Thumbnails of some video formats are black

[Piterplus]

I have VideoStudio 8 SE DVD which was bundled along with my new Genius MP4 video camera, and it works fine, although it has some annoying bugs and works slow on my computer (AMD 2400, GF6600GT, 768 RAM).
Recently I tried to use 30 days trial version 9.0 from Chip magazine DVD and found that when I load and want to edit some video clips (especially Xvid) all the clip's thumbnails on timeline and library are completely black. Changing options of clip display mode did not helps. All videos was opened by any other video players without any problems, framerate is 30.
In version 8.0 all thumbnails displayed correctly.
It seems that 9.0 version cannot create correctly library database thumbnails.
That may be cause such strange behaviour of videostudeo 9.0 , and how to cure it?

[Ron P.]

HI Piterplus and welcome to the forums..

The VS 8 version that came with your camera, has special drivers designed to work specifically with your camera. However VS8 is known to have been real buggy. The patches however will not install to a free (SE) version.

Xvid is one of the formats Ulead does not handle well at all. Most experienced users stay away from editing that format. It is highley compressed, and editing will yield a loss in quality, audio/video out of sync issues.

With that, since Xvid is an MPEG-4 compliant compression codec, you would need the MPEG-4 plug-in for VS9. It is free for registered users of the full version.

Ron P.

[Ken Berry]

Frankly, it does not make sense to think about trying out VS9 which has been already overtaken by VS10+. This new version comes with in-built ability to deal with mpeg-4.

As Vidoman has already said, editing formats like XVid and DivX can have problems associated with them, and I don't want to minimise that. But it seems to depend on factors like your computer architecture and exactly what you are doing in the editing stakes. I personally, for instance, have not had problems in starting off with an original mpeg-4 file, editing it, adding transitions etc and outputting again to mpeg-4. Indeed, I had no trouble outputting to standard DVD-compatible mpeg-2 files. And frankly, I could not see any obvious degradation with my naked eye. That's not to say there may not have been any -- just that I could not see any...

Given that your camera is an mpeg-4 one, I assume you will also be interested in producing the 'new' DVD format based on mpeg-4. As such, you will mainly be manipulating mpeg-4 originals and outputting to the same format. So I would certainly try out VS10+ in this regard if I were you.

[Ron P.]

Ken,

After reading your previous post, I was curious to see if I could do the same. So I found some MPEG4s (only source I have is d/l from Internet). Then attempted to edit one. I could only get the file(s) inserted into the timeline, then VS would crash. First time it crashed it just ran away, disappearing act. Then I relaunched, tried again, this time I got the write Bill Gates advisory, (send to M$)..

So I thought oh no, going to have to do a repair!! I tried to load an MPEG-1 MPEG-2, and DV. No problems with those. So my system is one of those that have problems with MPEG-4 format editing...

Ron P.

[Piterplus]

Thanks for reply.
I have checked studio 10 (from last Chip DVD also). Same story, Xvid thumbnails are black in library and timeline. But I can edit project , since in timeline I can see all videoclip content exept first two frames (with "only thumbnails visible" option switched on in file-properties) , and save it as video file.
It seems that Genius programmers indeed modyfied their copy of videostudio 8 to display xvid format (native format of their hybrid cameras). If I only know that exactly they did to it , I can do the same with studio 10...

Vidoman - I have no crashes with MP4 files at all, maybe you don't have all needed codecs installed?

[Ron P.]

Yes I have the codecs needed. I think it was more a problem of the specific file. As I stated I d/l it from the internet, which is not a good source. I can produce / convert DV to MPEG-4.

Thanks for your advice..

Ron P.

[sjj1805]

Frankly, it does not make sense to think about trying out VS9 which has been already overtaken by VS10+. This new version comes with in-built ability to deal with mpeg-4.

As Vidoman has already said, editing formats like XVid and DivX can have problems associated with them, and I don't want to minimise that. But it seems to depend on factors like your computer architecture and exactly what you are doing in the editing stakes. I personally, for instance, have not had problems in starting off with an original mpeg-4 file, editing it, adding transitions etc and outputting again to mpeg-4. Indeed, I had no trouble outputting to standard DVD-compatible mpeg-2 files. And frankly, I could not see any obvious degradation with my naked eye. That's not to say there may not have been any -- just that I could not see any...

Given that your camera is an mpeg-4 one, I assume you will also be interested in producing the 'new' DVD format based on mpeg-4. As such, you will mainly be manipulating mpeg-4 originals and outputting to the same format. So I would certainly try out VS10+ in this regard if I were you.

..... I was curious to see if I could do the same. So I found some MPEG4s (only source I have is d/l from Internet). Then attempted to edit one. I could only get the file(s) inserted into the timeline, then VS would crash...........

Ken, Ron,
This is an interesting develoment and When I get the chance I must make a few tests. The MPEG4 DivX and Xvid formats are gaining in popularity and indeed many TV Stations are now offering their content on the internet in these formats via subscription.

I am off to work shortly so no time to check now but here's an idea that will enable those of us without hardware that outputs in MPEG4 format can use to test this out. Take a DV (avi) file and use VideoStudio 10+ to render it into an MPEG4 format.
At least we will now the exact properties of the source material.

[Ken Berry]

The mpeg-4 files I played around successfully with originally came from an mpeg-4 camera, so that may make the difference. Frankly, I was expecting more problems with this format than anything else, but I had none. Might have been a fluke, but I will certainly be experimenting more with that format in future, including XVid, now that I have finally bought a DVD player that will play Xvid DVDs... Will post any results, including especially any anomalies I encounter.

[Piterplus]

Finaly I find out how to correct the problem with Xvid format media clip's thumbnails being black in library and timeline.
Go to: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users.WINDOWS\Application Data\Ulead Systems\Ulead VideoStudio\10.0\ and find file called "uvs.ini" (if it not present in this location, try using search, it sould be somethere in "documents" folder). In this file find "[HardwareAcc]' section and change the line "ReadByDS=IYUV,YUY2" in it to the "ReadByDS=IYUV,YUY2,XVID"
Now all Xvid clips will be opened and viewed properly by Videostudio 10+ (and I think same way may be applyed to vs 9.0).
To moderator:
I think that this information should be added to the FAQ, because I'm not only one who have to edit xvid video files with latest videostudio and have similar problems. My only wonder is why ulead emitted support of moderately popular format from last two VS versions (in my VS08.0 all xvid clips are viewed without problem)

[sjj1805]

Copied into FAQ:
How to correct the problem with Xvid format media clip's thumbnails being black in library and timeline.