Easiest way for cutting ads out of avis on OS X?

[broaddd]

I have a few avis encoded in ffmpegx mencoder that still have ads in them (tv episodes). What's the easiest way of cutting them out?

Cheers,
B

[DanSlagle]

I have a few avis encoded in ffmpegx mencoder that still have ads in them (tv episodes). What's the easiest way of cutting them out?

Cheers,
B

Drop them in iMovie?

[lordsmurf]

Final Cut Pro ... but it's best to cut out ads BEFORE encoding to MPEG.

[thoughton]

QuickTime Pro

[JGebauer]

I wonder: can Quicktime Pro do this on m2v files as well, or do they have to be converted to DV for this?

[thoughton]

Havent tried for a while but as far as I know QuickTime Pro can cut pretty much anything except mpegs so you need something else for your m2v. I think Mpeg Streamclip might be able to? Not positive - I havent played with it recently.

[lansing]

I wonder: can Quicktime Pro do this on m2v files as well, or do they have to be converted to DV for this?

Doesn't look like it but you can convert it to .mov and do it. Less time then converting it to DV.

[pixeljammedia]

Just to help explain, AVI isn't really a specific format, it's kind of a catch-all container like the quicktime MOV format. Within the world of AVIs, you could have DIVX, XVID, Intel INDEO, and scores of others that I won't take the time to mention. Since you used ffmpeg, I am guessing you have either MPEG4, DIVX, or XVID. All of which can be taken into QT Pro. Using something like DIVX Doctor II can also help in the transition to MOV.

As far as mpeg streamclip goes, you can move the sliders to the in and out points of the part you want cut from the mpeg and hit Command-X. This should trim out your selection.

[KnightED]

As long as quicktime pro can play the video it can slice it up. Now one you have a sliced movied playing the way you desire do a save as (click the self contained button).

You then take the file into something like ffmpeg (use ffmpegX for a gui). And you can then stream the .mov into a different file type without haveing to re-encode the video. Depending on the type of audio you may have to re-encode it so it can go into the stream.

Quicktime can edit mv2's if you have the mpeg-2 component (you get it with iDVD, any Final Cut and DVDSP3).

[TugBoat]

Quicktime can edit mv2's if you have the mpeg-2 component (you get it with iDVD, any Final Cut and DVDSP3).

Ahhh, how did you get the QT Player to edit ANY mpeg? It doesn't seem to work for anyone else. Hasn't worked since some ancient version of QT in OS7 or 8 or somewhere back around there. The only way I know to edit a mpeg with an Apple product is using the Clip Start Trim and Duration adjustments in DVDSP. It's somewhat clunky and much more expensive than MPEG Streamclip.

Otherwise, you seem to be on a good roll

[JGebauer]

Wow, that was close. I almost spent the dosh on QTpro, that would have been a disappointment...

[DanSlagle]

Wow, that was close. I almost spent the dosh on QTpro, that would have been a disappointment...

Why you will still need it! Export out of Streamclip to a DV stream. Crop in QT pro. Done.

[JGebauer]

The whole point is that I don't want to convert into DV.

[KnightED]

Well if you are having problems slicing in quicktime you can always look to the world of open source. Now the i myself use a program called mpgtx it can slice on time index's or file size. and it also lets you join them back up. Now i dont belive there is a gui for this one yet but its easy enough ot use if you are semi-compedent at the cli.

If you want an osx gui http://www.biermann.org/philipp/mpegcut/ has one i've never used it mself but its better then nothing.

it does mpeg1 and mpeg2 file types.

http://mpgtx.sourceforge.net

will help with you use it if you want to use cli.

[JGebauer]

I don't need to slice. All I want to do is cut out ads from recorded TV programs.

[thoughton]

Pixeljammedia has told you how to do that already

[JGebauer]

With Streamclip. Yes. I know that, and I knew it before. I didn't keep this going, but as it is: Streamclip is very inaccurate, crashes a lot when working directly on the VOBs, and introduces some sound artifacts at the edit points. Otherwise it does indeed work.

[thoughton]

As you've discovered cutting mpegs can be very hard As KnightEd says, mpgtx might work for you, but it also fails an awful lot of your mpeg is at all unusual. I'm afraid he's mistaken about QT Player, it's not possible to cut an mpeg with it.

You can also cut mpegs with a simple viewer app called Goldberg. However the cut off point will have giant green blocks across the screen. I've worked around that before by cutting off less than I actually want, and covering up the green parts with a fadein in FCP.

HTH