Problems with creating a timelapse video using mencoder/Mplayer with WinXP

[W.Lewin]

I downloaded Mplayer, VLC and followed the mencoder tutorial here:

I added the proper folders to the path variable, as instructed, and used the following code in a dos shell in the folder that stores the jpg image files.

mencoder mf://*.jpg -mf fps=115:type=jpeg -noskip -of lavf -lavfopts format=mov -ovc lavc -lavcopts vglobal=1:coder=0:vcodec=libx264:vbitrate=5000 -vf scale=1280:-2 -o test.mov

It goes through all the images in the folder (around 700mb of jpg), but it doesn´t seem to add any frames to the video, it says "error while writing frame".

The resulting video file is only 1kb. I've attached a screenshot that demonstrates the feedback I get. As can be seen, no images are being added to a video file( size is 0mb and the length of the video is 0)

[Baldrick]

You can use virtualdub, open the first image and it should open them all if they are named like image001.jpg image002.jpg, etc. Save as an avi.

[W.Lewin]

The problem is that the images are named 2011-05-02_14_40_02.817.jpg , 2011-05-02_14_50_02.474.jpg etc from the camera they are extracted from. I have to rename every single file (about 140 images per day are taken). There is a gap in the number. How can I get away with this. Is there any "grand renaming method" I can use ?

[Baldrick]

Copy all files to folder, select all files, hit F2 and rename to something and all will be named like name(1).jpg name(2).jpg. Open the first in virtualdub.

[W.Lewin]

I got this working, thanks for that.

Now that I've got this working, all the images are kept on a server computer, and I want to be able to make this a daily task, that is, for Virtualdub to compile the images into a timelapse video everyday.

How would I do this? The task would be to rename all new images, so the numbernig would fit, and then saving a new AVI file from Virtualdub.

[Baldrick]

Then would mencoder and ffmpeg be much better. Maybe try ffmpeg instead of mencoder. See http://electron.mit.edu/~gsteele/ffmpeg/

[W.Lewin]

I tried to work further with mencoder/MPlayer, but I have a feeling that this is a codec problem, maybe some codecs are missing.

Using the command

mencoder mf://*.jpg -mf fps=60:type=jpeg -noskip -of lavf -lavfopts format=mov -ovc lavc -lavcopts vglobal=1:coder=0:vcodec=libx264:vbitrate=4000 -vf scale=1280:-2 -o testvid.mov

I get the "error" when writing header

"Codec for stream 0 does not use global headers but containers for mat requieres global headers."

[W.Lewin]

I found out what the problem was. I was simply missing the libx264 codecs. This worked when using other codecs from the libavcodec library. How should I install libx264 so that I can use it with mencoder? Is there a better codec that I should use that compresses the images.

Also, how can I control how fast I go through all the pictures in the timelapse video, using mencoder.