potwnc
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Posts posted by potwnc
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Thanks, I've heard about it. How did you install it, and how to use it? I tried to use Avidemux for transcoding which uses x264, but it does not like AVIs using the PTE Video Codec.
Best regards,
Xaver
Just download it and then double-click on the .exe file I think - this is not the Snow Xmas build that I use but I couldn't find that one on the Internet so maybe it's not supported any longer.
Use it just like you would use any other codec from PTE.
I have no experience with Avidemux.
Ray
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Ray,
Is it possible to provide some more detailed information?
Regards,
Xaver
Go here... http://x264.nl/
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what is then the main benefit of h.264? It does appear to me that from within PTE Presets, the h.264 makes higher resolutions possible than does the .AVI output of PTE?
[Ray] The main behefit of the H.264 standard (and a codec that uses it) is greater efficiency (= smaller file sizes). It has nothing to do with higher or lower resolutions. I think the VideoBuilder maximum pre-set resolution is 1920x1080 but with .AVI output you can choose any resolution you like - including higher than this.
If I do want to use the PTE .avi output (F7), can I conclude that I have an h.264 codec available on my pc, if that is what VideoBuilder is already using for h.264?
[Ray] No. Installing PTE does not install an H.264 codec onto your PC. You have to install one by yourself. See below.
When I open PTE's AVI Video Codec window, several codecs list and include Microsoft h.261 and h.263, but I don't recognize any as h.264. But am I correct that I will need to actually identify and select an h.264 codec for it to be utilized for producing the .avi extension instead of the .mp4?
[Ray] Yes. but before you can identify and select one you have to install one. Google "Snow Xmas H.264" - that's the one I use and it's free.
If, the h.264 codec's claim to fame is HD in larger screen sizes, does h.264 offer any benefits if the desired result is only 1024x768?
[Ray] Yes. As I said above, H.264 offers greater efficiency. It does so at any resolution.
Does "HD" honest defintion encompass h.264 and is "HD" meaningful in small screen size such as 640x480 etc.?
[Ray] No and No. H.264 is only one of many codecs that can implement HD. It just happens to be the most popular one right now. 640x480 is "standard definition" (SD).
Finally - if the main object is to view PTE production in a video format for web viewing, can a matrix be constructed showing what PTE/Video is best for each given screen or view window dimension?
[Ray] Yes anyone who understands video production could easily produce such a matrix.
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Finally in desperation I used another converter program to convert PTE's h.264 (.mp4) files to some other .avi that the commercial editor would then accept and allow me to join.
Remember that PTE can output H.264 encoded video in 2 different ways. The way you are doing it is through VideoBuilder into a .mp4 container. You can also choose to produce AVI output (the old way, before VideoBuilder existed) and, as long as you have an H.264 codec installed on your PC, choose that codec and output it to a .avi container (.avi file). More 3rd-party software will recognize your output if you produce it this way.
Ray
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The files for this are now at www.peoplesoftheworld.org/demos/maskdemo2project.zip
Let me know if you have any questions.
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Ray, I have not even viewed yet your latest, but am downloading now. I would be very interested in your project file that would "teach" how to do this with masks "ease".
OK I'll upload it in the next few days.
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This zip only seems to download an audio file - where is the video please?
Ron West
Ron,
It contains a .mp4 file, which plays the video (there is no audio) if you have a compatible player - e.g. VLC Media Player or Media Player Classic HomeCinema.
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This is another demo of something that works fine in 5.5 but works much better in 5.6 - at least for me because I work in High Definition.
Many PTE users have probably created something based on Lin Evans' "route demo" and, of course, it works just fine in PTE 5.5. But with masks it is even easier and the file sizes are much smaller - especially for HD output.
This is another 9-second video (also about 1MB like the last one I did) that extracts to a .mp4 file in DVD quality. In this sequence we zoom into a detailed map of Southeast Asia and, as we do, the Mekong River flows from its source to its delta.
The end result is exactly the same in 5.6 as it is in 5.5 but because this version is done with a mask the size of the file that "acts" as the mask is reduced by 95%! If you work in HD that places much less stress on PTE and your PC to produce the output for the final .exe file to run (if you produce .exe files).
If anyone is interested I can upload a lower-quality version of the project file that shows how to do this with masks.
Credit goes to Al Robinson for the original idea - I just got it to work with masks.
Ray
www.peoplesoftheworld.org/demos/maskdemo2.zip
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Here's something that I first did in 5.5 with a lot of effort that is made so much easier with masks. Even then, in 5.6 I still had to work around a limitation of how masks are currently implemented - I had to drag the first keyframe of the photo to the left of the timeframe = 0 point before I could size it correctly to fill the frame.
This is a 1MB zip file that extracts to a .mp4 file that plays for 9 seconds. As we zoom into a map of Westcentral Asia to the part that is the Tibetan Plateau a mask reveals a photo that I took from a plane flying over the real Tibetan Plateau. The mask zooms in time with the map zoom and at the same time fades to reveal the photo under the mask.
I think this is a good example of how masks can be used.
www.peoplesoftheworld.org/demos/maskdemo.zip
Ray
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Igor,
Does this version fix the problem with Objects and Animation of text objects that I reported a few days ago under the 5.6 thread?
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The purpose of the "blue" area on the O&A timeline is to control the visibility of an object, whether at the beginning of the timeline or at the end (the end cutoff does not work in Preview mode either). It does not make sense that it would work "correctly" in the O&A window and not in the preview or the finished show.
So now I can find many different ways to get this to work...
I hope Igor will respond soon to tell us how this is supposed to work - or not work - in 5.6. I agree with the posts that say if the software allows you to do it this way then it should work! I'm sorry for opening a "can of worms" but the way I did this in my test project is the easiest way I know of to do it based on the way previous versions of PTE have worked without a problem and the way I thought 5.6 should work. I have other projects created in 5.1 and 5.5 where I did the O&A sequence using this approach but where the objects are png instead of text and they all work just fine in 5.6.
If all objects are required to start at offset point 0 then what is the purpose of the blue slider bar in the O&A window?
Ray
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Hi Ray
Yes a bug indeed.
Another work around that seems to work for now is
On your text keyframe set the "Opacity" to 0.0
Add another keyframe right behind it and set "Opacity" to 100%
Sent you mail
I'll try it and get back to you.
Ray
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You're right - I experience the same result. However, if you move the "visibility" slider completely to the left so that the text starts at the beginning of the sequence, it shows up in both the preview and in the O&A window. Something not working quite the way it should.
Thanks, Al, for confirming that I'm not losing my mind
. I was also able to get some options to "work" but in this case I need the text to appear later than at the beginning of the main slide. I can obviously work around it by having 3 copies of the same main slide but since this has worked in previous versions it does appear to be a bug. -
I know it's been posted before that you must open an old 5.5 show in 5.6 and then save it from 5.6 to make all the O&A sequences work.
But I now have an old show that works OK in 5.5 but then when saved from 5.6 the same O&A sequence no longer works in 5.6 from any view - mini player, preview, preview from current slide etc. - and the O&A effects are very simple.
Anyone else having this problem?
To demonstrate this problem I have uploaded the zip archive of a test project to www.peoplesoftheworld.org/demos/pte56test.zip.
This project was created from scratch using the latest 5.6. The O&A sequence is about as simple as it gets but the only view that gets it correct is the O&A view itself.
Igor (and anyone else) can you download it (about 2MB) and test it? Maybe something changed for 5.6 that I don't know about so I could just be taking the wrong approach.
Thanks,
Ray
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Lin,
I Just wanted to add my own sentiments. I hope everything turns out for the best. I know what you're going through as my own sister is also in very bad health at the moment.
Ray
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I know it's been posted before that you must open an old 5.5 show in 5.6 and then save it from 5.6 to make all the O&A sequences work.
But I now have an old show that works OK in 5.5 but then when saved from 5.6 the same O&A sequence no longer works in 5.6 from any view - mini player, preview, preview from current slide etc. - and the O&A effects are very simple.
Anyone else having this problem?
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Hi Mark,
To test I need the zipped PTE file which contains all images as well as the PTE file. Just go to "File" "Create Backup in Zip" and post a link to it on your site or use:
and send me a link. I'll create a CD and test it for you and get back with you on it.
Best regards,
Lin
Mark,
I'm also willing to test this once you upload your zipped PTE file.
Ray
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As I am using Pinnacle Studio 12 to render the shows to disk (an ordinary DVD disk) in either HD DVD or AVCHD format (the latter is accepted by Blu-ray players as a Blu-ray disk) I am at the over limit for an HD DVD (around 23 mins of video on the DVD if burned at 100% quality) and just on the limit for a Blu-ray AVCHD disk at 100% quality.
However, I have burned the shows (with menus etc) onto HD DVD at around 67% quality and there is not a huge drop in visual quality. Unfortunately this is not a quantitative comparison - I must first run half the show which was burned at 100% quality, then change to the full show burned at 67% quality and see If I can remember what the first one looked like. Unfortunately I cannot run a side by side comparison.
Carol,
Well this changes things... I thought you were burning to real Blu-ray discs. So now the questions are can your audience play ordinary DVD discs burned in HD-DVD format? And can they play ordinary DVD discs burned in AVCHD format? The answers will be different depending on what equipment they have.
But whatever the answer is you should be aware that ordinary DVD discs are designed to deliver a maximum bit rate of 8Mbps. So instead of choosing the "One pass - quality" mode I recommend you choose one of the "bitrate" modes (Two passes if your PC is powerful enough) and set the Bitrate to no more than 8000. Any higher than this and your audience's equipment may not play it at all. You should be able to get 23 minutes on an ordinary (single-layer) DVD in both HD-DVD format and AVCHD format.
I'm not sure about this but I don't think Pinnacle Studio 12 supports 24p.
Ray
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Thanks Ray, as these shows are Wedding Samplers which I send out to potential clients, the recipients are exclusively UK based, so I guess it will be either 25fps or 50fps. I guess converting at 50fps would double the size of the mpg4 file, but would opting for either interlaced or progressive for the final disk have any bearing on whether you render at 25 or 50fps??
Carol,
Usually you would render at 50 fps for interlaced content and 25 fps for progressive. But in PTE 50p means 50 fps progressive and 25p means 25 fps progressive so you actually can't choose whether the encode will be interlaced or progressive - it will be progressive.
Your mp4 file won't be double the size but it will be larger at 50p versus 25p. But BD-R disks (even single layer) will hold enough footage for a wedding sampler that this won't be an issue for you. So again it depends on your audience. If they'll be viewing the Blu-ray disc on a standard, set-top Blu-ray player attached to a standard HD TV they won't notice any difference because the TV will refresh at 25 fps but if they have a Blu-ray player in a computer (Home Theatre PC system) they will notice a difference because their PC monitor is almost certainly refreshing at 50 fps. Even then you'd need 20/20 vision to really notice that difference.
Bottom line, burn at 50p because you have nothing to lose by doing that. Also, choose 48000 for the audio sample rate - even if your audio is ripped from a CD.
Ray
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By default if you just use the HD (1920 x1080) setting, the frame rate is set to 29.97 for the resultant MPEG4 file. However, as I am UK based, should I be going into the custom settings dialog box (see below):-
and set the frame rate to either 25fps - or even 24fps for an intended target of a Blu-ray disk??
Carol,
The real question is "where is your audience?" If they're in North America or Japan you should choose the 30p or 60p setting otherwise 25p or 50p - for now. 24p is becoming a global standard for transfer of movies shot originally on actual film (celluloid) to digital media such as Blu-ray because that is the framerate at which such films are shot (everywhere in the world), and so it best preserves the original. But very few people today have TVs or monitors that also work at 24p so until 24p TVs and monitors become more common, and because you're not transfering a film originally shot at 24p I'd recommend not using that setting.
Ray
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Since the topic of watermarking images comes up often here, this site has free software to do that until about midnight PST today (Saturday). http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/
I haven't tried this software.
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Ray,
Or, are you suggesting that the original 1920x1080 images should be squashed to 4:3 and then opened up by applying the 1.33 pixel aspect ratio?
DaveG
Dave,
I'm not "suggesting" this - it is what happens. This is how DVDs can play back 16:9 movies. But you don't need to squash the original images. In video editing software, like Vegas Pro, this is done for you.
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Hi Ray
yes, I agree with you, except that I havent seen the possibility to make a mp4 video with 1440x1080 images with Videobuider . I can guess that, as 1080 pixels height images are compatible with hd format, that was the optimised choice. I can guess that coding the 2 vertical bands, if there are not too much colored details in it, will not grow the file size too much.
Is that right? If there were other posibility, let me know.
Best regrads
Daniel.
Daniel,
Yes the file size should not grow too much. But I think VideoBuilder lets you choose any size of output.
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What does "with a pixel aspect ratio of 1:1.33" mean?
DaveG
Dave,
This is covered in my HD Appendix in the guide. It is a setting in the video file that tells the player to stretch out the pixels so that their displayed width is 1.33 times what it would normally be (square pixels).
Another little mask demo
in General Discussion
Posted
Of course I don't mind... we're all here to learn, including me, and that's a better way to do this for this example. (But I don't know why you would rotate this?)
Ray