QT Videoclip Help

[catzlover]

I am trying to recreate a Hypercard stack. It was a small Christmas stack that contained the Movie XCMD and called for a QT movie to play on Card 2.

If you can view Hypercard Stacks, the original can be downloaded here: http://www.bry-backmanor.org/holidayfun/warpedxmas.html

I have managed to rebuild the stack EXCEPT for getting the Quicktime Movie to play. The movie plays in the Quicktime app just fine. When I tried to import it as a videoclip, the movie file turned into a black screen with gobblygook text.

So, I am wondering if I need to update the original file (made in 1997) somehow? Do I need to put it in a different format? Can I somehow script the movie to play as a separate file without any QT controls visible i.e. embed into the stack?

I ultimately plan to make the stack a standalone/revlet. Does this change how I need to treat the movie file?

Thanks in advance for any help. Sandra

[Mark]

Hi Sandra,

Just open your movie file in QuickTime. It should open fine. I can play it without any problems.

I have also imported your QT movie into Revolution, using a referenced video object (i.e. after choosing File/New Referenced Control/QuickTime Supported File... Rev created a player object referencing to the video file on disk), which plays fine in Revolution.

Apparently, you don't need to convert anything.

Best regards,

Mark

[catzlover]

Mark,

Thanks for your suggestion.

I tried importing as you suggested, but I can not get the QT file to actually play. Only the first frame shows. How do I script this to go further than the first frame and show the whole movie?

I was able to get everything to work via a player in Revolution, BUT I couldn't get the movie to work in a standalone at all. I don't know what the correct path would be to call a movie on the web. I am guessing a working import would bypass this issue.

I know I have a lot of questions, but I am a newbie at Revolution.

Sandra

[Klaus]

Hi Sandra,

after importing/referencing a movie the movie does NOT automatically start to play!

So you could either show the QT controller for the player, so the user can start/stop the movie by himself and/or you can script
...
start player "Name of your player here"
...

You can simply use a HTTP url for your movie:
...
set the filename of player "Name of your player here" to "http://www.yourserver.com/moviefolder/y ... _movie.mov"
...
and QuickTime will do the streming for you, if that is what you mean.


Best

Klaus

[catzlover]

I am missing something here. I just can't get this to work in a revlet.

My original stack script:

on openCard
start player "Player 2" --the filename in Player 2 is grammy.mov--
set the playSelection of player "Player 2" to false
play "grammytune.aiff"
end openCard

On playstopped
lock screen
show card button id 24844 at 274,302
show card button id 24845 at 208,338
show card button id 24846 at 338,338
unlock screen
end playstopped

on closeCard
lock screen
hide card button id 24844
hide card button id 24845
hide card button id 24846
unlock screen
end closeCard

I changed the script to make a revlet to:

on openCard
set the filename of player "Player 2" to "http://www.bry-backmanor.org/warpedchristmas/grammy.mov"
start player "Player 2"
set the playSelection of player "Player 2" to false
play "grammytune.aiff"
end openCard

On playstopped
lock screen
show card button id 24844 at 274,302
show card button id 24845 at 208,338
show card button id 24846 at 338,338
unlock screen
end playstopped

on closeCard
lock screen
hide card button id 24844
hide card button id 24845
hide card button id 24846
unlock screen
end closeCard

The rev stack works perfectly. The revlet does not load the QT movie using the URL. I also tried the filename: ./grammy.mov with the .mov in the same folder as the revlet and test.html.

Am I missing something in my scripting?

Thanks! Sandra

[Mark]

Hi Sandra,

It looks like you uploaded your movie file as it were a text file. Make sure that your FTP client uploads it as a binary. Before you play the movie in RunRev, test that you can play it in the browser.

Best regards,

Mark

[catzlover]

I uploaded the file as a binary file. I learned that with uploading a revlet. (The revlet does play minus the quicktime movie) I tested and It does not play independently in my browser.

The movie plays in quicktime on my desktop and in the rev stack.

Maybe this goes back to one of my first questions? The original quicktime movie was made in 1997. Do I need to update the movie somehow to be compatible with any sort of new Quicktime protocols?

Thanks, Sandra

[Klaus]

Hi Sandra,

everything should work fine in Rev if you can play the video in QT Player in the finder!

I do not know what's going on here but you could do this to find out.
Use only this "opencard" script to (hopefully) and omit all other scripts(!) get a hint:

Code: Select all

on openCard
   set the filename of player "Player 2" to "http://www.bry-backmanor.org/warpedchristmas/grammy.mov"
   answer the result
end openCard

If you get an empty dialog then the movie was loaded and should play.
Otherwise you will see a hint on what might go wrong.


Best

Klaus

[Mark]

Hi Sandra,

Actually, I have just tried to play your movie again, setting the filename to the address of the file on your server, and it works fine in Revolution. The card script contains only three lines:

Code: Select all

on openCard
     start player 1
end openCard

I made a RevLet of the stack and put it on-line here. It works fine on my Mac.

As you can see, I left out the line that sets the filename, because as long as you don't change the filename, you can just set it once and save your stack. Let's keep things simple. Many other lines in your scripts are reduntant, too.

The stack is attached.

Best regards,

Mark

P.S. I just noted that reloading the stack in your browser might cause a crash (one reason why the RevWeb plugin should not be used commercially) To play the movie again, you might want to add a button to the stack, using the same command as in the card script: start player 1. Also, I don't know why the controls don't work. It might be because the alwaysBuffer is set incorrectly (you can change this in the property inspector) or because controls don't work in revlets perhaps.

[catzlover]

Mark,

I really appreciate your suggestions.

I tried your revlet in both Firefox and Safari and it crashed in both.

My techie husband investigated the QT file last night after I saw that it did NOT play independently. He updated the file so that it plays now. (http://www.bry-backmanor.org/warpedchri ... rammy2.mov)

With the file updated, I tried the revlet again with the filename set to the URL. No go.

THEN, I imported the videoclip into the rev stack. It works perfectly in the stack with the script of: play videoclip "grammy2.mov" (eliminating the redundancies of the former script). Still a no go when I make this into a revlet even though the rest of the revlet works. (http://www.bry-backmanor.org/warpedchristmas/test.html) I would think that if the sound files are embedded in the stack, then the videofiles should be too, right?

So, I am still puzzled. Maybe there is something that needs to be checked or unchecked when I am making the standalone/revlet?

I think the time has come to ask the support folks.

Thanks again for your work on this!

[Mark]

Hi,

Could you make sure that you have the latest version of the plug-in and try my version of your revlet again? (Note that my revlet uses your url to the movie, don't remove it for now, please).

Before you load the revlet, make sure that the Activity Monitor (on Mac) or the Task Manager (on Windows) doesn't contain an item RevWebPlayer, because a crash is likely to happen if such a process is running already.

Best,

Mark

[catzlover]

Mark,

My oops. I put the new QT movie named to grammy.mov back in the original folder.

I have the latest version of the RevWeb plugin (X86). I did not see RevWeb in the Activity Monitor.

I went to see your revlet again in FireFox. The first frame of the movie showed up (no crash!), but I could not get the controls to work.

I double checked that the grammy.mov worked outside of the revlet in the browser. It did.

This seems like it should be simple. So why isn't it?

Sandra

[Mark]

Hi Sandra,

If my revlet (with a player that refers to your movie on your server) works correctly on my computer then it should also work correctly on your computer. I have now tried it on both a Mac and a Windows PC and my revlet worked fine both times. I really wouldn't know why it doesn't work on your computer.

When I try your revlet, I hear the music but the player only shows the first frame of the movie. As long as my revlet doesn't work on your computer, I don't think it makes sense to look at the stack itself. It has to be something related to your computer, whatever that may be.

I think you are using a Mac, but just in case... if you are using Windows 7, that could be a reason why things don't work as expected.

You could try to work around the problem. The movie doesn't contain very many frames. You might export every frame as a picture and import those pictures into the stack (e.g. in custom properties). Use an image object to change the text of the image object to the data of a picture (the contents of a custom property) approximately every 100 millisecs.

Code: Select all

on changePic x
  if x is not a number then put 1 into x
  set the text of img 1 to the cPicture[x] of this stack
  add 1 to x
  if x <= 50 then // assume 50 frames for this example
    send "changePic x" to me in 100 millisecs
  else
    go next cd // or whatever you want to do here
  end if
end changePic

Using the send.... in 100 millisecs command allows you to play music or whatever you like while showing the frames of the animation.

Kind regards,

Mark

[catzlover]

Mark,

I am using a Mac (sorry, I guess I assumed if I was importing a Hypercard stack that my computer was obvious - my bad). It is system 10.6.2.

I put in a support ticket to see if those folks had any insights.

I can't help but feel that if the stack works (with the movie embedded AND with a player/ filename http: .../grammy.mov) that something is changing or not scripted correctly or checked or not checked when I make the revlet.

Amazingly enough, I still have all the original pict files I used to make the movie. So, if I can't find another solution I will most definitely give your suggestion a try. I am trying to come up with some new content for my site for December when I get the most traffic.

Thank you so very much for help with this!

Sandra

[Mark]

Hi Sandra,

It is possible that you make a small mistake when making your revlet, but as long as my revlet doesn't work correctly on your computer, there is no way to find out what might be wrong with your revlet. I hope RunRev will provide a solution, but I think they will tell you to wait for the next update of the web plugin. If they do have solution, please let me know.

Kind regards,

Mark