Importing Videos into Windows Movie Maker - FIXED?

Comments

• TerryBritton

  July 2010 edited January 2011

  I never had any problem importing CamStudio video INTO Windows Movie Maker - even using the CamStudio Lossless Codec 1.4 it worked fine - the problem in quality was always getting it OUT of there again! The compression artifacts were terrible looking - especially once you uploaded the result to YouTube!
  
  I recently discovered four very superior codecs I could use to output my edited videos with some much higher quality than the older WMV codecs formerly listed in the drop-down gave me:
  
  WMV-HD-1280X720 (16:9 aspect ratio, 24 fps, 6.3 bit rate compared with the older one's 1.1 bit rate)
  WMV-HD-1920X1080 (16:9 aspect ratio, 24 fps, 8.3 bit rate)
  WMV-HD-960X720 (4:3 aspect ratio, 24 fps, 6.3 bit rate)
  WMV-HD-1440X1080 (4:3 aspect ratio, 24 fps, 8.3 bit rate)
  
  
  [Edit - I just found out where I found these: PapaJohn's! - http://www.papajohn.org/ (What a Windows Movie Maker Super-site!!!) thanks to this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBMDhd_8rnk (start at 2:10 for instructions where the codecs are ... or go directly to the WMV-HD page via this frame link: http://www.papajohn.org/MM2-WMV-HD.html down by the turtle!)]
  
  [Edit 2 - These seem to be the same files from two different download sources: http://www.filedropper.com/windowsmoviemaker2xphdplugins or here http://www.megaupload.com/?d=M3EMJHUA via http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2K8OgM9Kkeo - but visit PapaJohn's anyway! That's where I got mine originally, and the articles are great!]
  
  I never seem to be able to get the listing in Windows Movie Maker (under "Show More Choices") to show any other codec options besides these, but this new codec set is very, very clear compared with the older one. The transfers to YouTube are like night and day by comparison! (I use the 1280X720 one.) Basically, these are like plugins (called "Profiles"), and go into the Windows Movie Maker 2 folder in Program Files, inside the Shared folder, and into the Profiles folder that sits inside of that one. I'm certain the 4:3 aspect ratio ones are every bit as good as the 16:9 ones are!
  
  I have never understood the audio setting, "Set Interleave every" - I take it setting that for 1 frame is working for you very well for keeping the audio in sync in conjunction with your 50X20(=1000) capture-frames-every/playback-rate settings.
  
  I'm impressed how good the Quality setting of 70 looks!
  
  44100 kHz at 4 bits for audio surprised me, though!(Available to me in the Microsoft ADPCM format once I matched your Recording Format setting of 44.1 kHz, mono, 16-bit!) But I was under the impression that checking "Use MCI Recording" bypassed the compression scheme?
  
  Why do you opt for a "Set Key Frames Every" setting of 30 over what the "auto" slider would have suggested of 20 for this 50X20 setup?
  
  Thanks for starting this thread up, Nick!
  
  Terry Britton
• nickthegeek

  July 2010

  Hi Terry
  
  Awesome links, thanks dude!
  
  Re: the Key Frames question, a user recommended that setting to me some years ago and the results I got were always good (along with the 50x20) so I never changed it.
  
  No idea what his reasoning was.
  
  As I understand it, MCI Recording does bypass the compression choice (ADPCM, MP3, etc.) but not the Recording Format choice (44.1 kHz, etc.)
  
  The interleave setting = yep, that's what's working best for me at the moment.
  
  Your comment ... "44100 kHz at 4 bits for audio surprised me, though!"
  
  ADPCM at that quality surprised you in a good way or bad way?
  
  Cheers
  
  Nick :o)
• TerryBritton

  July 2010 edited August 2010

  Nick,
  
  Heh - 44100 KHz at 4 bits just surprised me! (Particularly the 4 bits part!) Good for voice, I take it. That is a very course setting for sampling music, though! (only sampling for 16 volume levels with 4 bits!) My friend's hearing implants sample at the same bit depth, so it must be adequate - I'll give it a try.
  
  [Edit: A little research turned up the fact that ADPCM is an early, pre-mp3 compression method that always uses 4 bits, no matter what the sample rate, and only records the "differences" between adjoining samples. See this article for the whole story: http://screencasttutorial.org/54/pcm-or-microsoft-adpcm-which-is-the-best-audio-for-screencasting-139 ]
  
  I believe that with "Use MCI for recording" checked it would only honor the top setting, and would ignore the ADPCM setting. I'll try a test or two and find out.
  
  Does Camstudio compress "on-the-fly" during recording, or does it only apply the compression after you have pressed "Stop" as it is saving the file?
  
  If the latter, then it is difficult to see why the "Use MCI for Recording" setting successfully defeats many people's audio sync issues! Could the compressors be "dropping frames" somehow? Anyway, all speculation - no hard tests for comparison, so I'll perform some and get back to you with some actual comparative data.
  
  Terry
• TerryBritton

  January 2011 edited January 2011

  Here are a few YouTube videos on using Windows Movie Maker to create HD movies.
  
  Important tips for Windows Movie Maker users (older XP WMM)
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_oPI32R06g
  
  How To Make Your Videos HD Using Windows Movie Maker (XP)
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2K8OgM9Kkeo
  
  How To Make Your Videos HD Using Windows Movie Maker (Vista Premium and Ultimate)
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRGW11RrqL0&feature=iv
  
  How to Get HD 1080p or 720p Video in ,Windows 7 WMM
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVnZnpmPm00&feature=related
  
  And this one is helpful as well:
  
  How to Fix Aspect Ratio on already uploaded videos
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFPcAIM8fB0
  
  yt:crop=16:9
  (zooms in on the 16:9 area, removes windowboxing)
  
  yt:stretch=16:9
  (fixes anamorphic content by scaling to 16:9)
  
  yt:stretch=4:3
  (fixes 720x480 content that is the wrong aspect ratio by scaling to 4:3)
  
  yt:quality=high
  (default to a? high quality stream)
  
  (from the vid's info box):
  "NOTE a common problem I'm constantly asked about when using stretch=16:9 tag is that it sometimes doesn't stretch to remove the black bars and stretch the whole screen.
  
  This is mainly because the video uploaded is in 16:9 widescreen ratio with black bars rendered into the video, the problem with this is that Youtube assumes the black bars are part of the video and doesn't stretch beyond the dimensions of the video with this tag, that only applies with the crop tag but not the stretch tag."
  
  Here is a search on the term, Making Video For YouTube With Windows Movie Maker sorted by upload date:
  http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=videos&search_query=Making+Video+For+YouTube+With+Windows+Movie+Maker&search_sort=video_date_uploaded&suggested_categories=26%2C1%2C28
  
  Terry