Joining .AVI movie files together without losing quality.
I have a series of small movie clips which I wish to join together to form one continuous movie. Each file is in .AVI format.
I can join the clips together using Apple's QuickTime Player 6.3, by copying each file (Edit/Select All, then Edit/Copy), and then pasting it to the end of the previous clip, using Edit/Paste.
The problem is that with this method of joining the files, using the Copy and Paste functions, there is a distinct loss of quality, even if each file is copied, pasted and saved (actually Exported) only once. (It’s a bit like repeated editing, saving and opening a .jpg file, which is not a recommended process).
Does anyone know how to join .AVI files without loss of quality please? The files were originally created with a Canon PowershotG3 digital camera.
Thanks
Jeeva
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rather than cut/paste, I would use a video editing tool that allows you to merge clips together.
http://www.thugsatbay.com/
http://www.virtualedit.net
http://members.ams.chello.
and a zillion free video editor links here:
http://www.amitm.com/links
The "merging" in other programs is exactly the same thing as copy/paste in QT Pro. You will still end up with the same inherent problems with compression. Here's an idea though. Do your copy/paste in QT, but when you Save it dont save it as a self contained movie. Youll end up with 1 small file that "links" to the other movies. Keep them all together but you only need to open the small movie that links to the others.
If the files are mpegs, there's a very neat no-loss trick. Just copy the files in a sequence into one big file, like this:
Go to command prompt in the same directory, and write:
copy /b file1.mpg + file2.mpg + file3.mpg + ... + fileXX.mpg final.mpg
The file extensions can also be .avi, if the codec is mpeg...
Thanks for the suggestions guys. The last one from cubolahead is the one I would like to try first, but how do I do it on a PC which runs under Windows XP where the START/RUN facility doesn't recognsie the DOS copy command? Hopefully there is some easy way to do this, but I have never tried it before on this computer!
Peck's Power Join 1.1b has been around since 1997 and it works very well.
http://www.soft-ware.net/d
Thanks spiderfix. Peck's Power Join is freeware and it has several bugs, but I managed to find work-arounds to deal with them, and in the end I have a reasonably satisfactory solution, which does not seem to lose video quality.
But still, if anyone can tell me how to implement cubolahead's last suggestion on a Windws XP PC, I would be pleased to award more points if that solution also can be made to work, both to whoever provides a method, and to cubolahead.
Thanks.
Jeeva.
To do the "copy /b + + + " line suggested above you first need to be at a command prompt. To get to one from windows XP / 2000 goto the start menu, click "Run..."
In the dialogue box presented enter 'cmd.exe' this will bring up the command prompt or 'dos box' as some like to call it.
You will then need to ensure you are in the correct directory to access your .mpg files.
to get their you will need to do simple command line stuff. CD (change directory)
eg
cd "c:\Documents and Settngs\UserName\My Documents\My Videos\"
once in the right directory enter the command and you should be away.
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by: weedPosted on 2003-08-08 at 09:10:34ID: 9109226
Being AVI in itself isnt causing the problem. It's that the files are probably encoded as MPEG or some other compression method. Because of the way most encoding methods store and update frames it's very difficult to edit them. That's the first problem. Second problem is that no matter what you do, as soon as you re-save/export/encode you're recompressing the video. No real way around that unless you dont compress the video. Problem there is that you end up with HUGE files. So, you either need to get uncompressed video from your camera (not likely) or dont compress your video after editing.