Advice needed for novice- file conversion

[afrika video]

Folks, I need some urgent help. I have video files on my external hard drive. When I open them up in windows media player or VLC they play and I can see the footage. However, if I attempt to import the file into a video editing programme (camstasia/and one other) it does not show up, only the sound files (.wav).

So, I followed some advice on here (that I picked up from another thread) and dpwnloaded free studio. As I want the files in .avi format I thought it would be easy. Again, when I open the file destination on the source (hard drive) there is NOTHING!

How do I convert these files (they are .m2v) so that I can import them into a editing programme, and make my DVD. I do not need sounds, as I will use my own sound tracks....

PLEASE HELP me. I have to get this done by Friday.

Take note that I am not good with this type of stuff, and will need to be spoonfed step by step.

The video footage comes from a Canon XH1 Mini DV camera and was shot in HD in PAL format. So I cannot use the tapes down here as I do not have anyone that can change it to NTC format. It was downloaded to Pinnacle studio 15. I saved it on the hard drive (external) and as mentioned, it plays in media player, VlC and all the main media players. I can also see if I click on the properties that all the files are big, showing the footage is in there. Just cannot get it to show up on the editing software!

Looking forward to your advice and help!

[Baldrick]

Use a mpeg editor? LIke mpeg video wizard or tmpgenc authoring works.


(m2v= mpeg2 video)

[afrika video]

Folks, please get this. I have downloaded many software programmes that is suppose to sort this out. The moment I want to drag and drop the.m2v file into the programme, it will not show up on the search. Only audio files shows up!

[Cornucopia]

Sounds like your OPEN/SAVE dialog box is buggered. You should still be able to use it anyway. Try this:

Open your app. Select Open/Load file...
When dialog box is onscreen, make sure the filetype filter is either the format you want (*.AVI, etc) or set to All Files (or "files of all types", etc).
Even if that doesn't work, if you go to the folder where a file is known to be (and you don't see any files of that type), all you have to do is type into the filename box: "*.AVI" (without the quotes) and they should MAGICALLY show up.

Scott

[Baldrick]

The above tools also? And you might have to select open all files(*.*) when you import the video files.


Or else convert your m2v to avi with for example video to video converter, format factory, etc. All free.

[afrika video]

Ok, I downloaded wondershare video converter, that i supposed to sort this out.

So I open "My videos" on windows. The file, named by me "Dave" shows up (and it plays the video in Realplayer, Mediaplayer, and VLC). Then, following the instructions from the soft ware programme, I drag the video clip to the converter box. An error shows up saying "failed to import files: ".mpeg2.m2v"

This is the same error I get when trying to directly import the clip into video EDITING programme...

Please be patient with me, my tech knowledge on this is obviously very very low.....