8 Hours of editing and I still have nothing - Help!

[brokenrobot]

I'm trying to edit together a series of MP4 clips recorded on my Samsung S5 phone but having serious trouble.

I've managed to import and edit about 15 of the clips in Windows Movie Maker and got about half way through then the thing crashed. I've tried restoring the partially complete movie but Movie Maker seems to have lost everything despite me saving every 5 minutes while I was working on it.

I was reading that mp4 is not a good file to edit and only has genuine keyframes ever 20 frames or so (or something like that) and I read you need to convert them for editing.

I downloaded handbrake as many people said you need to convert MP4 to WMV for easy editing. I've looked in handbrake but there was no WMV output format so I converted them to M4V files and grabbed a demo of Sony Platinum 15.

The files all went into Sony ok and I've edited about 30 clips into a 3 minute movie but now I cant compile it!?! Every time I try to render the movie it gets to 3% and crashes. I've tried various output settings and if I try and export it at something like 320 x 480 then its gets to about 80% before crashing. Each time I get a completely different error message (sometime Windows library file crashes, sometime Sony code problems)

I've been watching the task manager as it renders and nothing is peaking - processor never gets above 80% and RAM always has about half a gig spare but yet it always falls over.

I went up to a PC shop a couple of hours ago and bought an nVidia 750 Ti 2GB card and have selected that in Sony but it makes no difference whatsoever.

I'm so confused now that I would really appreciate any help someone can offer me. I can see from looking online that there are hundreds of little programs offering to convert mp4s to something editable so what format would you recommend? I've installed Quicktime and the latest Klite packages but they didn't change anything.

I'm the one who usually helps family and friends out when they have PC problems but now I'm completely stumped. This video malarkey is all new to me and I'll admit I'm completely clueless.

[brokenrobot]

Sorry - forgot the MediaInfo stuff -

General
Complete name : C:\Users\Nick\Desktop\dumbways\boom-gate.mp4
Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : Base Media / Version 2
Codec ID : mp42 (isom/mp42)
File size : 55.1 MiB
Duration : 9s 813ms
Overall bit rate : 47.1 Mbps
Encoded date : UTC 2016-01-05 19:06:12
Tagged date : UTC 2016-01-05 19:06:12

Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L5.1
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 1 frame
Format settings, GOP : M=1, N=30
Codec ID : avc1
Codec ID/Info : Advanced Video Coding
Duration : 9s 565ms
Bit rate : 48.1 Mbps
Width : 3 840 pixels
Height : 2 160 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Variable
Frame rate : 30.000 fps
Minimum frame rate : 29.713 fps
Maximum frame rate : 30.181 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.193
Stream size : 54.8 MiB (99%)
Title : VideoHandle
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2016-01-05 19:06:12
Tagged date : UTC 2016-01-05 19:06:12

Audio
ID : 2
Format : AAC
Format/Info : Advanced Audio Codec
Format profile : LC
Codec ID : 40
Duration : 9s 813ms
Source duration : 9s 818ms
Source_Duration_FirstFrame : 4ms
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 256 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Frame rate : 46.875 fps (1024 spf)
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 307 KiB (1%)
Source stream size : 307 KiB (1%)
Title : SoundHandle
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2016-01-05 19:06:12
Tagged date : UTC 2016-01-05 19:06:12
mdhd_Duration : 9813

[DB83]

Methinks your problem is the variable frame-rate that your phone has created.

Yes. mp4 is not the easiest to edit. But wmv is not the way to go. I do not think you read that on here. Better to convert to an intermediate, lossless format such as lagarith and a constant frame rate.(30 fps for you). Sony should be able to do that.

Also you have not helped yourself by installing a codec pack(k-lite). That may also be screwing you system

[brokenrobot]

Thanks for that. I used to use my ancient laptop to edit my home movies from my S3 and it worked fine. Now on my much more powerful PC I cant make a single video!

I've not come across lagarith on my travels yet bit I'll give that a go right now. I did see that often the k-lite pack can just create more problems but it was the last thing I tried just because I was getting desperate. I've just ordered a Win7 64 bit disk so will wipe my machine next weekend and install that and take your advice about not re-installing k-lite.

[poisondeathray]

Yes, VFR is a problem, but UHD resolution is also going to be a problem on that i5 system with 4GB ram . It can barely cut HD safely.

[brokenrobot]

Aaargh - thanks - was worried about that. The processor and memory never seem to top out when compressing but I did have a niggling feeling that I didn't have enough power. I've turned my phone down to 1920 x 1080 now and hopefully this will help with future vids.

[JVRaines]

I've managed to import and edit about 15 of the clips in Windows Movie Maker and got about half way through then the thing crashed. I've tried restoring the partially complete movie but Movie Maker seems to have lost everything despite me saving every 5 minutes while I was working on it.

Did you check the files in your temporary folder? You might have another autosave with more of the work in it. The temporary location is defined at Tools/Options/General/Temporary Storage.