Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by CarlosMontoro at 2011-09-21 10:48

This is just to ask for help regarding a problem I'm having with Elan on a Windows 7 HP G42 laptop using MP4 files in Elan 4.1.2. After making a selection, and writing an annotation in it, when I go back to play the annotated bit I find that it moved from its original place (by 1-4 seconds) making it impossible to annotate my video files (1-2 hour long). Thank you.

Re: Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by shaperoj at 2011-09-25 16:18

I have the same problem, though by .5 seconds, not 4 seconds. Systematically whole sets of annotations will shift by .5 seconds... not sure why. Any ideas?

CarlosMontoro-2011-09-21 10:48:42

This is just to ask for help regarding a problem I'm having with Elan on a Windows 7 HP G42 laptop using MP4 files in Elan 4.1.2.

After making a selection, and writing an annotation in it, when I go back to play the annotated bit I find that it moved from its original place (by 1-4 seconds) making it impossible to annotate my video files (1-2 hour long).

Thank you.

Re: Re: Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by hasloe at 2011-09-27 10:54

Using MP4 on Windows is still problematic, success highly depends on the installed codecs. We are working on a solution that makes use of the support for MP4 provided by the Windows Media Foundation (and hope that that is better).
You can check which codecs are used for your mp4 files by right clicking the video and selecting "Show filter graph".

You can try QuickTime Player to see if it works better. In order to do so, QuickTime has to be installed before ELAN is installed. Re-install ELAN if QT wasn't already on your system when ELAN was installed. Then go to Edit->Preferences->Edit Preferences and select the category "Platform/OS". Under Media Framework select QuickTime for Java and (re)open one of your files. Check if QT is indeed used by right clicking the video and selecting Player Info. Then you can try if it behaves more reliably.

-Han

Re: Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by CarlosMontoro at 2011-09-28 13:13

Dear Han

Thank you for your kind reply.

Following your instructions has indeed solved the problem. Video and annotations are in perfect sync again.

However, when using Quicktime for Java as the media framework Elan slows down in its performance considerably (everything you do takes seconds) and the laptop begins to struggle to muster the required processing power.

I guess I must choose a different video format for my next project, but that is not possible for this project now.

Best wishes.

Re: Re: Re: Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by CarlosMontoro at 2011-09-29 10:30

Dear Han Just a final thought on this: Would Elan's performance be unaffected if I were to use a Mac? It's just that the prospect of analysing 40+ hours of video data when every click takes 2-3 seconds to produce a reaction puts me on edge and I'm prepared to do anything to get a better performance from Elan with my mp4 files. Thank you. :)

Re: Re: Re: Re: Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by hasloe at 2011-10-04 16:57

Yes, in general I think mp4 files on the Mac work quite well. There can always be surprises depending on the encoding settings (e.g. bitrate) but for what I know mp4 in general works ok on the Mac.

-Han

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files

Posted by CarlosMontoro at 2011-10-17 11:53

Thank you for your reply Han. But I read somewhere in the forum that Elan is still not working very well with the latest Mac OS (Snow). Can you confirm that? Thank you again. Carlos

Language Archiving Technology

Sections

Personal tools

Navigation

Annotation problem Windows 7 MP4 files