Audio stops during clip

[kafka]

I have just downloaded Videopad and captured a number of clips from my high definition camcorder. While previewing the second and third clips I found that while the video continued to the end, the audio stopped prematurely leaving silence instead of my wife talking.

 

Am I right in believing that I cannot create a main menu and submenus in Videopad?

[Nationalsolo]

Hi

 

Was the sound in synch up to the point that it stopped? Full frame HD (1920 x 1080p H.264 MPEG4) from my camera has increasing lag between sound and vision on my PC making the clips unusable as such. (Whatever the reading software) but is OK when converted to MPEG2.

 

The DVD writing part of VP doesn't appear to have menu creation. You can insert chapters into each section of your film which will enable the DVD player to jump from chapter to chapter. (If it is capable of this,) but this is not really the same thing as menu driven film selection. Neither can you create a DVD from several films unless you load the films (not the projects-which you can't do anyway)) one after the other on the sequence line with chapters between them.

 

The best way if you want to have menus is to save your edited film to your PC and then use a third party DVD creator. Windows DVD creator is OK and comes with WMM. Otherwise there are several free programs that work OK.

eg. Sothink Movie DVD maker. (Has an advert flash screen between menu items unless you buy it but it's not too detracting, otherwise) You can set up menus and screen display/ music etc.

 

Free DVD creator is similar but has no promotional tags.

 

Nat

[kafka]

Thanks for your reply Nat. The sound was in synch up to the point that it stopped. I noticed also that there were several blank (black frames) at the end of each clip though the preview showed the whole clip. How do I convert MPEG4 to MPEG2? Does this require video converter software? I saw this solution mentioned elsewhere in the forum as the answer to out-of-sync video/audio.

[Nationalsolo]

Hi

 

If the sound is in synch up the point where it stops I can't think what it might be. When it's added to the sequence line can you see the missing sound on the audio track? If you can it should be rendered when you create your film.

 

 

The black frames thing has been mentioned before. Again, I have no idea about them. All I can say is I never get them but, of course when a clip is previewed, it always ends with a black frame. It's not part of the clip however as it's not present when another clip is added on.

 

I am wondering if it's related to the format your camera is producing?

 

With regards converting MPEG4 to MPEG2. It's what I do as a routine (or until I can affort a whizz PC). There a quite a few free conversion programs available. I use "Any video converter" from:

 

http://www.any-video-converter.com/products/for_video_free/

 

(NCH do one of course but I had this one first which does what I want.)

It's pretty easy to use and you can add multiple files and convert between different video formats using variable parameters. (frame size/fps/ etc.) The resulting file outputs to a named folder (usually on the desktop) and the original remains unchanged so you can try something different.

 

Sorry, all in all not much help. Try MPEG2 and see if there is any difference.

 

Nat

[kafka]

Nat,

 

Thanks for your advice. I have just played back a clip on my camcorder and compared it to the same clip on Videopad. I am embarrassed to say that I have discovered that the audio on Videopad is NOT in synch with the video after all! The audio on Videopad starts earlier than the video and, consequently, also finishes earlier. I could not tell this before because it seemed that my wife started talking while she had her back to me (which she didn't). Does this give you any clues?

 

Regards,

 

Michael

 

Hi

 

If the sound is in synch up the point where it stops I can't think what it might be. When it's added to the sequence line can you see the missing sound on the audio track? If you can it should be rendered when you create your film.

 

 

The black frames thing has been mentioned before. Again, I have no idea about them. All I can say is I never get them but, of course when a clip is previewed, it always ends with a black frame. It's not part of the clip however as it's not present when another clip is added on.

 

I am wondering if it's related to the format your camera is producing?

 

With regards converting MPEG4 to MPEG2. It's what I do as a routine (or until I can affort a whizz PC). There a quite a few free conversion programs available. I use "Any video converter" from:

 

http://www.any-video-converter.com/products/for_video_free/

 

(NCH do one of course but I had this one first which does what I want.)

It's pretty easy to use and you can add multiple files and convert between different video formats using variable parameters. (frame size/fps/ etc.) The resulting file outputs to a named folder (usually on the desktop) and the original remains unchanged so you can try something different.

 

Sorry, all in all not much help. Try MPEG2 and see if there is any difference.

 

Nat

[Nationalsolo]

Hi

 

The out of synch sound (video lagging) seems to be a common problem judging by a search on Google. Some while back NCH answered a question regarding this (a rare event indeed!) saying that it was performance related. All I can say is that if I film in big format (1920 x 1080 HD MPEG4 H.246 that I have this problem on my PC. Even 1280 x 720 MPEG4 show marked lag in the image.(The smaller frame sizes (not HD) run OK.)

 

I have tried lots of formats with different length clips just to time the lag to see if its proportinal or relates to frame size etc., a 15 second clip of 1920 x 1080 60fps MPEG4 can be out by an average of 7 seconds which makes editing such clips difficult to say the least. Even a 10 second 1280 x 720 MPEG4 clip lags behind the sound by 4 seconds! So perhaps NCH are correct. Perhaps it requires a 64 bit machine. It's not just VP that has this problem as I have several editing programs and all show a similar fault. Even the clips played in Quicktime lag, Irfanview lags etc.

 

No doubt someone out there will say this is all wrong...........

 

But by using 1280 x 720 HD and converting the clips to MPEG2 before I edit everything works fine. In fact the image seems clearer and the sound less muddy.

 

All you can do is give it a try.

 

Nat

[kafka]

Hi,

 

My prospects of producing a high definition DVD don't seem promising. I will try and work out how to convert the clips to MPEG2 and see how that goes. I have posed the problem to the NCH help desk but their suggestion wasn't helpful. I have followed up my original post with a second one and am awaiting a reply. I tried to install trial versions of a similar Cyberlink program but at the end of the installation I was told that the downloaded files were corrupt. I will continue searching for an inexpensive video editing program which works.

 

Regards,

 

Michael

 

Hi

 

The out of synch sound (video lagging) seems to be a common problem judging by a search on Google. Some while back NCH answered a question regarding this (a rare event indeed!) saying that it was performance related. All I can say is that if I film in big format (1920 x 1080 HD MPEG4 H.246 that I have this problem on my PC. Even 1280 x 720 MPEG4 show marked lag in the image.(The smaller frame sizes (not HD) run OK.)

 

I have tried lots of formats with different length clips just to time the lag to see if its proportinal or relates to frame size etc., a 15 second clip of 1920 x 1080 60fps MPEG4 can be out by an average of 7 seconds which makes editing such clips difficult to say the least. Even a 10 second 1280 x 720 MPEG4 clip lags behind the sound by 4 seconds! So perhaps NCH are correct. Perhaps it requires a 64 bit machine. It's not just VP that has this problem as I have several editing programs and all show a similar fault. Even the clips played in Quicktime lag, Irfanview lags etc.

 

No doubt someone out there will say this is all wrong...........

 

But by using 1280 x 720 HD and converting the clips to MPEG2 before I edit everything works fine. In fact the image seems clearer and the sound less muddy.

 

All you can do is give it a try.

 

Nat

[kafka]

Success! I converted the clips from MP4 to MP2 and video and audio are now synchronised.

 

Hi,

 

My prospects of producing a high definition DVD don't seem promising. I will try and work out how to convert the clips to MPEG2 and see how that goes. I have posed the problem to the NCH help desk but their suggestion wasn't helpful. I have followed up my original post with a second one and am awaiting a reply. I tried to install trial versions of a similar Cyberlink program but at the end of the installation I was told that the downloaded files were corrupt. I will continue searching for an inexpensive video editing program which works.

 

Regards,

 

Michael