[SOLVED] Application to combine video + sound tracks?

[yetanotherlogin]

Hello,

For personal use, I need to record lectures and conferences where the sound mixer is usually off-limit.

Since camcorders that can take an external microphone are a bit expensive for that purpose, I bought a Tascam sound recorder, will buy an entry-level camcorder, and combine the two tracks on a PC. Putting the Tascam in front of a loudspeaker provides good-enough sound.

As a first test, I borrowed a friend's JVC camcorder the other day (Everio GZ-MG330; Saves the file as MOV: MPEG-1/2 Video (MPEG), 720x576, 25 fps + A52 Audio (aka AC3) (a52), Stereo, 48KHz) and also recorded the conference with the Tascam as WAV file:

• AviDemux: No easy way to adjust video and sound (Audio > Filter: Time Shift)
• VirtualDub: Failed opening MOV file even with AviSynth installed
• Sony Vegas: Fails opening the file (bad codec?)

I would appreciate any help with the following:

1. How to open the MOV file in Vegas
2. If NOK, is there another good, affordable application for Windows that I should try that makes it easy to combine a video track and a sound track?

Thank you.

[poisondeathray]

1) Install quicktime

[yetanotherlogin]

Thanks for the tip. I did, on a brand new Windows7 host, but Vegas still fails opening the MOV file (Project > Import Media):

Warning: An error occured while opening one or more files. An error occured while opening a codec.

[poisondeathray]

sorry , I missed that it was MPEG2 in MOV . It's not compatible on windows without quicktime mpeg2 component (not free)

MOV: MPEG-1/2 Video (MPEG)

You need to re-wrap it into mpeg2-program stream (.mpg or .mpeg) or transport stream (.ts, .m2ts, .mts) in order for vegas (or any windows program) to open it . (or even elementary video stream .m2v, since you are discarding the audio)

Doesn't your camera come with software?

FFMpeg will work, but I'm trying to thing of easy to use GUI for you

ffmpeg -i input.mov -vcodec copy -acodec copy output.mpg

[Baldrick]

Or maybe tsmuxer, open mov, save as .ts file.

[yetanotherlogin]

Thanks for the help. After running ffmpeg and playing the output MPEG file in VLC, I get no sound and fifty streams.

Here's the ffmpeg output:

C:\ffmpeg 20120421\bin>ffmpeg -i myfile.mov -vcodec copy -acodec copy myfile.mpg

Input #0, avi, from 'myfile.mov':
Duration: 00:00:09.40, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 5379 kb/s
Stream #0:0: Video: mpeg2video (Main) (MPEG / 0x4745504D), yuv420p, 720x576
[SAR 64:45 DAR 16:9], 8400 kb/s, 25 fps, 25 tbr, 25 tbn, 50 tbc
Stream #0:1: Audio: ac3 ([0] [0][0] / 0x2000), 48000 Hz, stereo, s16, 384 kb
/s
Output #0, mpeg, to 'myfile.mpg':
Metadata:
encoder : Lavf54.3.100
Stream #0:0: Video: mpeg2video (MPEG / 0x4745504D), yuv420p, 720x576 [SAR 64
:45 DAR 16:9], q=2-31, 8400 kb/s, 25 fps, 90k tbn, 25 tbc
Stream #0:1: Audio: ac3 ([0] [0][0] / 0x2000), 48000 Hz, stereo, 384 kb/s
Stream mapping:
Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (copy)
Stream #0:1 -> #0:1 (copy)
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
frame= 109 fps=0.0 q=-1.0 size= 2902kB time=00:00:04.51 bitrate=5268.9kbits/
frame= 204 fps=0.0 q=-1.0 size= 5332kB time=00:00:08.32 bitrate=5250.0kbits/
frame= 231 fps=192 q=-1.0 Lsize= 6086kB time=00:00:09.40 bitrate=5303.9kbits
/s
video:5616kB audio:441kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead 0.481847%

I attached a screenshot of VLC's partial display of Codec Details.

[yetanotherlogin]

Or maybe tsmuxer, open mov, save as .ts file.

Thanks but when opening the MOV file:

tsMuxeR error: Error: moov atom not found

[poisondeathray]

The other streams were not listed in ffmpeg screenshot, I wonder why VLC is listing them ?

And both video & audio look ok in the ffmpeg log

Can you post a video sample?

[yetanotherlogin]

Yes, here's a 5MB sample from the same file. I used AviDemux to extract it.

[poisondeathray]

I can't download it from that site. Can you upload it directly here, or use another mirror like sendspace.com or mediafire.com

How do you know avidemux cut it / extracted it properly? Why don't you just re-wrap it in avidemux if it seems to work? (set streams to "copy" and use MPEG-PS or TS) ?

EDIT: nevermind it's downloading now

[yetanotherlogin]

I know next to nothing about editing video

The reason I don't use AviDemux is that it's not good enough to sync the video track with an external, WAV file.

[poisondeathray]

I know next to nothing about editing video

The reason I don't use AviDemux is that it's not good enough to sync the video track with an external, WAV file.

That's ok, you can learn. I meant re-wrap using avidemux so you can use vegas later.

EDIT: avidemux works ok for rewrapping too; tested in media players and vegas

video=>copy
audio=>copy
format=>mpeg-ps



It wasn't cut properly on keyframe at the beginning, so some programs may give you errors

You can re-wrap with ffmbc into program stream , and video & audio are ok in media players and tested ok in vegas too

ffmbc handles many types of video better than ffmpeg . You can download windows binaries here
http://www.mediafire.com/?8xynxe10rxb88

ffmbc -i input.mov -vcodec copy -acodec copy -f vob output.mpeg

If you wanted to batch re-wrap a directory of mov files

for %%a in ("*.mov") do ffmbc -i "%%a" -vcodec copy -acodec copy -f vob "%%~na.mpeg"
pause

With your permission, I will upload your original video sample here too, so if someone needs to test (MPEG2/AC3 in MOV) JVC Everio GZ-MG330 sample files, it will be available as 3rd party file hosts often die. (For some reason .mpeg isn't a valid extension for this message board (but .mpg is) so it's uploaded in a .zip file - not that it really matters)

[transporterfan]

sorry , I missed that it was MPEG2 in MOV . It's not compatible on windows without quicktime mpeg2 component (not free)

MOV: MPEG-1/2 Video (MPEG)

You need to re-wrap it into mpeg2-program stream (.mpg or .mpeg) or transport stream (.ts, .m2ts, .mts) in order for vegas (or any windows program) to open it . (or even elementary video stream .m2v, since you are discarding the audio)

Doesn't your camera come with software?

FFMpeg will work, but I'm trying to thing of easy to use GUI for you

ffmpeg -i input.mov -vcodec copy -acodec copy output.mpg

Avanti appears to have encoded the sample to mpeg2 ok. I used audio copy.
Once it converted (a few seconds) Tsmuxer demuxed it as it should.
I presume it will mux it again with a WAV.

[yetanotherlogin]

It wasn't cut properly on keyframe at the beginning, so some programs may give you errors

I was working on shorter versions of the original file and might have made a mistake when extracting some part for testing. Do you mean that I might have cut the part at the wrong point (ie. not at the start of a reference keypoint), which would explain why Vegas refused to open the file?

I ran Vegas with the original 3GB file copied from the camcorder (ie. not gone through AviDemux at all), but it still triggers the error: Does it mean the JVC camcorder uses a faulty file format?

I'm a bit lost at what I should do now

Edit: I ran the ffmbc command above on the short sample, and could open the output .mpeg in Vegas successfully

Still, I'm curious to understand what happened.

[poisondeathray]

It wasn't cut properly on keyframe at the beginning, so some programs may give you errors

I was working on shorter versions of the original file and might have made a mistake when extracting some part for testing. Do you mean that I might have cut the part at the wrong point (ie. not at the start of a reference keypoint), which would explain why Vegas refused to open the file?

Nope, the reason is you're using a PC and you are using a MAC format. Vegas (and most windows programs) cannot open MPEG2 in MOV directly. ( It might be able to with some 3rd party plugins)

MPEG2 in MOV cannot be opened on a PC through standard methods. Only with ffmpeg/mencoder (and avidemux uses libav, the same library ffmpeg/mencoder use)

I ran Vegas with the original 3GB file copied from the camcorder (ie. not gone through AviDemux at all), but it still triggers the error: Does it mean the JVC camcorder uses a faulty file format?

I'm a bit lost at what I should do now

Either use avidemux in the copy mode , or use ffmpeg . Directions for either are given above

[yetanotherlogin]

Thanks. I ran AviDemux with "video=>copy, audio=>copy, format=>mpeg-ps" and could open the .mpeg output in Vegas. Too bad I didn't know about this forum before; It would have saved me a week trying to get this to work.

Next, I'll try to remove the soundtrack from the .mpeg, add the WAV I recorded separately, and see if I can adjust both tracks.

Thanks everyone.