MOV files to AVI without re-encoding

[Raga]

I have a digital camera (Minolta Dimage 3) that shoots 640x480 VGA 30fps footage. However, I would prefer to keep my files as AVI for better compatibility with different programs, yet wouldn't like to re-encode the files. Is there a way to demux the audio and video out of a MOV, or just somehow directly convert the container?

[BJ_M]

non that I know of, anyway quicktime is pretty compatable with most programs ..

[edDV]

QuicktimePro will output an AVI but I don't know if it recodes. Try a Quicktime forum.

[iThinkYouBrokeIt]

You can use QuickTime Pro to export the video as an umcompressed avi. This way, the video is not being recompressed, so there is no loss of quality there. (at least not until you convert to mpeg)
However, uncompressed video can take up a huge amount of hard drive space. it could be about 1GB per minute with uncompressed video and PCM WAV audio.

I would prefer to just keep it as QuickTime, and use that for conversion if you can.

Also, if you don't have QTPro, you could use other programs such as EO Video to convert to uncompressed avi files. Just remember they will be huge...

[Raga]

Well, I can also just use AviSynth to grab it through DirectShowSource and save as uncompressed Avi - however I think we all agree uncompressed Avi isn't a medium of choice.

What's the encoding in MOV files, anyway, how do I find that out?

[iThinkYouBrokeIt]

What's the encoding in MOV files, anyway, how do I find that out?

Open the file with quicktime and press ctrl+I. It should tell you the vid.codec, audio.codec, framerate, etc

[BJ_M]

a digital camera (Minolta Dimage 3) used mjpeg QT

[celtic_druid]

mencoder or ffmpeg might be able to do it.

[BJ_M]

Ok - it works with graphedit to demux the MOV .. I tried it .. you can set it up to demux most mov files I suspect (note: with QT pro you can save out SOME types on thier own in their native format - ive done this several tiems with QT png and targa files (without re-encode))..



celtic_druid prob. right and mencoder can do the exact same thing ...

[Soopafresh]

If you install the Lagarith Codec , you can use the MOV2AVI binary to convert the quicktime to AVI, and there's an option to convert it uncompressed, or to lagarith.

http://lags.leetcode.net/Codec_mac.html

[BJ_M]

that is re-encoding though (except for uncompressed - which you can do many ways anyway)

[Raga]

The format is Photo JPEG, looking at QuickTime. Is that an alias for MJPEG?

GraphEdit wouldn't open them. Can someone spell out to me how I'll do this with mencoder?

[edDV]

It would be nice to keep the MJPEG untouched and just change the container from MOV to AVI and visa versa. Anything do that?

[BJ_M]

yes - graphedit as i mentioned already

[edDV]

yes - graphedit as i mentioned already

cool

[BJ_M]

I would try celtic_druid's suggestion first though - may be far simpler to do

[Raga]

I would try celtic_druid's suggestion first though - may be far simpler to do

Can someone spell out to me how I'll do this with mencoder?

[edDV]

I maintain a MJPEG optimized machine (Pinnacle DC30+ and Premiere 5.1c/6.5) for historical reasons. These digital still cameras may bring MJPEG back into the mainstream.