Automatic MLT profiles

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Wed, 06/24/2009 - 17:41

fuli

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Joined: 06/23/2009

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Automatic MLT profiles

Many people need to use video editing for small casual things, like uploading short clip to Youtube. Videos may come from non-standard sources, like mobile phones, web cams or digital cameras. Those people do not really want to learn about video editing, they just want get something trivial done, like add a tittle or combine two short clips.

I suggest redesign to MLT profile management so that 1) Profile selection is automatic, 2) Project setting and Manage profiles are combined and 3) project profile setting are visible on tool bar.

1) Automatic profile selection.
Kdenlive could check video clips added to project and first create profile matching to imported video then try to match it against existing profiles. If match is found existing profile name and properties could be show to user. If no match is found, temporal custom profile could be instantly created for the project without user intervention.

Adding second clip with different properties would invoke notification. If user clicks the notification he gets to chose which imported video properties to use in his project. If user ignores the notification, profile chosen based on first imported clip is used (no nagging).

2) Combining Project settings and MLT profile management.
Move Profile management to project profile selection. I see no reason to have them separate and located to different places. Then while choosing profile for a project, appropriate profile could be instantly created if no existing profile fits. There could also be possibility to save automatically created profile.

3) Project profile settings visible on user interface.
Fast profile selection from visible user interface (maybe from tool bar) would suit casual video editing needs. Unexperienced editor would not need to dig through menus, instead selection for automatic or manual profile would be visible. Selected profile properties would be visible next to selection for convenient confirmation.

Attached quick mock-up shows one possibility how this could be arranged. Mock-up shows automatic setting selected, flashing "!" notifying for possible need to change profile to match new imported file and menu opened for selection. Direct profile selection is grayed out, until manual profile selection is chosen.

I believe removing need to especially pay attention that profile is correct for the project would simplify video editing and increase usability for non-technical people.

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Wed, 06/24/2009 - 22:44

Weevil

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

On 1) Automatic profile selection... I understand the 'Keep It Simple Stupid' approach but a user who imports his/her 320x240 video before their 1024x768 video and then just ignores any automatic warnings will still be dissapointed that their videos get downsized in resolution and possibly blame it on the program.

Videoformats are -a little- complicated so let the user think about it. It's worth it in the end and more appealing to the advanced users who are begging for good open-source video editing software on GNU/Linux (and other platforms).

Thu, 06/25/2009 - 08:39

fuli

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

Problem with someone not using right automatic profile selection would be dealt with two ways: notification and constant visible project setting information. It could be forced to user consideration with dialog box pop up, but that would be kind of nagging and likely to annoy people. Notification could be highly visible, like blinking bright colored icon.

Advanced users would not have any features removed. Changing setting to manual would bring back same level of control as they have now.

Thu, 06/25/2009 - 09:10

avilla

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Joined: 11/04/2008

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

i don't know if this is possible or if it is safe to do, but i don't dislike the mockup and your ideas...

Thu, 06/25/2009 - 22:46

ddennedy

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

Currently, if you change project setting for an existing authored project, you might not get what you expect. The resolution is not easy either. So, I am worried that people will cause more trouble for themselves with suggestion #3.

Fri, 06/26/2009 - 12:34

fuli

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

That is unfortunate. Ability to create matching profile from imported video clips and rearrangement of project & profile settings might still improve usability a little (I have to confess, I used video tutorial to find out how to create new profile for my project). Major leap in usability, from technical users to kids & grandparents, would require that user can just drop videos in and get same type of video out without fiddling profile settings. Now if project settings can't be easily accessible and changed because of potential problems, I'm out of ideas how to fit in user interface that would serve both newbies and experienced users while not being annoying.

Tue, 06/30/2009 - 07:23

ddennedy

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

I am not saying that there can not be some sort of automatic profile feature based on what is added to the project tree. I am just saying that currently, some things that are position- and time- oriented do automatically scale when you change project settings. However, maybe we should strive to make the app more dynamic and scalable with respect to these sorts of changes.

Tue, 06/30/2009 - 23:58

ddennedy

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

Just wanted to add this pertinent link:

http://eugenia.gnomefiles.org/2008/08/28/sony-vegas-platinum-9/

Note:
1) There is a Media Match button in the properties dialog
2) "several elements in the timeline will not automatically adjust to the new resolution"

Wed, 07/20/2011 - 09:19

benderamp

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Joined: 07/20/2011

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

Hi,

I am using kdenlive 0.8 with kde 4.6.4

Just wanted to say that I am a person who at this moment matches exactly to the described usecase. I have already played with kdenline few times in the past, but did not do anything real in it, so I am generally a 1st-time user. Now I wanted to take small video file from my Htc Hero smarphone and rotate it 90 degrees to send by email to friends.

So, it seemed to me that it could be as easy as drag'n'dropping my 3gp video clip to kdenlive project window, applying Rotate effect and recoding video. But on practice it appeared not to be so.

When I try to import my video file to the project, I receive:

Your clip does not match current project's profile.
No existing profile found to match the clip's properties.
Clip size: 320x240
Fps: 40

Click on OK button, see that the video is shown in the clip list and can be played in preview window, but it is not shown on the timeline and it seems that I can't apply effects (need only Rotate) to it also.

That was already not really good, but as soon as the message says "current project profile", I have decided to go to project settings and select profile manually. The profile list was rather big, but I could not understand by the name which one would fit to my clip and I still had a feeling that it just was not there. This list also did not have "create new profile" button, so no way to create the new profile that would match to my video even manually (at this moment I started to doubt it is possible at all).

I felt a lite of hope when saw the "project/correct profile for current clip" menu item as I thought it could create this new profile automatically for me, but this just showed me the old "clip does not match" warning message, so I understood that the list of existing profiles really did not have an item which would match to my clip cause this menu item seemed to try to autodetect existing profile.

The last thing that I was able to find "Get new project profiles" with "get hot new stuff" kde feature, installed some profiles I found there, but this did not help.

At this point I gave up trying to understand how to solve this with my intuition and went to google with the warning message - not too much relevant messages - found this thread and decided to post my usecase here.

I don't ask for help, cause now I see the keyword "MLT profile management" which seems to be my next google search keyword. Just wanted to show, how things might look like for a casual user which just wants to perform a basic task. For me, I am rather technically advanced user, but not in the area of video encoding/editing - I just don't want to get into this ocean of codecs, framerates and resolutions without actual need. I could give up at any point of this trip and just send the original video rotated 90 degrees or just not to send this video at all, cause this quest for profile searching was rather annoying (I'm not even sure that I would want to find the next instruction for this profile creator now or would leave it for another day) - it's like you see a candy (advanced video editor with "rotate" option in the list) just in front of you, but you can't take it (this cool big thing can't import my small video clip).

And the button "create profile from current clip" on the original warning message could solve all this with single click.

Wed, 07/20/2011 - 10:14

#10

benderamp

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Joined: 07/20/2011

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

Ok, I have decided to create my own MLT profile and the process appeared to be rather tricky, would post it here if it is ok.

1. Found http://www.kdenlive.org/mlt-profiles page with online profile editor - this is ok, that there is some kind of gui for that, but the user will have to be registered on the site to create it and also he still will not have access to his profile (with download new project profiles from kdenlive) until it is not approved by moderator, so I even can't test intermediate version.

2. The page also contains descriptions for profile fields: http://www.kdenlive.org/mlt-profiles#description - but this says nothing about how to get them from existing video file. VLC media info dialog does not seem to have enough info to fill this fields, lucky for me, I knew about ffprobe utility from ffmpeg package.

So this is the output for my video file:

> ffprobe -show_streams VIDEO0001.3gp
ffprobe version 0.8.git, Copyright (c) 2007-2011 the FFmpeg developers
built on Jul 18 2011 10:18:53 with gcc 4.5.1 20101208 [gcc-4_5-branch revision 167585]
configuration: --prefix=/usr --mandir=/usr/share/man --libdir=/usr/lib64 --shlibdir=/usr/lib64 --disable-stripping --enable-pthreads --enable-shared --enable-avfilter --disable-static --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libxvid --enable-libx264 --enable-postproc --enable-shared --enable-libdc1394 --enable-libtheora --enable-libschroedinger --enable-libvpx --enable-gpl --enable-libopencore-amrnb --enable-libopencore-amrwb --enable-version3
libavutil 51. 11. 0 / 51. 11. 0
libavcodec 53. 8. 0 / 53. 8. 0
libavformat 53. 6. 0 / 53. 6. 0
libavdevice 53. 2. 0 / 53. 2. 0
libavfilter 2. 27. 0 / 2. 27. 0
libswscale 2. 0. 0 / 2. 0. 0
libpostproc 51. 2. 0 / 51. 2. 0
Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from 'VIDEO0001.3gp':
Metadata:
major_brand : 3gp4
minor_version : 768
compatible_brands: 3gp4mp413gp6
creation_time : 2010-07-04 15:28:15
copyright :
copyright-eng :
Duration: 00:00:26.20, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 815 kb/s
Stream #0.0(eng): Video: mpeg4, yuv420p, 320x240 [PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3], 800 kb/s, 19.88 fps, 40 tbr, 1k tbn, 40 tbc
Metadata:
creation_time : 2010-07-04 15:28:15
Stream #0.1(eng): Audio: amrnb, 8000 Hz, 1 channels, flt, 12 kb/s
Metadata:
creation_time : 2010-07-04 15:28:15
[STREAM]
index=0
codec_name=mpeg4
codec_long_name=MPEG-4 part 2
codec_type=video
codec_time_base=1/40
codec_tag_string=mp4v
codec_tag=0x7634706d
width=320
height=240
has_b_frames=1
sample_aspect_ratio=1:1
display_aspect_ratio=4:3
pix_fmt=yuv420p
r_frame_rate=40/1
avg_frame_rate=521000/26207
time_base=1/1000
start_time=0.000000
duration=26.207000
nb_frames=521
TAG:creation_time=2010-07-04 15:28:15
TAG:language=eng
[/STREAM]
[STREAM]
index=1
codec_name=amrnb
codec_long_name=Adaptive Multi-Rate NarrowBand
codec_type=audio
codec_time_base=0/1
codec_tag_string=samr
codec_tag=0x726d6173
sample_rate=8000.000000
channels=1
bits_per_sample=0
r_frame_rate=0/0
avg_frame_rate=50/1
time_base=1/8000
start_time=0.000000
duration=26.100000
nb_frames=1305
TAG:creation_time=2010-07-04 15:28:15
TAG:language=eng
[/STREAM]

320x240 goes to "Frame width" and "Frame height"

[PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3] according to abbreviations go to "Pixel aspect ratio num", "Pixel aspect ratio den", "Display aspect ratio num" and "Display aspect ratio den"

Find values for "Frame rate num" and "Frame rate den" from the basic "ffprobe VIDEO0001.3gp" output seemed to be a bit more tricky (I see 19.88 fps value which looks like frame rate, but can't see where to get 2 values "num" and "dev" from it), so added "-show_streams" parameter to ffprobe which showed additional info inside [STREAM] sections, so there I have found new value:

r_frame_rate=40/1 which seems to go to "Frame rate num" and "Frame rate den" correspondingly.

The last value for "Scanning" (interlaced or progressive) mode I could not find even among this info, from google came across this thread: http://ffmpeg-users.933282.n4.nabble.com/Interlaced-detection-td2333861.... where it is said, that this mode is detected in some kind of tricky way and even ffprobe would not say this info for sure, so just set this value to "Progressive" for my profile as most other profiles also have it.

So, this is my final profile I have created by following above steps: http://www.kdenlive.org/htc-hero-320x240

Wed, 07/20/2011 - 10:41

#11

benderamp

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Joined: 07/20/2011

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

And finally I have found GUI profile manager inside kdenlive - that was the 1st in the "Settings" menu :)

So, I was able to enter above values in it and my 3gp video file matched to it ok.

Also take back my words that I could not rotate the clip without matching profile for it - I just needed to drag and drop the imported clip to the timeline and after that I was able to apply effects to the clip even without matched profile - my fault - I just thought it did not go there automatically because of the profile mismatch.

I still think that the "create profile automatically" would be rather useful, so the user will not have to deal with all that nuances with initial confusion, ffprobe etc.

Sat, 07/23/2011 - 06:20

#12

ddennedy

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Re: Automatic MLT profiles

MLT v0.7.4 has a new mlt_profile_from_producer() function that makes it easier for applications to automatically generate a profile from a sample video file.

Automatic MLT profiles

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