So the questions are:

What's the correct input format for sample_noise?
Is there a way to sample the noise from a noise reference .wav file that I have, e.g. noiseprofile.wav?

Commands are instructions sent from an interface external to the filter, usually an external program using a ZMQ protocol. There is a filter that can execute commands which is what I'll use here.

Base syntax is

ffmpeg -i in -af "asendcmd=c='0.0 afftdn@n sn start; 1.0 afftdn@n sn stop',afftdn@n" noiseout.wav

To use another source for noise profile, you'll have to append it, measure noise, and then remove it.

ffmpeg -i in -i profile -filter_complex "[1][0]concat=n=2:v=0:a=1,asendcmd=c='0.0 afftdn@n sn start; 1.0 afftdn@n sn stop',afftdn@n,atrim=1,asetpts=PTS-STARTPTS" noiseout.wav

Above, I assume the profile is 1 second long, which is removed with atrim after denoising.


ffmpeg script encoding only few inputs I'm using this to create a video from multiple sources. But, the output has only until frames/300100.PNG. What should I change to make it encode all my inputs?

ffmpeg -i body.mp3
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 16.368 -i frames/000000.PNG
    -i 1.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 3.959 -i frames/100100.PNG
    -i 2.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 6.574 -i frames/200100.PNG
    -i 3.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 5.134 -i frames/300100.PNG
    -i 4.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 4.559 -i frames/400100.PNG
    -i 5.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 5.351 -i frames/500100.PNG
    -i 6.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 4.390 -i frames/600100.PNG
    -i 7.mp4 -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 8.950 -i frames/700100.PNG
-filter_complex "[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]concat=n=7:v=1:a=0[v]"
-map "[v]" -map 0:a -pix_fmt yuv420p out.mp4

You have to feed all inputs to the concat filter, and set the correct number of inputs in n. FFmpeg input index starts from 0. So the fifth input has an index of 4 and would be fed as [4] in the concat filter.

ffmpeg -i body.mp3
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 16.368 -i frames/000000.PNG
    -i 1.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 3.959 -i frames/100100.PNG
    -i 2.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 6.574 -i frames/200100.PNG
    -i 3.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 5.134 -i frames/300100.PNG
    -i 4.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 4.559 -i frames/400100.PNG
    -i 5.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 5.351 -i frames/500100.PNG
    -i 6.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 4.390 -i frames/600100.PNG
    -i 7.mp4
    -framerate 60 -loop 1 -t 8.950 -i frames/700100.PNG
-filter_complex "[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]concat=n=15:v=1:a=0[v]"
-map "[v]" -map 0:a -pix_fmt yuv420p out.mp4


How is looking process of making HDR movie? I'm going to work with conversion from SDR to HDR content. So I am looking for material where I can compare 2 version of the same movie, e.g. "A star is born" in HDR and in SDR.

I know that HDR by means is "higher dynamic range", "wider color space", "higher bit depth" and 4k (from https://video.stackexchange.com/a/21678/26522). But I'm little confused, how these movies are assembled.

Questions:

Do the operator has a couple of cameras with different exposure settings? E.g. first camera with 1/120s, second 1/60s and third 1/30s?
Or maybe movie is recorded in RAW format, and I can get material 1/120, 1/60 and 1/30 from RAW format?
Who is mearging these material? I'm pretty sure, that software will do that, but this software can be controlled - do you know which software do they use? Adobe Premiere?
Do I need camera with recording material in 2020 colorspace to get HDR movie?

--edit--

Is this camera solves all of my questions: Alexa SXT (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arri_Alexa#Alexa_SXT) ?

After some searching I have get this link: https://photography.tutsplus.com/tutorials/what-is-hdr-video-3-ways-to-create-high-dynamic-range-video--cms-25884

According to this link and RED company's cameras:

No there are now multiple cameras which are recording the same scene
These special cameras records one shoot as 2 separate frames. First overexposed, second underexposed


Choppy and Laggy audio in Premiere Pro My videos and audio files played fine in Premiere Pro yesterday, but today when I open the project file again, all the audio files, including those in videos, are choppy and laggy during playback. Tried opening new projects and with other audios and vids, the problem still exists. Any ideas ?

From my experience this can typically occur when Premiere is having either a hard time loading a buffer for the audio, or you're putting too much strain on your computer memory.

I'd clear out the Premiere cache, which you can do by going to “Preferences > Memory.”

If it's an issue that occurs through different clips, something tells me it's to do with either the amount of memory Premiere needs to process the realtime feedback for audio, or the bitrate of the clips. If your bitrate is too high, it'll DEFINITELY cause some playback issues.


Select range of clips in Kdenlive I'm editing a video in Kdenlive. After I cut out stuff, there are holes (parts with no video nor audio with video and audio to the left and to the right where the parts to the left and to the right should be concatenated) which need to be removed.

There seems to be a feature for removing those holes as there is a context menu entry called Remove Space when right-clicking empty space in a timeline.

However, it always displays the error message

  Cannot remove space in a track with a group

because I grouped my clips and it apparently can't remove space automatically if groups are used.

There is exactly the same amount of space on all tracks which have any content at this point on the timeline as I cut out part of a group.

The only way I see to close such a gap is to select all clips to the right of it and move them to the left. This is very cumbersome there are dozens of clips or groups of clips to right and I don't see how I can select many clips or groups of clips at once.

How I currently go about it is to click the first clip to the right of the gap, then hold down the control key, and then click every single other clip on all tracks. This not only is very cumbersome but it also yields the problem that if I miss any clip, I have to start over again, as I can't move my selection in this case and finding the clip that's not selected is virtually impossible.

Is there an easy way to close such a gap? Possibly by selecting a range of clips? So that I only have to click some part of the time line and then another part of it and it automatically selects all clips in that range? Or this thing file browsers commonly allow you to do where you draw a rectangle around the items you want to select:

I use Kdenlive 15.12.3 on Ubuntu 16.04. As of this writing (2017-06-05), this is the newest version in the official Ubuntu 16.04 software repositories.

Edit: I just posted this question in the Kdenlive forum: https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=265&t=140571

I didn't find a way of selecting a range of clips but the main problem is solved by the spacer tool which can be invoked by pressing M. One then grabs the left end of the clip to the right of a gap and drags it to the left until the gab is closed. By doing so, all clips to the right are automatically moved to the left as well.

When browsing through the different tools, I incorrectly assumed the spacer tool to be a restricted version of the selection tool because of its mouse pointer symbol: I assumed one could use it to expand clips to the left or to the right like with the selection tool (but not select clips).


FFMPEG - Using variables in curves video filer expression I'm tearing my hair out trying to get this to work, i assume it's a syntax issue.

I'm experimenting with the curves video filter in ffmpeg. When I enter the coordinates in the standard form;

ffmpeg -y -i 0.jpg -vf curves=r='0/0 .83/.88 1/1':g='0/0 0.84/0.88 1/1':b='0/0 0.88/0.88 1/1' curves.png;

....I have no issues.

I am trying, however, to use variables vs fixed numbers for the curve points and i cannot in anyway get ffmpeg to accept it.

For example if i simply type;

var3=0.88

and then repeat the code with;

ffmpeg -y -i 0.jpg -vf curves=r='0/0 .83/$var3 1/1':g='0/0 0.84/$var3 1/1':b='0/0 0.88/$var3 1/1' curves.png;

it won't work, it's sees $var3 as being 0.000000

also tried;

ffmpeg -y -i 0.jpg -vf curves=r='0/0 .83/${var3} 1/1':g='0/0 0.84/${var3} 1/1':b='0/0 0.88/${var3} 1/1' curves.png;

and

ffmpeg -y -i 0.jpg -vf curves=r='0/0 .83/`echo $var3` 1/1':g='0/0 0.84/`echo $var3 1/1':b='0/0 0.88/`echo $var3 1/1' curves.png;

I'm out of ideas. Could anyone help in this situation, really need these to be variables vs fixed numbers for my purposes.

Thanks!

Assuming you're using bash or a similar shell, you need double quotes. Single quotes conveys its contents literally.

curves=r="0/0 .83/$var3 1/1":g="0/0 0.84/$var3 1/1":b="0/0 0.88/$var3 1/1"


GoPro Fusion extended recording? The Goal

I am looking at purchasing a GoPro Fusion in order to record a group of people gaming. The games will last for between 3 and 6 hours. I'm looking at the fusion because of how very unobtrusive it can feel relative to something like a multi-cam setup.

The Question

Is it possible to create a setup for the GoPro Fusion or a competitor that will record for that kind of duration?

Additional Notes

We will be in my home. I will therefore have access to pretty much anything I can afford: wall power, computers, wifi control, etc.

This is very straightforward to set up, yes. Because you can fill up SD cards very quickly with the resolutions these are capable of, you could run one at 1080p for longer duration, but that's still not going to stretch to 6 hours.

For that length of game you will want to have it connected via USB to a PC of some kind recording the video feed directly to disk, and providing power.

Relatively simple - and in fact using the default software that comes with the GoPro Fusion, you can pretty much do that out of the box.

As the Fusion has voice commands, that can also make for a very unobtrusive recording station.


Removing Metadata Title in mp4 files I was able to remove metadata titles in mkv files through mkvtoolnix with this code

@echo off
for /r %%g in (*.mkv) do ("D:\Programs\MKVToolsNix\mkvpropedit" "%%~g" --tags all:"" --delete title )

I want to do the same thing with mp4 files too which probably cant be done with mkvtoolnix. How do I do it?

You can try FFMpeg.  There are examples showing how to strip all metadata and removing just a single item isn't much different.
Try
ffmpeg -i in.mp4 -metadata title= -c:v copy -c:a copy out.mp4
This can also be done with exiftool as of version 11.39. Exiftool can also do it in batch without need of a script.
exiftool -ext mp4 -Title= /path/to/files/
This command creates backup files.  Add -overwrite_original to suppress the creation of backup files.  Add -r to recurse into subdirectories.


Viewing mesh outline in After Effects In the tutorial I am viewing online, the teacher is able to view the mesh outline without the mesh triangles by selecting the mesh in the effects list within the layer. Its unclear even from putting the question into Google how to do this? Can anyone help? Hopefully the attached image illustrates what I mean.

Try enabling paths and alike by clicking on the button next to the one for your safe areas and rulers.

Can't upload a screenshot unfortunately, Stackexchange keeps crashing when I try...


How to give different colors to duplicate composition in after effects? So, I have this composition with an animated letter. Each letter is a different composition. To save me some work I duplicate the repeating letters. However I want to change the colour of one letter all of the repeated letters get the same colour. How can I disconnect in some way the duplicate compositions from the original? Thank you!

P.S. I'm newb

What you need to do is:

clone the layer,
right click and choose View Layer Source in Project,
duplicate the source in the project window, and finally
alt/option-drag the new source on to the (selected) cloned layer to change its source.

If this is too tedious, I've written a script that will clone the layer and create a  unique source for it in one step (it can also recursively clone all the source layers in compositions if need be). There's also a pay-what-you-want script called true-comp-duplicator on aescripts.com that will do the same job.


How to read 10-bit RGB values from HDR video? I had a HDR video and the format is ProRes. The colour bit depth of ProRes is 10-bit. I would like to extract the 10-bit RGB values from the HDR video.

As per this link, I have first converted the 10-bit HDR video to a number of 16-bit TIFF images. However, when I use some program like python to read back the RGB values from the TIFF image, some of the 16-bit RGB values are larger than 1024 (=2^10). It looks to me the 10-bit RGB value has been expanded to 16-bit and store the expanded value in the TIFF image but I am not sure if that is the case. How can I obtain the original 10-bit RGB values from the 16-bit RGB values stored in the TIFF image?

The ProRes input will have YUV encoding, not RGB. If you need a raw dump, save as rawvideo.

ffmpeg -i in.mov -f rawvideo raw.yuv

Note that bit depths which aren't multiples of 8 are still stored in data layouts which are, with padding. So, if ProRes is yuv422p10le in limited / studio range, the 10-bit luma value for a white pixel will be 940 or 1110101100 but will be stored as 16 bits in the file: 1110110000000011 where the order is little-endian.

You can however save as RGB 10-bit (with padding),

ffmpeg -i in.mov -pix_fmt gbrp10be -f rawvideo raw.rgb

where the green plane is stored first, then blue, then red. The above is for big-endian so the byte order isn't reversed.


How to fade in/out a video/audio clip with unknown duration? I'm working on a project where I'm using ffmpeg to batch convert some video files, and adding fade in/out effects at the head and tail of each clip.

I've been using this bit of code to add the fade/out effect on clips with known durations:

ffmpeg -i clip.mp4 -filter:v 'fade=in:0:30,fade=out:9650:30' -c:v libx264 -crf 22 -preset veryfast -c:a copy fadeInOut.mp4

My two questions are:

How can I simultaneously fade the audio in/out?
Can ffmpeg automatically figure out the duration of the clip and be told just fade out the last 30 frames?

Thanks!

#1 To simultaneously fade the audio in/out:

ffmpeg -i clip.mp4 -vf 'fade=in:0:30,fade=out:960:30'
                   -af 'afade=in:st=0:d=1,afade=out:st=32:d=1'
       -c:v libx264 -crf 22 -preset veryfast fadeInOut.mp4

The afade times are in seconds.

#2 Automatically? No. But see workaround below

You can first run ffprobe to get duration.

ffprobe -i clip.mp4 -show_entries stream=codec_type,duration -of compact=p=0:nk=1

You'll get something like this:

video|13.556000
audio|13.816000

You can then use the above to place your fades. These times are in seconds.

Workaround

ffmpeg -i clip.mp4 -sseof -1 -copyts -i clip.mp4 -filter_complex
       "[1]fade=out:0:30[t];[0][t]overlay,fade=in:0:30[v];
        anullsrc,atrim=0:2[at];[0][at]acrossfade=d=1,afade=d=1[a]"
       -map "[v]" -map "[a]" -c:v libx264 -crf 22 -preset veryfast -shortest fadeInOut.mp4

FFmpeg has a sseof option that allows one to seek an input from the end. We can use that to accomplish our goal. So we feed the input twice, with the 2nd time ingesting only the last second. We tell FFmpeg to preserve the timestamps, so that ffmpeg preserves the temporal position of this tail portion.

We apply a fade out to this tail and then overlay the result onto the full input. Since they are the same media file, the foreground completely covers the background, and since copyts was applied, the overlay happens upon the corresponding identical frame in the background input.

For audio, we create a blank dummy audio of duration 2 seconds, and then apply an audio crossfade from the main audio to this dummy audio. Since the 2nd audio is blank, this is, in effect, a fade-out for the main input. The -shortest is added to leave out portions of the dummy audio after the crossfade has occurred.


Export timeline with multiple audio tracks as video with single audio track in DaVinci Resolve 16 Disclaimer up-front: I'm a beginner when it comes to video editing, so I'm maybe using the wrong terms to describe my problem.

The task

So I'm working on an OBS recording of myself, where I wanted to replace a part of the video with another video in DaVinci Resolve 16 on Windows.

Cutting the old video and inserting the new video was done quickly and left me with two video and two audio tracks in the timeline (see screenshot). The audio clips are processed seperately in Audacity and were later imported (from WAV), and are linked with the videos before cutting, if that matters.

The preview in Resolve looked and sounded satisfying, so I went to Deliver to get a final render of the whole clip. This where the initial settings in Video, Audio and File:

The problem

In the final video, the sound went silent in the section where the second audio track was supposed to be. Poking at the video with VLC revealed that there was indeed a second audio track with the sound only in that part. What I had hoped for, was a single audio track such as there is only a single video track.

What I've tried

(I think) I then tried basically all alternatives I could find in the Deliver settings, threw quite a few combinations of "multiple" "audio tracks" "export" and "davinci resolve 16" at Google and the Video Production search, and also skimmed through the tutorial and reference manual of Resolve, but to no avail.

The only way that I could find to achieve what I wanted, was to move the inserted clip's audio and video track to those of the original video. But I guess there has to be another "proper" way to do this, because my approach would e.g. not work for music.

The question

Can anybody give my a hint what it is that I'm missing? I reckon it has to be something very basic, that I should be ashamed of having overlooked it all the time :-D

Edit: I somehow managed to get it to work, but I'm unfortunately not sure how. So I'd still be happy if somebody could give a proper explanation.

The likely culprit is the Audio setting [Output Track 1], which should normally be "Main 1 (Stereo)", which is the default final bus/mix of the audio in the compiled video.

When setting it to "All timeline tracks" -- each audio track (stereo or mono) is rendered as separate tracks (stereo or mono) in the output file.


How to achieve "Acid Burn" saturation? The TV show 'Utopia' has become renowned for its stylized visuals, including a type of saturation that is frequently described by reviews as "Acid Burned"...

  Director Marc Munden, who shot the first three episodes, set an incredible visual tone from the start with his use of acid colours and startling symmetry.

From the Guardian.

  Channel 4's acid-toned paranoid thriller got off to a disappointing start ratings-wise, but soon built a detail-orientated fanbase whose obsessiveness was almost a match for the show's own graphic-novel nerds.

From the Independent.

What this seems to translate to is incredibly rich and vibrant yellows and greens, with de-saturated blues and washed out darker shades.

How is this achieved, and how could it be reproduced?

Is it entirely modified digitally in post production, or is a mixture of filmic techniques, lenses and post?

The British adaptation of Wallander also prominently used this technique:

I have not seen any movie that used any onset technqiuqes for this look. Of course you want the lighting to give away a certain mood to begin with but there are no special filters needed.

For the post production workflow, there is a great plugin for several video tools like After Effects, Premiere and Final Cut from Red Giant called Mojo that makes it extremely easy to achieve and fine tune such an effect. They also offer other tools to achieve specific filmic looks.

If you don't want to use a plugin or simply want to achieve a more "unique look", you can play with contrast and the individual color channels. I recommend using a "Levels" effect not a "contrast" effect, you usually have greater control with that. Then punch the blue channel up a bit and the green channel aswell but not as much. For some scene you may want to work with masks to strengthen the effect in some areas without overdoing it in others.

What can also help even more to achieve the color distortion but is not available in every video editor is to apply a blue (or other color depending on your desired look) layer over your footage with a blend mode like "Overlay" or "Vivid Light" (that's how they are called in Adobe programs) and adjusting the transparency of the color layer. This tints the image nicely in a blueish dark look.
Play around with different blend modes, you can achieve very interesting effects with that technique. Your video software just needs to support blend modes for that.

You also want a very sharp image, thats important for the effect to really shine and have this "harsh" feeling. Applying a very subtle sharpening effect could be benefical.

You can also add a vignette as used in your first set of screenshots.


Red Epic, Adobe Premiere Editing Workflow We shot some stuff on a Red Epic. The footage is on a 2TB Hitachi HD. Now I need to edit the footage. I can't transfer all the footage to my MacPro desktop because it is too many TB and will take too long. I also tried editing the footage straight from the external Hitachi HD before and it is very laggy and no good.

So what is the preferred workflow for this situation? I've heard something about exporting proxies or low-res video from the original footage via RedCine-X Pro. Then using that low-res footage to edit in Premiere. Then I guess export some data that will link to the original footage, or name the low-res files the same filenames as the original footage?

I'm lost and need a workflow.

Drag all your r3d files into Adobe Media Encoder (or CineX Pro), transcode to ProRes 422 (Proxy) and then use these to make your edit in Premiere. Once done, make the proxy footage offline in your project window and then relink to the original files.

Make sure to keep your folder structures the same for the proxies so that relinking is just a 1-click process. Also think before about what resolution you're delivering in and use sequence settings to reflect this.

Also make sure you actually have room for the proxies on your desktop. The files will be smaller but still take up a significant amount of space.


Looking for compressed standard definition file format to share footage between Final Cut Pro 7 and Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 Brief Background

I have a 30 minute film originally edited on Premiere Pro 1.5 in 2005/2006 that used 4:3 720x576 PAL interlaced DV AVI footage imported by firewire from a DV Cam. The entire raw footage totals at around 100Gb. I have archived/backed up this.

My question

I'd also like to work with the footage in a more efficient codec/file format (but preserving quality) that used much less space than the DV/AVI format and that works in both Final Cut Studio 7 and Adobe Premiere Pro CS6.

Further background

I have both licensed copies of Premiere Pro CS6 and Final Cut Studio 7. I am in the process of importing the old Premiere Pro 1.5 project into both tools. This has worked with reasonable success with the original AVIs (used Premiere Pro CS3 as an intermediate step) though there are some effects that didn't migrate but I am happy to tweak these manually.

I would like to keep the project that made this film in a current format so that it is still workable and to serve as practice for learning both tools. I believe that modern codecs provide efficiency in file size compared with the AVI file but still retaining the quality. I believe that FCP7 still does have some fans even though FCP X is said to be improved.

Detail about my technique for replacing the .AVI with the newer efficient file format

I am hoping that I can batch create copies of all the original footage files but in a more efficient commonly compatible format. I would expect the efficient version of the files to have the same name but with a new extension, e.g. .MOV for quicktime instead of the original .AVI. Assuming that both tools use a text-based/XML project file, in a text editor I should be able to global replace .AVI with .MOV so that the tool refers to the new efficient version of the file.

Research so far on a auitable codec/format

I have done some research including the FCP7 manual and on this site but not found many options. At the moment QuickTime seems to be the common format to use, but how efficient is this compared to the original AVI. I am not so concerned about Adobe Premiere Pro as this seems to be compatible with many formats.

What digital file formats are compatible with final cut pro?
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090729091700AAFR72i
Video Formats Supported by Final Cut Pro
http://documentation.apple.com/en/finalcutpro/usermanual/#chapter=C%26section=13
https://video.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/final-cut-pro+file-formats

Your best bet is probably MPEG2 or MPEG4.  Both are going to have quality loss compared to your high quality DV format though, but proportionally, they should be pretty good.  You should be able to use Adobe Media Encoder to make the transition to whichever format you want to use.  Simply setup a profile and drag all the files in to Encoder and let it rip.

As to the type of MPEG2 or MPEG4, it really depends on what you are trying to accomplish.  I would personally probably go with h.264 at a fairly high quality level, though there will be some amount of difficulty working with the format in an NLE since it doesn't store very frame.  You really have to choose a trade off between space and efficiency in your NLE.  Large, less compressed videos can more readily access a particular frame without hammering the CPU, but they take up more space.

Motion JPEG is an in-between format that compresses each frame individually (or you can use all I frame H.264) but both give up a LOT in terms of compression since they compress each frame individually instead of making use of multiple frames at a time (which complicates non-linear playback).

One final option, (which is likely what I would do in your shoes) is to not recompress at all, but rather move the DV format video to an MOV container.  AVI and MOV are just containers and while AVI may not play nice in Mac world, MOV should play nice in both.


Video editing with playable jump forward I'm looking for an open source video editor for windows

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_editing_software

in order to cut out some parts of a video.
A necessary feature that I'm looking for is to be able to jump forward a few seconds while playing the video (to find where I need to cut it next).

So far, I checked:

OpenShot: doesn't have the ability.
Shotcut, Avidemux, Kdenlive: it can jump forward, but it stops playing the movie, and I need to press play again, which makes in clunky.

I came up with the following solution.
Find the durations using your favorite player.
Then, use the following python script that employs ffmpeg:

# Cut out clips from a video given a text file with times, e.g.:
# 0.0-12.20
# 14.28-15.58
# 53.25-53.31
# 54.47-55.05

import sys, re, os
import datetime

fin = "8-01.mp4"
flist = "8-01_cut_out.txt"

def main():
    with open(flist) as f:
        lines = f.readlines()
    #print(lines)

    print("Durations to remove:")
    times = ["00:00:00.000"]
    #for line in sys.stdin:
    for line in lines:
        line = line.rstrip()

        reg = re.compile('(\d+)\.(\d+)-(\d+)\.(\d+)')
        m = reg.match(line)
        if not m:
            print("Couldn't find pattern:", line)
            return

        m0, s0, m1, s1 = [int(m.group(i+1)) for i in range(4)]
        t0 = "00:%02d:%02d.000" % (m0, s0)
        t1 = "00:%02d:%02d.000" % (m1, s1)
        print(t0, "...", t1)
        times.extend([t0, t1])
    # append last
    times.append("10:00:00.000")

    print(">> \nDurations:")
    fclip = open("clip_list.txt", "w")
    for i in range( len(times)//2 ):
        t0 = times[2*i]
        t1 = times[2*i+1]
        fout = "clip%02d.mp4" % i
        dur = datetime.datetime.strptime(t1[:8], "%H:%M:%S") - datetime.datetime.strptime(t0[:8], "%H:%M:%S")
        dur = dur.total_seconds()
        print(">>", fout, t0, "...", t1, "%dsec" % dur)
        if dur == 0:
            continue
        fclip.write( "file " + fout + "\n" )

        cmd = "ffmpeg -y -ss %s -i %s -t %d -c copy %s" % (t0, fin, dur, fout)
        print(">>", cmd)
        os.system( cmd )
    fclip.close()

    print("\n>> Concatenate:")
    cmd = "ffmpeg -y -f concat -i clip_list.txt -c copy out.mp4"
    print(">>", cmd)
    os.system( cmd )

if __name__ == "__main__":
    main()


How to merge video stream and two Stereo audio streams in 5.1 with a terminal command? What I want as result: a video with the English stream on the front lineout of my soundcard and a German audio stream on the rear lineout of my soundcard.

So far, I extracted the streams with:

mkvextract tracks video.mkv 1:video.h264 2:audio.ac3

...to get the single streams from an .mkv.

Is there a way to merge the two audio streams to the video the way I want to have it?

That depends on your video file format and possibly if you have a surround encoder.  Some file formats provide multiple audio channels that can be configured for different speakers, others rely on a Dolby encoding or similar to provide the speaker information in one audio stream.

Either use a file format that supports multiple independent audio tracks per speaker or use a Dolby (or some other system like MPEG Surround) surround encoder to encode the audio in to a single Dolby (or similar) stream that can be processed by a Dolby (or similar) receiver.

The encoding option would be the best one if you want to ensure compatibility with most players.  Encoders are available in most professional quality DVD/Bluray authoring software packages as well as for some better audio software packages.  You can alternately get a stand alone Dolby encoder, but licensing fees (1 time) for the encoder apply.


Which low budget video camera would be appropriate for making travel/advenutre short films? I run a small travel company in a remote Himalayan region. We are very much interested to shoot some interesting films of your trips and adventures. As our budget is low (somewhere around $200 to $300, what would be the best camera to buy which can give us professional HD quality videos. We have been checking out GoPro but are confused if a proper camcorder would be better option. Would appreciate if someone can help with the best buy for our project.

For your budget and situation, GoPro is probably the best bet as it is exceptionally light and a good value for the money.  It doesn't have a variable length lens, so it can be a little limiting in shot composition, but you won't get the same video quality, weight and durability in any other camera for the same price.  That's why they are the market leader in that segment.

Most other cameras that are that cheap sacrifice either quality and durability or size for more versatility and consumer friendly features, but at that low of a price point, there isn't enough budget for making the device to keep much of any quality with any kind of versatility.  (As an example, an optical zoom lens of decent quality would probably take 1/4 to 1/3 of the budget of a camera in the price range you are looking for.  That doesn't leave much for sensor and processing electronics.)


Line between photographer and video Just been reading an article on dpreview about the panasonic gh4. The newest hyrbid that almost seems like a crossover product between photography and videography. The 4k video sounds pretty cool. 30 still per second at 8MP!

It just seems to me that the two arts are becoming less divided. Is the record button going to become the new shutter button?

Having done both professional photography as well as professional videography, I have a lot of experience in both of these areas.  They have many similarities, but also many differences.

The technical capabilities of the tools have already converged to some level and will continue to do so.  DSLRs are one of the more popular choices for shooting video now due to the low cost and high quality as well as interchangeable optics.  Major TV shows have actually been shot on DSLRs. (The last two episodes of House were shot on the Canon 5D Mark iii for example.)

That said, the fields themselves are no closer to converging than they have ever been.  From the perspective of a photographer, capturing 30 images in a second is largely noise.  There are some environments where it is helpful, such as sports, but in general a photographer is looking for one perfect image while controlling as many variables of that moment as possible.  A videographer on the other hand is controlling the behavior of their camera to capture a scene as it unfolds.

The language of the mediums, while similar in terms of composition and many techniques, such as lighting, is completely different when it comes to how emotion and story is communicated.  Photography cares about capturing the essence of a moment in crystal clarity while video is concerned with capturing the beauty of motion and telling the story through flow.

Similarly, on a technical level, the quality of image we can capture at slower frame rates will be higher for quite some time still (until we are regularly hitting the diffraction limit for practical sensor sizes).  We will get burst capabilities that rival film much sooner, but they will be to large buffers that fill rapidly.

Just at the 35mm format, we need video to be in the upper 20s or low 30s of megapixels before we hit the diffraction limit reliably.  Until that point, the most quality for a photographer will come from shooting the moment rather than just capturing all moments.  Even when we can capture all moments, sorting out the perfect moment from among all the images would be more painstaking than simply capturing the one moment that is needed.

Additionally, trying to capture all moments well detracts from how well you can look for and capture that one perfect moment.  Photography requires focus on the moment while video requires focus on the whole time of the shot.  They are different mindsets with different technical goals and requirements that require a different use even when using the same tools.


Crop a video with a moving crop area of fixed size I have 3840 × 2160 videos where I want to cut out a moving person on stage (e.g. music video). The crop area is fixed (1080 x 1920). The problem is, the person is moving around. Not much, but in a 3min. video the crop area would move a couple of times.

Example: Frame 0-889, area(500,34,1080,1920) - Frame 950-1735, area (800,10,1080,1920) - Frame 1820-2530, area(600,40,1080,1920)

I gave some example numbers above. The solution should interpolate the crop area between Frame 889 and Frame 950; Frame 1735 and Frame 1820. Ideally I would like to define those areas in a visual editor which allows me to move a fixed size crop rectangle for the Frames and coordinates given above.

Optionally I could also figure out the crop areas without visual help and then use that data to crop the video in something like ffmpeg (although I don't know how to do this properly including the interpolation step).

I am on Linux and tried different video editors but their crop filters are not useful to solve my task. I have Windows available but no commercial editing software installed at the moment.

Thanks for the help!

I recommend AVISynth (a script based video editor for VirtualDub) and the DeShaker plugin.

You can learn a minimum amount about AVISynth and simply load DeShaker, have it stabilize on the person's body and it will follow them smoothly as they move.

You will have a finished product that is stabilized as a bonus.

You can also learn more about AVISynth, establish precise crops that are animated to follow the person, and get a perfect result (based on the quality of the input). You can set your moves with frame and pixel accuracy by typing numbers into the script and reloading the frame in VirtualDub.

It might be worth 5 mins. exploring those links to see if you want to try another video editor.

If one of the current video editors you've installed has image stabilization you can try it, but DeShaker is one of the better free ones (as of a year ago) that I've used.


Encoding 1080p for DVD - Pr 5.5 When I encode my 1080 sequence using the MPEG2-DVD preset I get a slight letterbox effect on either side of the frame. Does anybody know if there is any way around that, or if that is just-the-way-it-is?

1080 would suggest full HD, the rub is that DVD is not HD. At best DVD is 720 x 480 so I believe that PR5.5 like many other pro editors is scaling your 1080 to fit in this smaller screen format, so letter boxing would be expected.


proper way to undo AVCHD mess? Most of my video editing programs simply take the stream (.MTS) files from my camera's AVCHD videos. I can confirm the imported video/audio are exactly the same if the program has access to the whole directory structure or simply the MTS file and nothing else. In fact, no program even touches the other files (my filesystem saves the time the file was last accessed).

But everywhere everyone says that all the other files are important, that by saving only the MTS files i can lose information. What information am i losing?

And if there is any information to be had, is there any way to get rid of AVCHD so my other NLV editing programs do not have to care about it (since they obviously can't handle it anyway)? maybe MTS/AVCHD converted to audio + stills (PNG)? what should i use to do that conversion and not lose all that hidden information that is scattered around?

If the specific AVCHD implementation matters, I'm using mostly panasonic cameras (GH2 to GH4).

tl;dr how do you import AVCHD footage into your workflow for maximum flexibility?

It's possible that with certain Panasonic or MTS-specific software, the associated files are useful. I've heard of situations where Premiere won't import the footage correctly without the full folder structure. I don't have any MTS folders here at the moment to verify for sure, but it's most likely just metadata that the camera recorded.

That being said, I've never had an issue importing an MTS file disassociated from its associated files (and I do this for a living). Fortunately, the associated files and folders are relatively small and don't take much space, so it's usually more trouble to weed them out than it is to remove them.

I'm assuming you're editing in Final Cut, as the rest of the major NLE's can handle the AVCHD codec, and an MTS wrapper, natively. Final Cut's Log and Transfer does a fine job with the transcode and you won't lose anything significant.

If you're using another NLE, the best transcode codec you can use is ProRes, as it's fairly universal and a very high-quality codec. I've also seen guys use DNxHD for visually lossless transcodes, but it's a heavy codec and some machines may have trouble playing it at full speed. Unfortunately, on Windows you're out of luck with ProRes altogether as it's Mac-only.


Effects Control does not show anything When I made a shape, all of my effects like rotation, scale, etc. would pop up in the Effects Control window. Now they don't and I have to work in that cramped space in the timeline. Why is this?

Here's an image of the problem:

My AE was always like that. I believe you confusing Adobe After Effects "Effects Control" panel, with Adobe Premiere "Effects Control" panel, where you can find all basic effects.


Camera randomly re-connects to PC I don't know if it's the right place to post this question or I should go to StackOverflow, but I'll give it a try.

I've got my camera connected to PC. It works just fine. But sometimes, let's say every 10 minutes, it 're-connects' to the computer which makes a process of capturing a video from a tape impractical.

I'm sure that the camera works fine by itself, because on the other computer everything works fine. I know that in order to find the core of the problem I should check if the cable is not damaged first or if there is something wrong with Firewire adapter card inside the computer, but I do not have access to a second cable or card.

So is there any programmatical way to find out what the problem may be?

No, but if you have another computer entirely that it works on, then you know that the cable is good.  This means it must be the firewire card or drivers on the PC that isn't working that is messed up.  I'd first try uninstalling/reinstalling the firewire card and drivers and if that doesn't work, I'd try a new card.


Blackmagic Cinema Camera: recording, bitrate and bitdepth If connecting a Blackmagic Cinema Camera via Thunderbolt to a laptop, can you record directly to the harddrive of the laptop? Which bitrate does have these recordings if using ProRes HQ422 at 1920x1080 @25p? And what's the real bitdepth of the image you get in this setup?

The Media Express software it ships with will let you capture video directly from the Thunderbolt port at 23.98p, 24p, 25p, 29.97p, 30p frame rates (from the tech specs page)

From the Wikipedia ProRes 422 page you will get 10-bit sample depth, and High-Quality comes in at 220 Mbit/s for HD resolution at 60i

Thunderbolt can handle 10Gb/s and SATA 3 can handle 6Gb/s so they will not be a bottleneck here.


Editing a 640x480 mp4 in premiere CS4 I have a video with 640x480 resolution, which I want to import into premiere and add a MASK over specific areas which should not be visible.

I'm wondering what settings I should select when I start my project.
Additionally, wondering if there is a better way / program. Basically I want to have te final result with minimal loss of data from re-compression and minimal creation of artifacts etc..

My video has the following characteristics:

ID_VIDEO_ID=0
ID_DEMUXER=lavfpref
ID_VIDEO_FORMAT=avc1
ID_VIDEO_BITRATE=0
ID_VIDEO_WIDTH=640
ID_VIDEO_HEIGHT=480
ID_VIDEO_FPS=1001.000
ID_VIDEO_ASPECT=0.0000
ID_LENGTH=10970.24
ID_SEEKABLE=1
ID_CHAPTERS=0
ID_VIDEO_CODEC=ffh264
ID_VIDEO_ASPECT=1.3333

The Media Information from VLC is the following:

A custom resolution of 640 by 480 with square pixels would work.  It's also worth noting that if you import the video and drag it on to a new sequence, Premiere should offer to automatically adjust the settings for the sequence for you.


Is there a way to use nlmeans_opencl filter with a 10 bits source? So far I have only managed to run nlmeans_opencl filter with the following settings:
ffmpeg -init_hw_device opencl=gpu:0.0 -filter_hw_device gpu -i 10bit_input.ts \
       -vf "hwupload,nlmeans_opencl,hwdownload,format=yuv420p" -an output.mp4

Pretty much every other pixel format I set to format= fails one way or another. For example
My source is yuv420p10le, so that is my first choice, but I get this error:
[hwdownload @ 0x55ab32e60c40] Invalid output format yuv420p10le for hwframe download
[Parsed_hwdownload_2 @ 0x55ab32e61c80] Failed to configure output pad on Parsed_hwdownload_2
Error reinitializing filters!
Failed to inject frame into filter network: Invalid argument
Error while processing the decoded data for stream #0:0
Conversion failed!

With yuv420p16le:
[Parsed_nlmeans_opencl_1 @ 0x563d97d93600] input format yuv420p16le not supported
Error while filtering: Invalid argument
Failed to inject frame into filter network: Invalid argument
Error while processing the decoded data for stream #0:0
Conversion failed!

With no format=... at all:
[hwdownload @ 0x5610a4653380] Invalid output format gray for hwframe download.
[Parsed_hwdownload_2 @ 0x5610a472a400] Failed to configure output pad on Parsed_hwdownload_2
Error reinitializing filters!
Failed to inject frame into filter network: Invalid argument
Error while processing the decoded data for stream #0:0
Conversion failed!

So, is there any way to make this work, without dropping component precision to 8 bits?

No, the nlmeans_opencl filter supports yuv420p, yuv444p and gbrp, all 8-bit planar formats.


Record Screencast of Remote Presenter For some time now I've been looking for screencast software that can record someone presenting on another computer. The application is for a commercial screencast recording company that comes in and records screencasts of lectures, product demos, and keynotes for other companies.

The problem I run into is that all the screencast software I've seen records only the local screen. That doesn't work--we can't load screencast software on the presenter's computer. What we've used so far is Wirecast and Desktop Presenter. Desktop Presenter goes on the presenter's computer, and Wirecast goes on our recording cart computer. This works, but it produces videos that are difficult to edit (we use QuickTime Pro 7 to edit without re-compressing). If we had something like ScreenFlow that also had remote recording (i.e. Desktop Presenter)--that would be perfect. Anyone know of a product like this? If no product like I've described exists, can you think of another creative solution? It would be ideal if the solution can track and zoom in on mouse movement like many screencast products do (i.e. Camtasia Studio and ScreenFlow).

You have two options, one, install software on the presenter's system that can encode and send a video feed to another system.  This is in-effect going to be a screen casting application, even if the feed is only forwarded to another system to be packaged.

The other option is to actually capture the raw output from the presenter's system through a frame grabber or video interface of some type.  This is the least invasive way, but then have no idea about cursor position or the like.

There is no solution that can connect to another computer and grab whatever is on their screen without putting software on that computer.  You can however do something minimally invasive like putting a VNC server that can run from a USB stick without installing and then connect to that VNC server and run the screen capture off the VNC client on a system you control.


Sync Video to Audio in SonyVegasPro13 with multiple anchors I have a sample recorded with half speed at 60fps (for better quality later on), which is my video track.
Then I seperately recorded the audio track at normal speed.
I imported the video track into SVP13 and in its Properties I set the playback rate to 2.0000
When syncing the video to the audio at one point, it is out of sync a few moments later, as the audio and the video track don't match in there playbackrate.

Is there a way to set multiple anchors on the audio and video track and let SV sync these anchors together (with the priority on the audio track, so the sound does not get distorted and the video get adapted)?

Short Answer

Split your Video track into separate Events;
Adjust the Events individually by dragging them along the timeline and stretching/expanding them;
Overlap the adjacent Events so that there were no gaps;

Long Answer

I find one of the most valuable features of Sony Vegas its ability to split the original tracks into Events and adjust them individually. As I wrote in another answer, playing with Track's Velocity or Velocity envelope appears to be inefficient.

Also, no plugin will detect the best moments in timeline for transitions. Doing this manually seems a bit boring at the first glance, but it will certainly give you the best result.

Full scale image here

Note, this image shows splitting of a single track, but in your case it would be two Grouped tracks, one is Video and another one is Audio.

Here's how I would align Audio and Video tracks to accomplish your goal:

Decide what Tracks are to be adjusted. Since you probably have a high-quality Audio and you worry about any distortions, let us assume your HQ Audio remains intact. Moreover, since the video is filmed in double framerate, there's no worry of possible artifacts appear after adjustments.
So, place both Video and Audio tracks to the timeline.
Note, if the Video track goes with some Audio, you will have three tracks:

Video
Its accompanying Audio (to be discarded in the future)
A high-quality Audio

Make a temporary adjustment of Audio volume so that you could hear both Audio tracks. It can be 50% for each, or you may set them to left/right channel, depending on the nature of the audio. You will revert this at the end;
Find the moments of any mismatches. The best way to do is by finding drums or some other sharp sounds. Zooming Tracks' height will also be helpful as it lets you see the audio peaks on the histogram;
At each moment of mismatch, split the Video event (along with its accompanying sound since they are Grouped); Don't do it straight on the peaks. ½ seconds earlier is a better idea.
Shift the Video to right or left so that it matched;
Note, Shift+dragging ignores grid, markers, fade-in/fade-out marks, and all other time points that otherwise would cause "sticking".
Repeat for the rest of your composition;
Now, on the Video track, drag the left/right edges of each Event and Ctrl+drag them to change the playback speed of individual Events. Your final goal is to make the speed matched firmly.
Manage the overlap of the Events. Make sure you have standard Fade as your Transition Effect, not another fancy one. Make sure the Transition is not longer than ¼ of second (at 60 FPS, it would be 15 frames), or otherwise you get video artifacts.
After you complete, simply turn off the original low-quality Audio track.

Also note that the split points are best when the picture movement is minimal. For instance, if you have a drum player, the best would be when his/her hands are in the lowest point of hitting the drums, not raised.


Material to record though so camera isn't visible? I am building an Arduino (https://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardUno) device that will record video based on a motion sensors, as well as other data in the environment. The thing is, I need to record from within a box to the outside, but the camera should not be visible. Any ideas or advice on how and what to use?

If quality of video is not so important to you, then you can use effect, which is used on public transport windows:

It is when you use lot of dots on the glass. From the outside it looks like semitransparent image. But from inside it will look like that:

With correct focus dots will be less visible on video.

And second option is to use half-silvered mirror.


Edits to a Multicam Clip in Final Cut Pro do not Show Up in Timeline I have a Multicam clip with about 8 different angles in Final Cut Pro 10.4.8, and have them automatically synced and made some manual adjustments to get all the clips to line up properly.  This worked well, and so I dragged this Multicam clip into my timeline and started making cuts.  I made several cuts among the camera angles and they all take effect as I would expect.  The Multicam clip is the only clip in my Project Timeline.
Today, I'm reviewing the Multicam clip and noticing that one angle is slightly off.  I double clicked the Multicam clip to open the editor and made the adjustment to the offending angle.  When I view it in the Multicam clip editor, everything lines up perfectly.  However, when I go back to my timeline, my edit does not take effect.  The angle is off as it was originally.  If I open a new project and drag that Multicam clip into a new project, I see the same results.  Every time I double click the Multicam clip to edit it, my fix is there and the angle is synced correctly.
Any ideas why the clips are synced in the Multicam clip editor, but in the timeline, they appear out of sync?  Many thanks in advance for help with this perplexing behavior.

As a quick idea I would try to delete the Optimized, Proxy and/or rendered media, let FCPX create all new and see if that makes a difference.
Manage render files in Final Cut Pro


Infinite Video Loop in Ffmpeg? Is there a way to infinitely loop a video in ffmpeg for a livestream? I've been looking around and can see it was possible to use "loop 1" but it appears that is no longer working.

This is what I'm currently using, but as you can see, it is not infinitely looping and entering a ridiculously high number is not an option for me due to 32-bit integer limitations:

ffmpeg -re -f concat -i <(for i in {1..10000}; do printf "file '%s'\n" /root/file.flv; done) -codec copy -f flv rtmp://a.rtmp.youtube.com/live2/xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx

Use

ffmpeg -re -stream_loop -1 -i file.flv -c copy -f flv rtmp://x.y.z

This option is buggy when the input it is applied to is filtered with another input, like in an overlay. For a single input - output chain, it works fine.


Render failed - Davinci Resolve 16 I have a problem with exporting an old timeline from Resolve. In 15 it worked fine, but I did some changes in an old composition and want to export the updated version. Error message says:

  Render job 1 failed as the current clip could not be processed. The Fusion composition on the current frame or clip could not be processed successfully.

The fix of copying and moving to a new time project hasn't worked for me.

In the 'Deliver' panel, under the Advanced Settings, try enabling/ticking “Use render cached images”.


Is 4K 4.2.0 just HD 4.4.4 I've been reading about codecs lately and found out, that the 4.2.0 codec combines 4 pixels color to one used for all 4 of them, effectively lowering the filesize.

Now how does this compare to a normal HD image with 4.4.4 (which is 1/4 of the image size, but with full resolution)

What is the difference and what gives the better end result?

I assume that the resolution would be the same, however, the 4K having more accurate colors, due to the fact that it had 4x more pixels recording it.

4:2:0 means that only the colour information is subsampled. So while that the colour is at a lower resolution the brightness information is at full resolution. This works because human vision is more sensitive to brightness than colour.

A 4K 4:2:0 image has 3840×2160 luma samples (luma ≈ brightness) and 1920×1080 chroma samples (chroma ≈ colour). So it's still going to have more information than a HD 4:4:4 image which has 1920×1080 pixels of both luma and chroma. What's more, human vision will notice the difference more, so it will look more detailed.

Also it's worth noting that while I've been talking about luma and chroma the information is actually YUV encoded (or more correctly Y,Cb,Cr), where the Y channel is a combination of the red green and blue channels, but it is weighted so that the green channel most strongly influences it (a bit under 60%). This takes into account the fact that human vision is more sensitive to green than red or blue. The U and V channels are the weighted differences between the Y and the Red and Blue channels. This means that more information is recorded for green, and is the reason why video predominantly uses green screen, rather than blue for chroma key.


How do I get screen captures from VLC to import properly into Premiere? I recorded my screen in VLC, and I saved that file as an .mp4 on my desktop. I can open and play the recording just fine, but I can't seem to import it properly into Premiere. Have you ever seen this error before?

Looks like a codec that Premiere is unable to read.

I encountered a similar issue with Final Cut when trying to import an MP4 file encoded with H264.  Then came across this advice:  "H.264 is a delivery format, not a production format. You need to convert the media into a suitable format. What that is depends on what the files are and what their frame size is." https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/8/986671

So if you can't recapture with a suitable codec, you'll have to decompress your H264 MP4 file into something Premiere can import.


Create video from a series of single frames and use original audio I am looking for some advice on how best to create a video which is comprised of a series of single frames from an original piece of 30fps footage.

I can create the effect by making a screen recording and using the right arrow key to advance the track. Visually this is what I want BUT the issue is with the audio. Because Quick Time Player screen recording uses my computers internal mic the original sound is compromised (i.e. it’s a n audio recording of an audio recoding) and it gets distorted.

Here is what I have currently: View Video

The visual is okay but you should be able to hear the audio (even when it is much slowed down) better than you can on this version.

Two questions:

Any idea how achieve the effect I am after automatically, using Premiere or After Effects.
Any fixes for using the original audio - without having to re-record.

All help and ideas much appreciated.

if it is something like "Stop-Motion Videography" that you need,
Follow 13 steps

{The keyboard shortcut are defaults of windows, for your case use that of MAC}

Target your 'PlayHead' to the position you want in 'Sequence' or 'Source Monitor'.
2.When the position you selected is the one which shows the photo you want to use as single frame or photo.
If you are in Source monitor Skip to
If you are in Sequence Panel go to "Program monitor"(shift + F4)
Use button named "Export Frame"(CTRL+Shift+E), if not available make it visible by finding in from "+" button on Right-bottom.
Choose the Image_Format, Name & the Path to save.
Check "Import into Project".
A new photo will appear in the "Project Panel".
export as many frames as you want.
Set them manually or whatever the way you want & your visual is ready.
to set the audio Right click on the audio part of the clip and 'uncheck "Enable"'.
Set the audio as you like & Re 'Enable' it.
Set the audio & image sequence in your preference & You are good to go.

Tell me if anything get confusing or I'm Wrong


how come my editor(vsdc editor) only has audio but not any video footage My audio is great, but when I export the video it doesn't show-only a black screen.

Any suggestions?

http://www.videosoftdev.com/how-to-export-project

Here maybe the link can guide you a bit.

Best basic setting for videos is .mpg, .mpeg, .mp4, try to save for .mpg with video & audio output. You maybe forgot to output your video. Or video rendering failed, you need to save it again.


How much and who to pay This is my first doc and I need footage from an event that the event organizer hired someone for. I have already approached the event organizer but he wants to know the doc subject matter. My associate has mentioned the subject matter to him on a different occasion and it is evident that the organizer does not agree with it. The doc deals with women's rights and this guy is old school. So we have a problem. He seems to want to be the middleman between us and the videographer. Unfortunately, since it was a private event, I don't know the videographer's name. Even if I did find out who it is, would I be able to ask the videographer for footage not included in the final cut for the organizer? Or does the organizer own all the footage of the event? Either way, what would be considered a fair amount to pay the organizer or the videographer for, say, 1 minute of footage?

It all depends. You have to find out what the organizer and videographer agreed upon in detail. It is possible that the organizer holds all rights even to unpublished material.

The amount you pay is dependent on how much time effort and maybe investment in equipment was taken to produce the original material. But your budget will set a limit anyway. Assuming you can track down the videographer talk to him on the phone and try to find out about their efforts, then offer a higher or lower percentage of your limit.


How to paint on video? Is there a specific name for this technique? so I can search for tutorials about it.

The technique is classically called rotoscoping after the original process done using projected film. If you google rotoscoping in after effects you should find lots of samples and tutorials.


Glidecam focus control Is there puller for controlling the lens focus when using a glidecam? Is there also something similar for the zoom, in case it's a zoom lens?

I have not found anything off the shelf that I can buy online.

I don't think there is anything specifically made for use with a glidecam.  My impression of most stabilization systems is that you still operate the camera directly, you just are not supporting it without the stabilization.  I'm not aware of any follow focus/pull systems that are designed specifically for use with a gimble or gimble and spring-arm stabilization system.


Copying h.264 video from TS into MP4 changes frame rate and time I have large MPEG-TS file that I am converting to MP4 using the below command.  If I seek to the same time in the video in both the MP4 and the TS file,  the MP4 will be a few frames behind the TS file.  This get progressively worse the further into the video I seek.

c:\>ffmpeg -y -r 30 -i full-ts.ts -c:v copy -r 30 -an full.mp4
ffmpeg version N-69040-gb23a866 Copyright (c) 2000-2015 the FFmpeg developers
  built on Jan 12 2015 22:02:37 with gcc 4.9.2 (GCC)
  configuration: --enable-gpl --enable-version3 --disable-w32threads --enable-avisynth --enable-bzlib --enable-fontconfig --enable-frei0r --enable-gnutls --enable-iconv --enable-libass --enable-libbluray --enable-libbs2b --enable-libcaca --
enable-libfreetype --enable-libgme --enable-libgsm --enable-libilbc --enable-libmodplug --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libopencore-amrnb --enable-libopencore-amrwb --enable-libopenjpeg --enable-libopus --enable-librtmp --enable-libschroedinge
r --enable-libsoxr --enable-libspeex --enable-libtheora --enable-libtwolame --enable-libvidstab --enable-libvo-aacenc --enable-libvo-amrwbenc --enable-libvorbis --enable-libvpx --enable-libwavpack --enable-libwebp --enable-libx264 --enable-
libx265 --enable-libxavs --enable-libxvid --enable-lzma --enable-decklink --enable-zlib
  libavutil      54. 16.100 / 54. 16.100
  libavcodec     56. 20.100 / 56. 20.100
  libavformat    56. 18.101 / 56. 18.101
  libavdevice    56.  4.100 / 56.  4.100
  libavfilter     5.  7.100 /  5.  7.100
  libswscale      3.  1.101 /  3.  1.101
  libswresample   1.  1.100 /  1.  1.100
  libpostproc    53.  3.100 / 53.  3.100
Input #0, mpegts, from 'full-ts.ts':
  Duration: 00:11:25.75, start: 1.424000, bitrate: 3407 kb/s
  Program 1
    Metadata:
      service_name    : Service01
      service_provider: FFmpeg
    Stream #0:0[0x100]: Video: h264 (Main) ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), yuv420p, 1280x720 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 30 fps, 30 tbr, 90k tbn, 60 tbc
    Stream #0:1[0x101]: Audio: aac (LC) ([15][0][0][0] / 0x000F), 48000 Hz, stereo, fltp, 125 kb/s
Output #0, mp4, to 'full.mp4':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf56.18.101
    Stream #0:0: Video: h264 ([33][0][0][0] / 0x0021), yuv420p, 1280x720 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], q=2-31, 30 fps, 30 tbr, 15360 tbn, 30 tbc
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (copy)
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
frame=20419 fps=0.0 q=-1.0 Lsize=  251660kB time=00:11:25.59 bitrate=3007.0kbits/s
video:251446kB audio:0kB subtitle:0kB other streams:0kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead: 0.084929%

I'm confused why the TBN is so large in the output stream.  I've tried -copyts,  -copytb, all the -vsynch options,  but I cannot get seek times to match up on the MP4.   Also,  the MP4 shows a frame rate of 29.78,  whereas the TS file is solid 30/1 using ffprobe.

ffprobe -v error -of flat=s=_ -select_streams v:0 -show_entries stream=avg_frame_rate full.mp4
streams_stream_0_avg_frame_rate="5227264/175529"

ffprobe -v error -of flat=s=_ -select_streams v:0 -show_entries stream=avg_frame_rate full-ts.ts
programs_program_0_streams_stream_0_avg_frame_rate="30/1"
streams_stream_0_avg_frame_rate="30/1"

Any idea how I can get the seeking on the both containers to show the same frame?  Please help!

As per a comment here, removing the -r flag ought to do this properly. You have another -r flag for the input, also. Remove both of them, and it should properly copy the stream as it is into a new container; you may need to remove that -an (disable audio) switch, too. I'm not sure on that:

ffmpeg -y -i full-ts.ts -c:v copy full.mp4

If that fails, also per a comment here, you could try a different output container format.


ffmpeg - trascoding multiple streams from stdin errors out: pipe:: Invalid data found when processing input I'm trying to transcode(below just copy) a/v streams from stdin and generate a thumbnail simultaneously. The issue that I get an error pipe:: Invalid data found when processing input.

Why is that and how can I fix it? Separately the map commands work just fine so I assume I'm incorrectly using the pipe functionality.

cat a2.mkv |ffmpeg -i - -y -map 0:0 -c:0 copy -f matroska 0.mkv -i - -y -map 0:0 -vf "select=gt(scene\\,0.4)" -frames:v 1 -vsync vfr -vf fps=fps=1/60 -codec png -f image2pipe 0.png
ffmpeg version 3.2.4 Copyright (c) 2000-2017 the FFmpeg developers
  built with Apple LLVM version 8.0.0 (clang-800.0.42.1)
  configuration: --prefix=/usr/local/Cellar/ffmpeg/3.2.4 --enable-shared --enable-pthreads --enable-gpl --enable-version3 --enable-hardcoded-tables --enable-avresample --cc=clang --host-cflags= --host-ldflags= --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --enable-opencl --disable-lzma --enable-vda
  libavutil      55. 34.101 / 55. 34.101
  libavcodec     57. 64.101 / 57. 64.101
  libavformat    57. 56.101 / 57. 56.101
  libavdevice    57.  1.100 / 57.  1.100
  libavfilter     6. 65.100 /  6. 65.100
  libavresample   3.  1.  0 /  3.  1.  0
  libswscale      4.  2.100 /  4.  2.100
  libswresample   2.  3.100 /  2.  3.100
  libpostproc    54.  1.100 / 54.  1.100
Input #0, matroska,webm, from 'pipe:':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : libebml v1.3.1 + libmatroska v1.4.2
    creation_time   : 2017-03-11T02:56:50.000000Z
  Duration: 02:12:52.39, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
    Chapter #0:0: start 0.000000, end 520.270000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:00:00.000
    Chapter #0:1: start 520.270000, end 1135.718000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:08:40.270
    Chapter #0:2: start 1135.718000, end 1703.660000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:18:55.718
    Chapter #0:3: start 1703.660000, end 2314.187000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:28:23.660
    Chapter #0:4: start 2314.187000, end 2888.594000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:38:34.187
    Chapter #0:5: start 2888.594000, end 3499.246000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:48:08.594
    Chapter #0:6: start 3499.246000, end 4154.692000
    Metadata:
      title           : 00:58:19.246
    Chapter #0:7: start 4154.692000, end 4646.392000
    Metadata:
      title           : 01:09:14.692
    Chapter #0:8: start 4646.392000, end 5373.660000
    Metadata:
      title           : 01:17:26.392
    Chapter #0:9: start 5373.660000, end 5882.085000
    Metadata:
      title           : 01:29:33.660
    Chapter #0:10: start 5882.085000, end 6627.871000
    Metadata:
      title           : 01:38:02.085
    Chapter #0:11: start 6627.871000, end 7144.471000
    Metadata:
      title           : 01:50:27.871
    Chapter #0:12: start 7144.471000, end 7451.944000
    Metadata:
      title           : 01:59:04.471
    Chapter #0:13: start 7451.944000, end 7972.394000
    Metadata:
      title           : 02:04:11.944
    Stream #0:0(eng): Video: h264 (High), yuv420p(tv, bt709/unknown/unknown, progressive), 720x300 [SAR 1:1 DAR 12:5], 23.98 fps, 23.98 tbr, 1k tbn, 47.95 tbc (default)
    Metadata:
      title           : X264
    Stream #0:1(eng): Audio: aac (LC), 48000 Hz, stereo, fltp (default)
pipe:: Invalid data found when processing input

I fixed your command

       cat a2.mkv | ffmpeg -nostdin -i - -y -map 0:0 -c:0 copy -f matroska -y 0.mkv -map 0:0 -vf "select=gt(scene\\,0.4)" -frames:v 1 -vsync vfr -vf fps=fps=1/60 -codec png -f image2pipe 0.png


Using a static Boom Pole I have a Manfrotto tripod, Canon T3i and Rode videomic pro. I also have the Rode boom pole, but I was wondering which the best way to use it in an interview situation.

For an interview indoors where the talent is sat down, it would be ideal to have the boom pole fixed (i.e. not being held by an operator), since we have minimal crew (2-3 people depending). That being said, we also want to minimise the amount of gear we carry so my question is this:

Is it possible/recommended to somehow mount my boom to the tripod (which will also have the camera attached too) AND keep it out of shot?
Should I buy a separate stand for the boom and if so what kind?

Thanks

For seated interview subjects I usually put the mic on a standard mic stand, the kind that has a horizontal arm, like this:

usually I have to extend the main pole as far as it will go to get the top pole horizontal so it doesn't cut the corner of the frame.

Having the mic in front of and above the speakers mouth means that you don't get pops and sybilance from them breathing into it, and also lets you get the mic closer—the top of the frame is usually closer to the subject's head than the bottom of frame.

Another option is to get a boom pole holder - like this one:

That will be a more pricey option as you'll need to buy a C-stand to put it on


GoPro Studio Editing HD Videos Looking at buying a MacBook Pro with this Spec:-

2.2GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7, Turbo Boost up to 3.4GHz
16GB 1600MHz DDR3L SDRAM
256GB PCIe-based Flash Storage
Intel Iris Pro Graphics
Backlit Keyboard (British) & User's Guide (English)

Will this run the studio without any glitches etc etc. Thanks For your help Will

if this meets the minimum spec for the software then that would be your answer, reading the min spec it will be fine to run the software

Mac OS X 10.8 or later
Intel® Dual Core™
  Recommended: Intel Quad Core™ i7 or better
Any graphics card shipped with Intel® Dual Core™ Macs or better
Recommended for 4K editing and playback: Intel HD4000 or better
4GB
Minimum: 5400 RPM internal drive
Recommended: 7200 RPM drive.
If external, use Thunderbolt, USB 3.0, Firewire or eSATA
Version 7.6 or greater

if there is something more specific you would like to know we would need the specifics then


ffmpeg drawtext timecode source framerate I'm trying to burn timecode onto a video file with ffmpeg. Documentation notes that frame rate is a required parameter. It confuses me that I need to specify it manually when the information is available for the source file. This confusion suggests I'm missing an important assumption.

I'm batch-processing source files with different frame rates depending on their source (24, 29.97, 30). How can I set the frame rate automatically?

FFmpeg has a modular design. The module which unpacks a stream from a file and discovers/sets its properties, including framerate, is ffmpeg base code. drawtext is a filter module that operates upon decoded frames. It has no concept of a framerate because it receives a sequence of individual frames in series, and only gets to see the metadata pertaining to that frame.

Usual M.O. when performing such operations is to get the framerate information by running ffprobe beforehand and saving it to a variable, referencing that variable in the drawtext options so that the shell can substitute the value.

That ffprobe command is

FPS=$(ffprobe -v 0 -show_entries stream=r_frame_rate -select_streams v:0 -of compact=p=0:nk=1 "$file")


DaVinci Resolve: Blur and fade title on top of video I am using DaVinci Resolve 14.  Is it possible to have titles on top of video which blur and fade out at the same time?

I know how to fade them, but I cannot blur them. Adding a transition seem to affect not only the titles but also the background video (it will blue the video too). I attempted to apply effects to the title clip, but wasn't able to do so.

DaVinci doesn't really have a strong toolset when it comes to working with titles and motion graphics, although given BlackMagic's current trajectory, that may change in the near future.  For now, you'll have more control over graphic element animations in other packages like AE, Motion, or even Premiere or FCPX.  Blackmagic Design also offer their own compositing software, Fusion, which is also fully capable of this type of effect, and has direct ties with DaVinci.

It is possible to animate both blur and fade out in DaVinci, but not gracefully.

The trick is to turn your text clip into a compound clip.  From there, DaVinci will treat it like any other piece of video.  Do this:

In the edit tab, make sure your text layer is the default white on
black.  You can change the color later.
Right-click on the text layer and select "New Compound Clip" from
the contextual menu.
Switch to the Color tab and select the compound clip.  Now you can
affect it with nodes.
Right-click anywhere in the background of the node editor and select
"Add alpha output" from the contextual menu that appears.  You
should see a little blue box appear at the right of the node editor.
Right-click anywhere in the background of the node editor again, and
select "Add node" -> corrector.  Do this twice so that you have a
total of three nodes in the node editor.  Node 01 should be wired at
this point, and 02 and 03 should not.
Unwire the RGB output of node 01 (green circle) and plug it into the
alpha input of node 02 (blue triangle).
Wire the alpha output of node 02 (blue triangle) into the master alpha output that you created in step 4 (far right blue box).
Wire the green master RGB input on the far left of the node editor
into the green input of node 03.  This master should now be routed
into two places, node 01 and node 03.
Wire the RGB output of node 03 into the input of node 02.
Finally, wire the RGB output of node 02 into the master RGB output
 (green box far right).
In the OFX library, drag the color generator onto node 03.  This is
 where you will now control the color of your text.
You may have noticed that everything is inverted.  To fix this,
 select node 02, move to the "key" tab, and invert the key input
 (the black dot in the white box) * edit * This step is no longer necessary in DVR R16.  New serial nodes used to reverse the previous node's alpha output by default.  Now, they do not.
Finally, you should be able to control the blur of your text from
 node 01.  You should be able to animate this parameter just like
 any other color adjustment in DaVinci.  For the fade, you'll have to animate the opacity of the composite on the edit page.

Here's what everything should look like when wired up properly:

Yes, this is a kludgy workaround which suffers from serious limitations (blur radius*, for one).  But hopefully, it's a good demonstration of why this type of operation is best approached from other software.  DaVinci just isn't built for it at the moment.

If you'd like an explanation of how to accomplish this in Fusion, I could add to this answer.

EDIT 01-24-2020
Blur radius is no longer a limitation.


h264_omx and non-existing PPS 0 referenced Trying to stream a webcam through rtp with a raspberry pi.

Cating the SDP file on my desktop, and launching ffplay:

ffplay sdp.out

then streaming out this way:

ffmpeg -i /dev/video0 -c:v h264_omx -f rtp rtp://192.168.0.101:1234

works perfectly. But If I launch ffmpeg first THEN ffplay, ffplay stutters some error message about missing PPS and never displays any frame:

[h264 @ 0x7fd97c0008c0] decode_slice_header error
[h264 @ 0x7fd97c0008c0] no frame!
[h264 @ 0x7fd97c0008c0] non-existing PPS 0 referenced

After looking for a while I understand some intermediary frame might be missing. However, using the -g option this way does not change anything:

ffmpeg -i /dev/video0 -c:v h264_omx -g 30 -f rtp rtp://192.168.0.101:1234

It is a problem for me because I am using the raspberry as a securiy camera. My desktop can be restarted from time to time and I need ffplay to be able to catch after the streaming is started.

Any help is appreciated.

It turns out it is impossible to live stream with the RPi hardware acceleration using ffmpeg.
For ffmpeg to configure the hardware acceleration to issue SPS/PPS frames during the stream and not only at the beginning of it, it needs to use a specific API of the raspberry firmware which it does not at the moment.

Raspivid and gstreamer does that though. So turn to thoses solution and forget about ffmpeg.


What is the least noticable way to re-stream a video to Twitch? I have a local video file from a past Twitch stream (which I failed to archive), broadcast and recorded through OBS. My goal is to re-stream it to Twitch so that it feels as close as reasonably possible to a normal archived stream, in terms of quality, aspect ratio, position, sound, etc. The OBS Video Source Plugin has been recommended for this task. The original recorded file was in .flv format. I have since converted to .mp4, and cut a bit from the beginning with VideoPad Video Editor (I still have the original .flv file).

1) Will the outcome look and sound just as authentic using the converted and cut video file, assuming said file plays just as well on my local machine, or is it better to re-stream the original and cut it again using the Twitch highlight function?

2) What Video Source Settings should I use when adding the video file as a source via the plugin? Should the height and width always match the recorded video settings (pre-downscale, according to my understanding)? Is it better to select to stretch the image, which presumably overrides the entered height and width? What about "Deinterlacing" and "Apply Video Filters"?

3) Finally, in the Video Source Settings, what is the default volume (which is the full 100), the volume at which OBS normally streams, or should this be adjusted?

You should try FFsplit, is easy to use and free. With proper settings you should loose few or no data at all.

Setup the encoder to match the quality (bitrate and aspect ratio) of the original file.
Add a new layer of window capturing, and adjust width, height and origin (x,y) to capture only the region of the video
Setup hotkeys on ffsplit so you can start the streaming when the video player is on focus

Start your stream first then play you video.

Find a quick-start guide here on twitch.tv help, althoug this an old document, the new version of ffplist has few, but nice changes


How to automate the rendering of all possible combinations of a composition in Adobe After Effects? I have a composition used to display current scores for a match on a tournament. It shows the two teams banners on both sides and their current scores underneath them. The scene also has various animations and effects.

The rounds are best of three so the different combinations of scores are 0-0, 1-0, 2-0, 0-1, 0-2, 1-1, 2-1, and 1-2. So the way I'm doing it now is: change the numbers, render composition, and repeat for all combinations.

As you can see, this can get tedious and time consuming as it has to be done for every combination of teams as well.

I would like to know if there is a way to automate this process or a more efficient way of carrying out these steps.

I hope there is a better answer, but my similar case is making lower thirds where I have to change out the name.  In that case, I have a static composition with the title that I use as a source in other compositions.  I then create a text layer for each name, hide all but one, click through to the final render comp (using the parent/child links) and start a generation for each.

It's still manual, but it is a relatively quick way to get them dumped out.  In your case, you could do one comp for the team logos and one for the scores (or just do two sets of layers in the same comp.)

Alternately, you may be able to render the background blank and then render the text and graphics layer's being animated without the background render.  This can save time if the background animation is difficult to render and the composition allows for alpha blending to meet the needs.  I wouldn't generally bother with that added complexity unless the background being pre-rendered would save a lot of time though.


Is there a thing that can hold the subject in front of the camera, locked, not moving while shooting video? I want to shoot a video for my iPhone app demo. My idea is shoot a phone running the app, and the iPhone is relatively still in the video, while I could move the camera around, so the background changes, but not the phone. Is there something available to do this? I would imagine something like an extension arm, one side holds the camera, and the other side holds my phone. I don't know if this thing exists nor not. Please help, thanks! (What I have now is a DSLR and a tripod)

Yes, what you are talking about falls in the realm of rigging.  There are lots and lots of rigging products available, but most of the specialty built rigs are going to be very expensive for your needs (hundreds to probably over a thousand USD).  If you aren't turned off by the price, I suggest looking at rigs in a web store like B&H to find something that will suit your needs and allow attaching an extension and the phone mount.

You might be better off to do something yourself to save money.  You should be able to buy a basic mount plate that you could bolt to a pipe and then on the other end attach a device holder for the phone.  I'd probably try and do it with something like a Trident case that will look like a nice case on the phone while allowing you to attach the mount to the back of the case securely.  It will still probably run you a couple hundred USD though, even making it yourself.  (Trident cases and the stand for it alone will run you $70 or so.)


Stream Screen from one machine and webcam from another I want to start doing some Twitch.tv streaming, but don't have a webcam. I have a gaming PC desktop and an OSX laptop with eyesight webcam built in. I was wondering if it is possible to stream the webcam feed over the network to my desktop and add it to my desktop stream as you would normally on OBS or similar.

Looks a lot like  share desktop to laptop to stream from laptop  (that guy's goal was lower CPU load on his desktop, but same solution.)

Use the usual streaming setup on your desktop, but with high bitrate.  stream to laptop, decode there.  overlay webcam, encode for normal streaming, send that output to Twitch.tv.

IDK what it takes to send streams to twitch, or to receive streams from desktop streaming software.  Assuming you can get ffmpeg to do it, and read from your webcam, use the overlay filter to combine the streams, and -c:v libx264 -preset medium to encode to h.264.  Not sure what you'd need to do to get ffmpeg's output to go to Twitch.tv.


Encoding settings in FFMPEG I have a MKV file with the following encoding settings. I know the file was encoded in Handbrake because it says so in the meta data.

cabac=1
ref=5
deblock=1:0:0
analyse=0x3:0x133
me=umh
subme=9
psy=1
psy_rd=1.00:0.15
mixed_ref=1
me_range=24
chroma_me=1
trellis=2
8x8dct=1
cqm=0
deadzone=21,11
fast_pskip=1
chroma_qp_offset=-4
threads=12
lookahead_threads=1
sliced_threads=0
nr=0
decimate=1
interlaced=0
bluray_compat=0
constrained_intra=0
bframes=5
b_pyramid=2
b_adapt=2
b_bias=0
direct=3
weightb=1
open_gop=0
weightp=2
keyint=240
keyint_min=23
scenecut=40
intra_refresh=0
rc_lookahead=60
rc=crf
mbtree=1
crf=27.0
qcomp=0.60
qpmin=0
qpmax=69
qpstep=4
vbv_maxrate=10000
vbv_bufsize=10000
crf_max=51.0
nal_hrd=none
filler=0
ip_ratio=1.40
aq=1:1.00

I have used FFMPEG for a while, but I am not sure what these settings are, what they do or how I can make FFMPEG encode with the same settings.

All of these parameters are specific to the x264 encoder which is used to produce H.264 streams.

x264 has long since introduced a preset system whereby different permutations of values of these parameters can be set at once using -preset value in FFmpeg, e.g. ffmpeg -i in.mp4 -c:v ibx264 -preset slow out.mp4

AFAICT, the permutation of parameters shown in your file don't match any preset. However, you can set preset to slow, and then override the individual parameters, e.g.

ffmpeg -i in.mp4 -c:v ibx264 -preset slow -x264opts "me=umh:subme=9:psy_rd=1.00:0.15" out.mp4

For a guide to individual parameters, see https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/MeGUI/x264_Settings.


What happened to the 3CCD camcorders? Back in the day they were everywhere [There was even a handheld Panasonic one!] but today they dont exist at all?

I can't find any 3CCD camcorders with SD card video recording because I don't want to fiddle with Mini DV

What happened? Are there any Full HD or 4k 3CCD camcorders these days?

Looks like the ugly CMOS replaced them...

"The ugly CMOS replaced CCD" because of cost, complexity, power consumption, pixel density, light sensitivity, etc. In every regard — except of the rolling shutter artefacts, of course — CMOS sensors are better. They also do not exhibit the saturation trail effect, the vertical "ray of light" that occurs when pointing a CCD camera towards very bright light source.

You can find a 10-year old tapeless 3CCD-based camcorder on eBay for less than $100. For example, Panasonic HDC-SD5 or HDC-SD9, the latter records progressive HD at 24 fps. Better than Super8 ;-)


Old video tape effect in Premiere Pro I am creating a video promo, and the customer wants the "crap old soviet" style.

We have shot the video on a Nikon D800 and it is being edited in Premiere Pro CS6, so the workflow is top-notch digital.

I want to impart a few "old analog" effects into the video but cant figure out how to do it.

first effect:
 - The weird fuzz you got when you started a recording over another one on VHS, the new recording was always really fuzzy/noisy for the first second or so as the tracking changed between the old and new recording.

second effect:
- the general "old videotape" look - odd colour casts, fuzz, like the tracking is off a bit.

third effect:
- now the sound, needs to be a bit muffled and low-fi

You could try a plugin that does it all in one:
http://www.digieffects.com/product/damage

(edit: removed video example for aged film - was intended to show the powers but could mislead to think it only produced aged film look).

With the plugin you should be able to produce the old video tape look using one or more of these in combination:

Go directly to features (thanks Inan):
http://www.digieffects.com/product/damage#features

  Artifact: Create displaced pixel blocks, color errors, frame dropping
  and video compression artifacts

  Blockade: Control color inaccuracy, block size, speed, and temporal
  frame stuttering

  Destabilize: Create convincing camera shake or earthquake simulations

  Interference: Simulate the CRT look of a security camera or interlaced
  video

  Overexpose: Overexposes images just like your eyes would

  Skew: Create analog noise with reckless abandon


What Beginner Video Editing Software Should I Use? Specifically, I need to edit HD video on Windows 7.

I need a software solution which can zoom, pan and insert text. Also, I will need to adjust the scale of video clips and composite multiple video layers into the main picture (eg. zoom to a black TV screen and insert video to that TV screen).

The software can not be complex/difficult to learn (eg. After Effects/Premiere/Vegas) as I do not have much time to complete the project. However, it should be capable, unlike Movie Maker, and run on Windows 7.

So, what do you recommend?

I think pretty much every editing program would allow you to zoom, pan and insert text. Inserting another video into the main video is a little more complex and the only program I know for sure that does it is After Effects. But I'm sure there are others that will.

I would suggest using Premiere because it's a very powerful program. Even though I've never had to insert video into another one like you've described, I'm sure there's a way to do it. You don't have to learn the program inside out to be able to edit in it. There are hundreds of tutorials online that take you step by step through the process. A quick Google search would reveal that.

However, if you still don't want to go with Premiere, here is a list of free video editing programs that might be able to do the job. I haven't used any of them so I can't make a recommendation – but it's a good starting point.


Adobe after effects showing green background with nothing every time I import hd videos I want to make a project about my country by combining various hyperlapse videos and adding some graphical kinetic topography to them. But every time I import a video, it appears full green...nothinge happens but the workplace appears full green. It does not happen with low quality videos like 240p,but happens with the 1080p ones. Please help!!!!!I have very less days to finish this project. (P.S.- I am a mediocre beginner)(https://i.stack.imgur.com/aOoZL.jpg)

It should be problem with codec. Found two solutions:

First — recompile footage to different codec.
Second — try to install software with codecs.Like Auicktime. Or if it will not help, some codeck pack.


How to quick select PNG image for masking in After Effects? Is that possible to generate mask from Layer Alpha Channel?
I want to quick select this image for masking.

Found a solution. Maybe someone will need it.
Layer -> Auto-Trace


How do you do a "Video Algorithm"? Facebook generate these anniversary videos which they allow you to share. The video has your Facebook avatar (along with certain friend's avatars) imposed onto certain objects. For example, it can put your avatar on an album cover.

This made me wonder how you do this on a mass scale like Facebook does?

Surely there is some kind of "video algorithm" that does this? What is this technique called and how can I do it?

I would imagine it would be a laugh for my friends if I could take pictures of them and impose them effortlessly onto landmarks, where their pictures are perfectly warped and tracked to the surface each time.

Before you answer I should mention that my attempt at this would be to film a template which had some well placed markers on a flat surface and then track a plain 'placeholder' texture on top of the surface. When the time comes to render a video I would just change the texture with a friend's face or something.

However that's the long way of doing it. I am more curious if there is a way for me to set this up so that I could type into a terminal prompt:

root@root:~$ myCoolVideoProgram.o pictureToImpose.jpeg

and in a matter of seconds (or however long the rendering takes) I have my funny video, without having to go through a GUI in the video editing software of my choice.

This is effectively what every professional editing software in existence does at its core.  Video editing is always done non-destructively in any professional and most consumer contexts.  What that means is that when you are editing a project, you are not actually making changes to the source files, but rather making a series of decisions about what changes should be applied to get the desired output.  When it comes time to make the final rendered output, the instructions are run by the editing software on the original sources and the output is recorded to a new video file.

This series of instructions can be saved off in a variety of different formats such as EDLs (editing decision lists), Final Cut XML files (which are supported by more than just Final Cut) or any number of other formats that include the series of instructions that need to be applied.  These files can be used to move editing projects between completely different editing software.

It is also possible to change the inputs that go in to these instructions.  As long as they are the same size and placement, then it should carry through consistently for different inputs.  This is why proxy workflows work.  In proxy workflows very large and difficult to work with files (such as 4k RAW video) are replaced with easy to work with files (such as much smaller compressed 1080p video).  This makes it easy to work through the edit and then only swap out with the high quality, difficult to work with footage at the end of the project.

The same principle can be applied to swapping photos or videos in to a particular spot in an overall video template.  All the various effects and edits will be applied to the new source just like they were to the old, you just need a render engine capable of doing the rendering and swap automatically.

There are some commercial options available for this, but much is done with custom solutions.  Depending on the complexity, it may also be possible to do it with an ffmpeg script that could be easily run by a command line, though ffmpeg would be considerably more manual to develop the template for.


Cheap solution to shoot during several hours at night? I'm facing an annoying problem, for the last few weeks somebody in my neighborhood steals gas from my motorcycle.
It's a Honda VT125 Shadow, all the wires and hoses under the tank are apparent. So the guy unplugs the hoses and siphons the tank.

So i'm looking for a way to film the bike at night to try and find out who this jacka** is.

The street isn't very dark at night.

Any ideas are welcome

I would say your best bet is to look through the surveillance section on amazon and see what your options are for your budget...100 bucks seems to get you a pretty good setup.

http://www.amazon.com/Security-Surveillance-Home-Automation/b?ie=UTF8&node=524136


What are the outer dimensions of the GoPro 3+ lens holder? I need to know the outer dimensions of the GoPro 3+ lens on the waterproof housing (The square black ring).

Does anyone know where I can find them or does anyone have the camera themselves that they can measure?

I don't have the Hero 3+ but you can measure it with the help of a front picture of the cam and the dimensions of the camera.
Taking the dimensions from here: http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8137555963/hands-on-with-The-gopro-hero-3-black-edition
(5.8 x 3.9 x 2 cm)
And using this picture:

And measure how big the lens casing is compared to the size of the camera in pixels (for example with the Photoshop ruler tool)
We get 35.4 mm for the width for example. So I'd go with a solid 35mm (width).

I measured 537 for the camera and 327,5 for the black lens casing. So the Black Lens casing is 61% the size of the camera. 61% of 58mm is 35.38mm.
You can do the same with the other dimensions.