Strange happenings converting to h.264

[ionblue]

I tried over the weekend to convert an exported iPhoto slideshow in MOV format into H.264 format and have not had too terribly much luck. The video as exported as MOV looks perfect, but if I use ffmpegX to convert it to H.264 the video is made super dark. Now, it may just be due to scaling it down to 480x272, but I don't know. I've tried every conceivable combination of settings to combat that, including trying mencoder so I can adjust the brightness - which completely screws up the video BTW - and nothing works.

So far, the only way I've gotten close is to use QT7 to export it - BUT doing that produces a substantially brighter video!!!! In this case, brighter is better than darker, though. I haven't tried mpeg stremclip yet, but might tonight unless anyone has any other suggestions.

Oh yeah, the other thing is the content - there are a few images of text which will either look perfectly fine OR if I mess with the settings too much, get all jagged and wavey during the Ken Burns effects.

So if anyone has any suggestions, I would appreciate it! Thanks.

[rumplestiltskin]

That "jagged" problem is probably because additional rendering (that iMovie would do) may be lacking when doing this from iPhoto. You might try creating the slideshow in iMovie and exporting from there. iMovie will ask you if it may perform the rendering when you export.

As for the darkness issue: I've seen this complaint before but can provide no substantive assistance. Sorry.

[ionblue]

I thought about iMovie, but it doesn't have the same functionality as iPhoto with regards to the slideshow.

Maybe somebody else will ahve an idea on the darkness issue - or at least acknowlege it as a "bug" and look into it!

[ionblue]

OK - well I was incorrect in my assumption that iMovie couldn't do the slideshows in the same manner as iPhoto. I haven't done it yet, but the functionality is there, albeit not as "easy". I may give that a try and see if that makes any difference. If so, what format should I start the project in/export to so that ffmpegX might have better luck with it?

[rumplestiltskin]

New project "DV" (not widescreen unless that's what you want). Set your "Ken Burns" effect parameters before you drag in your photos so they're correct when they land in the timeline (so you don't have to go back and re-render).

I believe ffmpegX will handle DV-Stream without a problem. That will provide the maximum quality to ffmpegX. Use the expert QT export settings in iMovie to get the DV-Stream choice. Remember that such output will be 720x480 but your TV (assuming 4:3) is 640x480. Therefore manually set your width & height (in ffmpegX) to match your project's ratio.

You'll be asked to render certain items before you begin the actual export process (from iMovie). Do so; it takes only a few moments.

H264...for iPod? or for eventual playback through the iPod to a TV? Quality settings can be different.