MP4's cropped during playback

[sandydoull]

Whenever I play mp4 videos (640*480) taken with my Sanyo digital camera the image is cropped to where you can only see like 1/4 of the picture or something. When I playback in Quicktime the video plays back fine, anyone ever experienced this?

[VLC_help]

Can you upload a sample file?

[sandydoull]

Can you upload a sample file?

http://www.sandydoull.com/VCLP0334.MP4

Cheers

[VLC_help]

Video is 320x240 according to Mediainfo, Quicktime and VLC.
http://www.wixler.com/u/18/aa37f4eb38.jpg and they look pretty identical to me.

[sandydoull]

Video is 320x240 according to Mediainfo, Quicktime and VLC.
http://www.wixler.com/u/18/aa37f4eb38.jpg and they look pretty identical to me.

I guess there is something messed up with my VLC cos when I playback the video it only shows a small portion of the video. For me Quicktime says the video is 640*480 and VLC says 320*240 (The camera is set to 640*480).

I wasnt able to get a screen capture of the VLC movie like you have but I have marked on the quicktime movie the portion of video which i see in VLC: http://www.sandydoull.com/Clipboard01.jpg

Oddly enough if I use VLC's screenshot function the screenshot is full size!?

Any suggestions, I hate quicktime

[VLC_help]

Have you tried disabling Overlay video output from VLC?

[sandydoull]

Have you tried disabling Overlay video output from VLC?

Tried doing that, still the same.

It's strange how when you save a screenshot in VLC it is of the full video?!

[VLC_help]

What version of VLC are you using? And what Video output module?

[dgbear]

I have the same problem where VLC playback has changed from 640*480 to 320x240.

I went back to VLC 0.8.2.0, the video is recognized as 640*480 and VLC works fine.

When I use Mediainfo 0.7.4.7 the video is recognized as 640*480.

** However when I use a later version of Mediainfo - Version 0.7.6.2, then the video is shown as 320 * 240.

The video uploaded previously produces these same results:
http://www.sandydoull.com/VCLP0334.MP4

How can we tell what versoin is correct and what can be used to fix the problem without having to change the source video (which requires one to deal with new file dates etc.)

Thanks to the team for such a great product... VLC ROCKS!

[VLC_help]

IIRC there are two ways to store video dimension with MP4. One is to store it to MP4 container, another is to put it inside videodata. Container seems to give 320x240 and video stream 640x480. This can be fixed by remuxing the file with yamb+mp4box.
http://rapidshare.com/files/106919530/V ... d.mp4.html
http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/6600/mp4fixedpp6.jpg

[mpatnode]

I have the exact same issue now with 0.9.9 and 1.0.0-RC1. Covert the file to an AVI and it plays 640x480, the MP4 plays 320x240 I could swear it worked in an earlier version but I don't know what version that was. Here's the MP4 and the AVI.

http://mpsharp.com/V640x480.avi
http://mpsharp.com/V640x480.MP4

IIRC there are two ways to store video dimension with MP4. One is to store it to MP4 container, another is to put it inside videodata. Container seems to give 320x240 and video stream 640x480. This can be fixed by remuxing the file with yamb+mp4box.

So are you saying this is a bug in the Sanyo MP4 format and won't/can't be fixed in VLC? I'd prefer not to install Quicktime since it continually reinserts itself in the startup sequence.

I notice in 1.0.0-RC1, Stream 0 Codec Details now says Resolution: 640x480, Display resolution 320x240.

[VLC_help]

So are you saying this is a bug in the Sanyo MP4 format

technically it isn't a bug. It is a feature. But most players don't support it properly.

[icke2576]

So are you saying this is a bug in the Sanyo MP4 format

technically it isn't a bug. It is a feature. But most players don't support it properly.

Hello,

I have the same problem with VLC 1.0.1 Golden Eye.

From all my sanyo videos with resoltion 640x480 are only seen the upper left quarters. In the codec informations there are the video solutions 640x480 and the screen solution 320x240. With older versions of VLC 0.x.y the same videos were shown in full size. All other installed players, not only quicktime, show the videos in full size too. So I think the problem must be solved in VLC ! It is not useable for me to convert all the old videos as said some postings before.

[VLC_help]

You can automate the remuxing.

[mkanwischer]

I have the same issue with the new versions of VLC (playback only shows the top left quarter of the original video). The files I have problems with are mp4 files that were pulled off my Panasonic video camera using their software. I'm not sure what VLC version it stopped working with... but I think it was working with 0.9 ? I certainly had no issues with a few of the older versions of VLC. Both 1.0.1 and 1.0.3 have this issue. How can I play these video properly? (I have hundreds of videos like this) The previous post says you can automate remuxing... how is that accomplished?

Thanks for any feedback... and thanks for what I consider to be the greatest video player over the last number of years.

[VLC_help]

You use tool called mp4box and batch file to process all files you get from your camera.

[mkanwischer]

I "downgraded" to 0.8.5 and it plays all my videos properly. Why can't the new versions of VLC play them properly as well? Is this something that can be looked at by one of the VLC software programmers? I would be more than willing to provide a sample video.

Thanks,
Mark

[VLC_help]

Why can't the new versions of VLC play them properly as well?
Earlier VLC versions didn't follow the specs. The proper way is to crop the file because the container says that must be done.

[Lotesdelere]

The proper way is to crop the file because the container says that must be done.

Maybe but the point is that even QuickTime doesn't do that. It changes the display resolution, yes, but it doesn't crop the video so you can see the whole image which I believe is the expected behaviour.

[VLC_help]

Maybe but the point is that even QuickTime doesn't do that. It changes the display resolution, yes, but it doesn't crop the video so you can see the whole image which I believe is the expected behaviour.

Good point. Maybe I should dive into MP4 specs and check it out.

[mkanwischer]

Thanks for looking into the cropping problem for me. It would be much appreciated if new versions would continue to play my "non conforming" video files correctly.

Many thanks,
Mark

[VLC_help]

I think it should be cropping

Code: Select all

/* Support for cropping (eg. in H263 files) */ p_track->fmt.video.i_visible_width = p_track->fmt.video.i_width; p_track->fmt.video.i_visible_height = p_track->fmt.video.i_height;

if somebody finds other info, I am happy to do code changes.

[warpi]

Thanks for the help. Here comes a summary how to fix the problem using Ubuntu or similar.

Installing MP4Box on ubuntu, write

Code: Select all

sudo apt-get install gpac

Go to the directory where all your bad movies are located, and write

Code: Select all

find . -name *.MP4 -exec MP4Box -add {} -new {} \;

This command will search up all movies with the extension .MP4 in all subdirectories and recreate the header, so you will have no problem with the movie anymore

Cya