Combining avi movies with jpg photo slideshow

[Guest]

I have imported avi files and jpg's into the same timeline, applied all my
transitions, audio overlays etc and saved the output as "High quality video
(PAL)" which gives me .wmv file which I then convert to SVCD using Nero 6.

(I've found I get better quality output on my TV by converting the DV-AVI
file to WMV and then use the MPEG-2 encoder in Nero 6 to create my SVCD, than
encoding DV-AVI directly to MPEG-2. Strange I know)

My problem is that the jpg images do not expand to the 16:9 display size on
my television in the way the avi files do. So my resulting movie shows black
side bars to the image slide show element of the movie, but the avi's play
full screen.

I've tried re-sizing my original jpg's from their default 2304 x 1728 to 720
x 576 as given in "setting details" section of the Save Movie Wizard, but
this does not resolve the problem.

Any ideas on how I can combine true movie footage with jpg slideshows in the
same output file and have both elements display in full wide screen output?

Thanks in advance.

 

[John Kelly]

Hello there,

I don't know where you got the information from, but its wrong. Well obviously
thats why you are asking. To get your image to display with no borders you
should resize it so that its ratio is 16:9 and not 4:3 (which is what 720 * 576
is)

The reason is that Movie Maker cannot create a 16:9 ratio without using non
square pixels.....that works OK with Video but it will NOT work for still
images..... So, its not necessarily a resize job....you need to do a CROP
job....If you have something like Adobe Photoshop its very easy...simply set
the crop tool to 16 x 9 ratio and then make the largest crop marks that you
can...do the crop and there it is an image with a ratio of 16:9.

Ont the resize front...Movie Maker is not all that good in this area...you
should use your still image editor to resample your image so that its height is
576.....the width takes care of itself.

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[Rehan]

you

should resize it so that its ratio is 16:9 and not 4:3 (which is what 720
* 576
is)

Minor correction: 720x576 is neither 16:9 nor 4:3. For some strange reason
my calculator reports it to be 5:4.

 

[Rehan]

Hyde

Your problem is interesting:

My problem is that the jpg images do not expand to the 16:9 display size
on
my television in the way the avi files do. So my resulting movie shows
black
side bars to the image slide show element of the movie, but the avi's play
full screen.

I've tried re-sizing my original jpg's from their default 2304 x 1728 to
720
x 576 as given in "setting details" section of the Save Movie Wizard, but
this does not resolve the problem.

I challenge you to do it any other way than the following methods. I am
pretty sure that by now you would have tried all sort of cropping and
resizing... Nothing works. I sympathise with you.

You actually do not need to either resize or crop your images. You can use
them in the original form with these solutions:


A. For best quality and control:

1. Download and install my pan zoom effects from
http://rehanfx.org/panzoom.htm
2. Try the new effects in movie maker to make sure these are working
3. Copy paste the following lines into notepad and save as rpzwide.xml in
"C:\Program Files\Movie Maker\shared\AddOnTFX" folder
4. Restart Movie maker and apply the new effect called "RFX Widescreen" to a
photo in Storyboard you want to make fit into widescreen.

<TransitionsAndEffects Version="1.0">
<Effects>
<EffectDLL guid="{4B4670E6-4512-4bec-BED1-57A017078ECC}">
<Effect name="RFX Widescreen" iconid="33">
<Param name="X1" value="0.125" />
<Param name="Y1" value="0.125" />
<Param name="Size1" value="0.75" />
<Param name="X2" value="0.125" />
<Param name="Y2" value="0.125" />
<Param name="Size2" value="0.75" />
</Effect>
</EffectDLL>
</Effects>
</TransitionsAndEffects>



B. If you dont want my package, it can be done with customizing standard
effects but you would see marked loss of quality.

Copy paste the following lines into notepad and save as zoomwide.xml in
"C:\Program Files\Movie Maker\shared\AddOnTFX" folder. After that restart
Movie maker and apply the new effect "Zoom Fixed 75%" to a photo you want to
make fit into full widescreen.

<TransitionsAndEffects Version="1.0" >
<Effects>
<EffectDLL guid="{B4DC8DD9-2CC1-4081-9B2B-20D7030234EF}">
<Effect name="Zoom Fixed 75%" iconid="33">
<Param name="InternalName" value="Simple3D" />
<Param name="ScaleA" value="1.3333" />
<Param name="InitialScaleA" value="1.3333" />
</Effect>
</EffectDLL>
</Effects>
</TransitionsAndEffects>





Hope it helps. Please report back your experience.

 

[Jen Rowe [MS]]

John's reply is correct. The problem you're facing is that images are square
pixels and video is typically non-square pixels. It sounds like you want to
output as 16:9 PAL which will have a resolution of 720x576 but those pixels
are actually wider than they are taller so that when rendered they make up
the 16x9 frame.

However your images will have square pixels so you will need to resize/crop
your picture so your resolution matches the 16:9 ratio. As you're using PAL
you're better off resizing/cropping your images to 1024x576. (that way it
only gets resized horizontally by MovieMaker). As John said you're probably
better off cropping the 16:9 area of the picture you're interested in and
then resizing that crop to the 1024x576 resolution. If you've done it right
nothing should look stretched in your image.
Regards
Jen
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Rehan]

OK I was talking from my back side... when I said cropping wont work

John and you are right on this.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

 

[Guest]

Many thanks to all of you for your prompt contributions and explanations.

For the time being I have downloaded Rehan's PanZoom package and found that
it does exactly what I need, whilst retaining the quality of the overall
image, and in a fashion consistent with Movie Makers other video effects.

My only observation is that whilst I appreciate that some cropping must take
place to make the image fit the 16:9 format, it would be great if the video
effect allowed the user to position a 16:9 mask over the target image to
explicitly select the area of the image to be cropped. Something along the
lines of using the alphabet approach in the pan & zoom effects to place the
crop position would also be an idea. Just a though a layman. If I'm talking
bo**ocks, just ignore me.

Thanks again

 

[John Kelly]

I do hope those at Microsoft are reading your inflamatory remarks.....the
attitude they give towards every one who dares say anything is realy quite
remarkable

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[John Kelly]

Yawn....you have cracked up mate...challenges now is it????

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[John Kelly]

hello there,


Thank you

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[John Kelly]

Hello there,

My only observation is that whilst I appreciate that some cropping must take
place to make the image fit the 16:9 format, it would be great if the video
effect allowed the user to position a 16:9 mask over the target image to
explicitly select the area of the image to be cropped. Something along the
lines of using the alphabet approach in the pan & zoom effects to place the
crop position would also be an idea. Just a though a layman. If I'm talking
bo**ocks, just ignore me.

Yes, well, if you had tried what I suggested, you would have had maximum
quality and the picture wiould have been exactly the one you wanted. You should
take note here....you can not increase the quality of an image by panning or
zooming...its just not possible. I am pleased though that you found a solution
that almost does what you want, when you have the time try my solution. I think
you will suddenly realise how simple it actualy is.
--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[John Kelly]

Hello again,

Sorry to reply twice, I just re-read your remarks. If you remove the references
to me what's left is exactly what I said. Yes I know this message will upset
rehan again, but frankly I don't care. It is nice to have some one such as your
self defend my remarks instead of what many have become used too where people
from your company defend the MVP's come hell and high water and to the extent
that they try to redefine what MIME is intended for as well as what "Network
Aware" means. I can guarantee that the "back channel" of a certain person is
now red hot. Its a pity he cannot trust everyone. Sorry...EOT (from me at
least)

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[Rehan]

Yes, well, if you had tried what I suggested, you would have had maximum
quality

I now second Johns remarks. Cropping to 16:9 ratio would give you better
quality.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

 

[John Kelly]

Hello,

As I have told you MANY times before, your thoughts on what happens to an image
and how big it is are wrong...see previous posts on this from around six months
ago.

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
Just glad I don't live in Croydon, UK
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[John Kelly]

Oh my god....I will have to frame this one...I will add it to the relevant
section on my website...should raiuse more than a few laughs!!!! LOL

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
Just glad I don't live in Croydon, UK
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[Guest]

Hi John

Unfortunately I have over 150 images that need incorporating into various
"chapters" that will make up our holiday compilation. A fact I omitted from
my original post.

Speaking as an end user, rather than from any technical or purist
standpoint...

....Your method would indeed give me the absolute control I desired. I
decided not to follow that route for the following reasons:-

1. I don't have the time (or interest) to manually crop over 150 images.
2. The method requires that I make copies of the images (at least it does if
I wish to preserve the original images)
3. The source images are not all stored in one folder, making copying by any
batch process a good deal more time consuming.
4. I can apply the widescreen effect to all images in a single timeline with
a simple cut n paste routine, and optionally remove it if I require. All
without making any changes to the original image.

My suggestion to Rehan was just a "small" enhancement to the applet, akin to
the feature used in the pan and zoom effects, whereby the user can control
from where in the image the pan/zoom process is to start (a feature I don't
actually need by the way).

So by using the same alphabetical positioning technique the user can refine
the selection point from within the image that the widescreen effect is
applied, for those odd images that have not cropped in the manner the user
was expecting.

I'm sorry that my post has created some ill will amongst the contributors,
but do appreciate the efforts you have all gone to to explain the cause of my
original problem.

Thanks again to everyone.

 

[John Kelly]

Hello there,

Don't worry about it.....rehans previous guffaw was to invent a procedure that
was adopted by certain programs with respect to the windows registry, he did
not like being corrected then either...and some time prior to that we had the
almost identical problem with him over picture ratios...he does not learn. and
gets very uptight when any one dares to mention that the info is even slightly
wrong, he follows it up with a challenge of one sort or another where he sets
up one of his weird experiments. Any possibility of polite exchange of
information went out the window when on the first encounter with him he started
inventing these wild and wonderful scenarios in an attempt to prove that Media
Player and Movie Maker were both giving false information about the size in
pixels of the video it produced....it was quite funny.

Anyway...

I have several ways for collecting still images nowadays...I have a rather fine
film camera as well as digital. I became disappointed with the Kodak burning to
disk of images and actually moved up in conjunction with a Doctor to Medical
quality scanned images and I have to say that I was very disappointed with that
standard as well, the Doctor friend moved away from film all together and has
gone completely digital.

So I bought my own film scanner...its an odd resolution 5,700 dpi at 16.7 m
colour's....the quality is marvelous though. Its a Hewlett Packard and runs on
a SCSI port. The point of all this is that I now automatically crop my Film
scanned images as I receive the film...I don't bother with prints anymore and I
crop the digital direct off the smart card. So your particular problem of
volume of images to work with does not often arise.

I am retired so the time involved is not exactly a problem either. I have a
flatbed scanner that does 35mm film but have never used it for that purpose and
during the scan process from the dedicated film scanner I just move a 16:9
ratio box around the preview image so that only that part is scanned.

At this time I am busy compiling a set of three DVD's for a wedding...the first
has two video's the first is stills from the engagement party and the second is
the full wedding service, the second DVD has the arrival at the reception plus
the reception and speeches etc together with the film from 25 throw away
cameras (one off each table) and the third is the nights entertainment...video
and stills....I have been hard at it now for about two weeks...scanning all
that film has grown tedious but the results are well worth the extra effort.

It was during the first week or so of owning the film scanner that I discovered
the big con trick on the general public by the manufacturer of APS film
cameras.....I had no idea or even thought about it until one of my sons sent me
some film to scan. If you do not know APS its those cameras that have a
"panorama shot" capability...as my film scanner can handle APS film containers
I ran it through and discovered that all images were the same physical
size...but along the edge of the film was instructions for normal and
panorama...the panorama shots were effectively cropped by the placement of
shutters during the film print process. What a con !!!

Now you can see where I gained the knowledge about the ratio etc.

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
Just glad I don't live in Croydon, UK
\|||/
(o o)
----------ooO-(_)-Ooo-------------
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[Rehan]

Dear Hyde

My suggestion to Rehan was just a "small" enhancement to the applet, akin
to
the feature used in the pan and zoom effects, whereby the user can control
from where in the image the pan/zoom process is to start (a feature I
don't
actually need by the way).

So by using the same alphabetical positioning technique the user can
refine
the selection point from within the image that the widescreen effect is
applied, for those odd images that have not cropped in the manner the user
was expecting.

I will be taking your suggestion into account and perhaps make available a
group of custom effects for anyone else who might be in your position.

However if you needed you could easily do it yourself. Thats the best thing
about being customizable. The xml code I posted earlier can easily be
modified to move the crop rectangle to any place within the image. if you
need more information do contact me directly using the email address on the
website.

I'm sorry that my post has created some ill will amongst the contributors,
but do appreciate the efforts you have all gone to to explain the cause of
my
original problem.

I am sorry you get caught in all this. it happens sometimes here... Its
perhaps the side effect of being one of the most active and vibrant
newsroups. However be assured there is no ill-will, at least not on my side.
I wish everybody well.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get transitions and effects for Windows MovieMaker

Hi John

Unfortunately I have over 150 images that need incorporating into various
"chapters" that will make up our holiday compilation. A fact I omitted
from
my original post.

Speaking as an end user, rather than from any technical or purist
standpoint...

...Your method would indeed give me the absolute control I desired. I
decided not to follow that route for the following reasons:-

1. I don't have the time (or interest) to manually crop over 150 images.
2. The method requires that I make copies of the images (at least it does
if
I wish to preserve the original images)
3. The source images are not all stored in one folder, making copying by
any
batch process a good deal more time consuming.
4. I can apply the widescreen effect to all images in a single timeline
with
a simple cut n paste routine, and optionally remove it if I require. All
without making any changes to the original image.

My suggestion to Rehan was just a "small" enhancement to the applet, akin
to
the feature used in the pan and zoom effects, whereby the user can control
from where in the image the pan/zoom process is to start (a feature I
don't
actually need by the way).

So by using the same alphabetical positioning technique the user can
refine
the selection point from within the image that the widescreen effect is
applied, for those odd images that have not cropped in the manner the user
was expecting.

I'm sorry that my post has created some ill will amongst the contributors,
but do appreciate the efforts you have all gone to to explain the cause of
my
original problem.

Thanks again to everyone.

 

[Guest]

Hi John

Many thanks for updating the post.

I'm relatively new to getting my hands dirty at creating "home movies". My
previous efforts have been limited to the output from my Panasonic EX1B
digital camcorder. Thus I've always excepted the visual and audio ouput as
the complete input to my eventual home movie (other than titles and
transistions).

More recently I've purchased the Casio Exilim EXZ4 digital camera. Being in
the UK this camera allows me to capture still images at the resolution
described in my earlier post and also some low resolution, one minute long,
AVI movie files (not available in the US version of this camera).

Now I have three image formats that I need to combine in the SVCD (jpg, avi
low res, and DV-AVI from the Panasonic). Naturally I want to try and create
a single file output where the difference in these file formats is reduced to
an absolute minimum, when viewed on a TV, but at the same time give me a
"loss-less" as possible final result. A final result that I hope I'll be
able to convert to other technologies as they develop over time.

I have our own wedding video on VHS tape, that I'd dearly love to take at
it's current "quality", and convert it to SVCD. I know the quality won't
improve, but it will at least stabalise it, so at least I can convert it
without further appreciable loss in the future. You don't know of a "cheap"
box of tricks that allows me to plug a scart output socket into something
that then outputs via firewire or USB do you?

I do all the "film" work on a cheap medion laptop, balanced on the arm of my
sofa. This laptop gives me "firewire" and "USB 2.0" connectivity to these
peripherals.

So hopefully I've given you a mental picture of this particular member of
your audience.

Keep up the good work.
Hyde.

 

[Guest]

Hi Rehan

I'll take up your offer via a "lineone" email account.

Please note that as an "end user", as I mentioned in earlier posts, things
that are customisable, are not necessarily a good thing in my book.

I really do like the fact your solution to my problem fell within the user
interface of Movie Maker 2.x

I suspect that you'll be attempting to make me an xml programmer before too
long ;-)

My background is one of a Business/IT project manager. Thus my approach is
to surround myself with technical expertise without having to get myself too
close to the coal face.

Are you up to the challenge? ;-)

Thanks again in advance.