Powershot SD700 IS -- Major Problem

[phule]

You could try uninstalling Quicktime, couldn't you? Or maybe you could just uncheck the AVI box under "File Types" in preferences?

[alfarmer]

AVI files aren't associated with quicktime in the "file types" dialog. Everything in there is associated with Windows Media Player. I'm not sure how applications like Roxio choose which encoder to use, but Adobe Premiere Elements puts them in a list for you to choose. So I'm thinking somwhere there's an application that will show what's installed. No luck finding it so far, though.

 

ALF

[jean_paul_samson]

I'm using a G4 PowerBook. That sample video from the 700IS (TestSample.avi) crashes

QuickTime Player when I try to open it. It seems to playback just fine in VLC. Unfortunately

but not surprisingly, many Mac application simply use QuickTime to work with video, so

they all suffer the same fate (i.e. they crash).

 

It seems other people have similar problems with the AVI files from digital cameras (see

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20060505122748893 ).

 

Sorry I can't help further, just wanted you to know that it's not just you! :-)

[jean_paul_samson]

Oh, never mind. I got your clip working on my G4 PowerBook. One of the plug-in

components in my /Library/QuickTime folder was causing problems. Once I removed the

component, entitled "AviImporter-r7 (ppc).component", I was able to open the AVI in

QuickTime Player, play it back, and transcode it to another format. (I've now deleted that

file, as it really was unnecessary.)

 

Perhaps you should try temporarily removing all your QuickTime plug-ins to see if any of

they are the culprit. This means moving everything in /Library/QuickTime (at the root of

your hard drive) and ~/Library/QuickTime (in your user directory) somewhere else where

QuickTime can't find them. Then, restart QuickTime Player and try working with your AVI.

Remember to move all the plug-in files back to their proper place when finished testing

this out.

[1ev]

I had the very same problem with the Powershot Pro1 where all the usual transcoders failed on the audio stream. On the Powershot the audio is sampled at 11024 Hz in 8 bit and this might be too unusual.

 

I now use mencoder a command line tool shipped with mplayer to transcode the Canon AVI files. Also I force the audio sampling to 11025 Hz to get rid of the annoying background high pitch noise.

 

Here the command I use:

 

mencoder -o video-encoded.avi -oac mp3lame -ovc lavc -srate 11025 -channels 1 -af-adv force=1

-lameopts preset=medium -lavcopts vcodec=msmpeg4v2:vbitrate=600 -mc 0 video-toencode.AVI

 

It also works fine with your sample. The quality is very good with 600 bit rate and the files are about 1/10 of the original size. I never tried mencoder on Windows or OSX but it flies on Linux/FreeBSD.

 

I hope I could help.

 

Cheers,

Colin.

[alfarmer]

Thanks everyone. Here's some new info. to add to the mix.

 

1. I called Canon and they offered no assistance, saying that their

AVI files are industry standard. This is patently false, however,

because they aren't standard AVI files, they're Motion JPEG. In

addition, the audio stream is atypical and screws up most software

unless one installs specialty transcoders.

 

2. That aside, Quicktime Pro seems to handle the transcoding fine on

my Mac. The problem, at least in my case, was I'd installed a WMV

decoder called Flip4Mac and it took over .AVI files as well. And

of course it completely chokes on Canon's MJPEG files. After

removing Flip4Mac, the files were again handled by Quicktime and

works fine.

 

3. Windows is a completely different story. I've still not found a

good solution, but the key thing is THERE IS NO transcoder for

MJPEG files built into Windows as standard. There's a DEcoder for

viewing, but no transcoding ability. That ability seems to come

with each individual application (Quicktime, Roxio, etc.)

 

4. If you have Windows XP and Canon Powershot .AVI files, I believe

the best solution is purchasing Quicktime Pro. It's "only" $30

and should work as smoothly as the Mac version. I've not tested

this theory, however, as I don't plan to buy two copies.

 

5. Outside of that, I'm hoping the latest version of Vegas Video or

Roxio will deal with these MJPEG files appropriately. I'm most

concerned about converting to DVD MPEG, however, so there may be

some freeware out there that works well enough for everyone in my

family to use and I'd prefer that. If it were just me, the command

line tool would be okay, but it's not that simple. :)

 

6. I presume this stuff applies to ALL Canon Powershot cameras that

spit out .AVI files. It's really too bad they didn't pony up the

extra FEW bucks and crank out Quicktime files like Panasonic does.

 

I relaly like my Lumix camera too, but it suffers from being VERY underpowered when it comes to CPU & memory. One of the reasons I'm upgrading to the SD700 is because the Lumix totally chokes when writing video about half the time. And unfortunately, all data recorded to that point is lost. My wife is VERY unhappy with it, so this SD700 helps out a lot there. I just need to streamline post-production on her Windows XP machine.

 

Again, thanks for the help everyone.

 

ALF

[andrew robertson]

I ran your file through Divx Doctor II, which can sometimes clean up non-divx files as well

as divx. Then I used Quicktime Pro to convert it to h.264, mpg, avi, and dv stream formats.

They all work fine.

 

My dvd burner is broken right now, so I can't help you with that. But I did manage to

convert it into many different formats with no problems and retain the audio.

[alfarmer]

As mentioned previously, I was able to convert the file on my Mac using Quicktime Pro and therefore assume that would work on the PC as well. I've just been told repeatedly that Windows handles this type of file automatically, so I'd like to get it working without spending any more money.

 

ALF

[alfarmer]

Interesting...

 

I just tried Pinnacle Studio (an older version) and it handled the AVI files fine on my machine. I presume that means it uses its own internal processing for MotionJPEG files, while the other applications are relying upon the OS for that functionality.

 

ALF