Category Archives: movies & filmed entertainment

fixed : Green Screen button not showing in iMovie 10

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

I have made a video recording of myself in front of a green screen, and now I want to make the green transparent and put a video behind it in iMovie. I have iMovie 10.3.5 and the option for Green Screen should be in there, but when I import the video into iMovie and select it, there should be a Green Screen button at the left of the editing buttons above the clip preview, but the button just isn’t there, it isn’t greyed out or something, it just isn’t showing up… I searched in iMovie menus to find an option to switch the Green Screen button on, but there isn’t any…

What am I doing wrong ?

Answer :

Yes, it would have been better if Apple had included the button permanently in the row of editing buttons above the clip preview, then it could have been greyed out and instructions of what to do could be shown when you would try to click it.

So… yes… there is a modus operandi that isn’t obvious to everyone, but causes the Green Screen / Blue Screen button (the icon depicts ‘two overlaying squares’ and appears on the left of the row of editing buttons above the clip preview) to stay invisible :

the green screen video should always be an additional layer, but not the main layer !

so, do this to fix this problem and get the Green Screen / Blue Screen button to appear :

  • open iMovie
  • create a new Project
  • in the new project’s time line, import the video (or picture) that you want to show in the background first (so make the background video/picture the main clip in the time line)
  • then import the green screen video on top of the main (background) clip (so drag it in the row / layer above the main clip in the time line)
  • then select the green screen video in the time line (a yellow outline will appear around the clip) ; now the Green Screen / Blue Screen button will show up in the row of editing buttons above the clip preview on the upper right section of the screen
  • then click the Green Screen / Blue Screen button ; now the options needed to make the cut-out of the green screen will appear

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

Advertisement

fixed : EyeTV 4 crashes after installing macOS 13 Ventura

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

Today I have upgraded to macOS 13 Ventura. Now the EyeTV 4 (64bit) app no longer works. The app doesn’t open, it seems to crash, because a Report or Ignore “Send to Apple” window opens… I’ve tried downloading the latest version of EyeTv from the Geniatech website, but even after installing that, the only thing that I get after starting the app is the Report or Ignore window…

Is there any way to fix this ?

Answer :

For macOS 13 Ventura, you will need at least build 8528 of the EyeTV 4 app. You can download it from the Geniatech website :

http://file.geniatech.com/eyetv4/EyeTV4.0.0_8528.dmg

After installation, you might need to go through the setup steps again… here are some tips if you need to do so :

  • make sure you have your licence number at hand, as you might be asked to enter it anew
  • make sure you select the proper version of the EyeTV-stick you have [ note : the MyGica DVB-T2 is not listed separately, so make sure to select its hardware-twin, the EyeTV Hybrid T2 ]
  • make sure you select the right input source : choose DVB-T/T2 if you have an aerial antenna connected, and choose DVB-C PAL BG if you have a coaxial from you cable-TV provider plugged in

that’s it !

enjoy 😉

fixed : Google Chromecast-ing option not showing up

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

I have some Chromecast devices (a Google Chromecast, a Google Nest Hub, a Google Home Mini, etc.) that I want to stream to from my iPhone. But even though te Apple AirPlay streaming option shows up, the Google Chromecast option only shows up in some of my iPhone apps and not in the other ones : in my case I can stream to Google Chromecast devices from the Spotify and Netflix iOS-apps, and not from Disney+, AmazonPrime and ZiggoGo…

What is wrong ? How can I solve this ?

Answer :

Even though AirPlay is always available on iOS/iPadOS and Apple AirPlay devices are automatically detected by default, the Google Chromecast option is turned off by default.

Since you can stream to some Chromecast-able devices and not to others, you seem to have turned on the option to do so per app individually. Yes, you need to switch on the Chromecast-ing option for each individual iOS/iPadOS-app…

To do so, do this :

  • make sure that your iPhone/iPad is connected to the the same WiFi network that the Chromecast-device(s) that you want to cast to is/are on
  • open the Settings.app in iOS/iPadOS
  • in the Settings page that opens, scroll down to Privacy (the blue icon with the white hand) and click on it
  • in the Privacy page that opens, click on Local Network (the blue icon with the white globe outline)
  • in the Local Network page that opens, scroll down to the app(s) that you need and set it’s slider to ON (slide to right will make the slider green and turn the option ON)
    • your apps are now able to discover the Chromecast devices that are on the same WiFi network
  • now, turn on the app that you want to stream from and the Chromecast-icon should appear (note that in most cases the AirPlay-icon will immediately appear and the Chromecast-icon will be added with a slight delay)
  • then start the video (or audio) you want to play and click on the Chromecast-icon to select the Chromecast-able device you want to stream to

…that’s it !

enjoy 😉

fixed : convert video for WhatsApp

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

I have a short video file (a movie clip) that I want to share with my friends on WhatsApp. When I drag&drop it into the WhatsApp.app in macOS, the file appears to start uploading… but when done, there is no preview shown and no Play-button, just a file icon… as if it were an unknown or incompatible type of file…

What can I do to fix this ?

Answer :

Before uploading your video file to WhatsApp, you must make sure your video file meets WhatsApp’s file requirements :

  • video format preferably MP4 in H.264 or MPEG-4 codec ( MKV, AVI or 3GP will also do )
  • audio format preferably AAC ( or AC3 codec )
  • file size smaller than about 16MB ( in reality even 18MB might be okay )
    • usually, this means your movie clip will be about 90 seconds, but by tweaking the display size and the frame rate ( fps ) you can even squeeze 3 minutes or more into about 16MB

Do this to check your video’s specifications :

  • right-click ( CTRL-click ) on the movie clip’s icon
  • select “Get Info” from the popup-menu
  • in the window that opens, check these :
    • the file name either has the “.mov” or “.mp4” file extension
    • at “Size:” less that 18MB should be listed
    • at “Codecs:” either “H.264” or “H.264, AAC” is listed

If these are all okay, you should be able to just drag&drop the movie clip into the macOS WhatsApp.app.

If not, you will have to convert the movie clip. To do this conversion, do this :

  • first, download the FREE OmniConverter.app ( by 7littlemen ) from the Mac AppStore :
  • then, open the OmniConverter.app and click on “Convert Video” from the list on the left
  • then, drag&drop your movie clip file onto the OmniConverter window
  • now, at the right of the arrow (in the middle), check if “MP4” is listed and the file size is less than 18MB
    • if you do not see “MP4” listed at the right of the middle arrow, click the Format-button
      • in the window that opens, select the “Device”-tab
      • then, select “iPhone” from the list on the left
      • then, select the “iPhone HD” option
      • now, click the Confirm-button
    • if you see a file size larger than 18MB listed at the right of the middle arrow, click the Edit-button
      • in the window that opens, at “Video”>”Encoder:” select “H.264”
      • and at “Audio”>”Encoder:” select “AAC”
      • leave the rest as is and click the Confirm-button
  • back in the Convert Video window, click on the Start-button ( circled arrow icon, at the right )
  • now, wait for the conversion to complete
    • if the file size already was less than 18MB, you’re usually okay and you will not need to do extra compression
    • if the file size was over 18MB, do this :
      • open the OmniConverter.app and click on “Compress Video” from the list on the left
      • drag&drop the .mp4-video you’ve just converted onto the OmniConverter window
      • check if the file size listed at the right of the arrow (in the middle) is less than 16MB
        • if so, click the Start-button on the right
        • if not, click the Edit-button (below the arrow)
        • in the window that opens, set the “Quality:”-slider in-between “Mid” and “High”, set “Resolution:” to “720P” and set “Frame Rate:” to “24 FPS”
        • if at “Size:” it now says anything less than 16MB, click the Confirm-button
        • if at “Size:” it says anything over 30MB, set “Resolution:” to “480P”
        • if at “Size:” it says anything between 20MB and 30MB, set the “Quality:”-slider to “Mid”
        • now, if at “Size:” it still says anything over 18MB, start tweaking the available settings until at “Size:” it says about 15MB ( see how much the file size decreases when you tweak each setting to find the optimal combination of settings )
        • when done, click the Confirm-button
      • now, in the “Compress Video” window, click the Start-button
      • …and wait for the compression to finish

After the file conversion, drag&drop the converted movie clip into the WhatsApp.app to share it with your friends…

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

fixed : convert old .flv movie files to .mp4 for free

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

I’ve found this old Flash videos (in .flv format) on an old hard disk and I want to play them on my Mac / iPhone, but QuickTime gives a “The document could not be opened”-error, stating “The file isn’t compatible with QuickTime Player.”

Is there a simple way to convert them to a video file format that QuickTime can handle (preferably .mp4) ?

Answer :

Yes, there is : the FREE Smart Converter app can do this for you very easily. Just do this :

  • open the SmartConverter.app
  • when the Smart Converter window opens, drag&drop the .flv-video file that you want to convert onto it
  • then, click the Mac-button (in-between the QuickTime and iPad buttons)
  • then, click the blue Convert-button (bottom right) and wait for the conversion to finish
  • then, after noticing that the blue Convert-button has changed into a blue ShowFile-button, click on it
  • in the Finder-window that opens, click on the converted video file (that now has an .mp4 file extension) and it will open in the QuickTime Player app

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

fixed : quickly create GIF from QuickTime or MP4 video

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

For my social media I regularly want to create a .gif-animation from small clip out of an .mp4-video file that I have, but I don’t have a lot of video-editing skills or specialised software.

Is there a simple way to do this ?

 

Answer :

There are lots of ways to do this. And no video-editing skills are required to do the most basic, but with some editing you can quickly get better results.

I would recommend buying the $5 GIF Brewery 3 from the Mac AppStore and doing the editing in QuickTime (or iMovie).

The recommendations for a good GIF-animation for most social media are (suggested by .gif-database GIPHY) :

  • duration of about 6 seconds (shorter is better)
  • file size close to 8MB (smaller is better)
  • video resolution of 480 pixels (or 720 pixels maximum) on the shortest side (depending on either landscape or portrait view, or square, or any custom size)
  • total number of frames of 100 maximum (less is better)

If you just want to turn part of an existing video into a GIF, do this :

  • get GIF Brewery 3 from the Mac AppStore ( the $5 price tag is worth it if you plan on doing this more frequently )
  • first, open the video source in QuickTime.app
  • then, in the top menu bar, click on “Window”
  • then, in the pulldown menu, click on “Movie Inspector”
  • then, check out the number that is at “Encoded FPS” and remember it (you need this later)
  • then close QuickTime.app
  • now, open your source video in GIF Brewery 3
  • then, in the video slider below your video, slide the green slider to match the first frame of your desired GIF
  • and slide the red slider to where you want your GIF to end
    • click on the PLAY-button (black triangle left of the video slider) to preview your GIF
    • if the preview-length is not okay, readjust the green and/or red slider to improve your clip
  • now, in the editing window, click on the Resize-button top left
  • then, in the popup window, make sure “Maintain aspect ratio” is checked
  • then, move the Scale-slider until either Width or Height is 480px (if the clip size is less than 5 seconds, you could also stop the Scale-slider at 720px)
  • now, in the editing window, click the Settings-button top right
  • then, at “Frames Per Second” set the fps to match the “Encoded FPS” of the original video
    • again, click on the PLAY-button (black triangle left of the video slider) to preview your GIF
    • if the preview-speed is too slow, adjust the Speed-slider to a higher value (anything less than 110%, even 103%, will usually do)
    • if the preview-speed is too fast, adjust the Speed-slider to a lower value (anything over 95% will usually do)
  • then, make sure there’s a checkmark at “Optimize GIF colors”
  • then, adjust the ColorCount-slider to 48
    • again, click on the PLAY-button (black triangle left of the video slider) to preview your GIF
    • if the preview looks okay, leave the ColorCount-slider at 48
    • if the preview looks too dark or otherwise odd, adjust the ColorCount-slider to a higher value like 96, 128, 216 or 256, but make sure to set it as low as possible
  • then, click the “Create”-button (at the bottom, slightly right of the middle, with a beer glass in it) to generate the GIF
  • then, click on the Save-button (bottom right)
  • in the popup window, type the name you want your GIF to have, set the location where you want it stored and click the Save-button
  • then, browse the Finder to find the GIF’s icon and ALT-click on it
  • first, select “Get Info” from the popup menu and check if the file size is 10MB or less
    • if the file size is over 10MB, go back to GIF Brewery 3, lower at least one of the values you have set there and create an extra version of your GIF that has a file size of 10MB or less
    • as mentioned before, the main values you can adjust are :
      • Length of the clip
      • Scale / Resize (might make the picture more grainy)
      • Frames Per Second / FPS (might make motions less fluent)
      • Color Count (might make the colors less vibrant)
  • then, ALT-click on the GIF’s icon again and select “Open with” from the popup menu and select your internet browser (probably Safari) to preview the animated GIF
  • If you are happy with the end result, you are ready to post the GIF on your social media
    • if not… redo your editing and try again

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

 

fixed : Sony miniDV cam “for InfoLithium battery only” error

Posted on by
Reply

Question :

I was planning to review some old miniDV videotapes to see if there was anything interesting on them that I might want to import into my Mac and edit it. However, when I plugged the battery onto my Sony PC1E miniDV camera, I immediately got a blue screen and an error saying “For InfoLITHIUM Battery only”, which is weird because the battery is an original Sony InfoLithium one…

So I plugged in the power cable and connected the power adapter to my Sony miniDV cam… but now I got even weirder : again, I can into the “For InfoLITHIUM Battery only” error… that’s impossible !?! this time it isn’t even a battery that’s connected, it’s the original power cable…

Is my Sony miniDV cam broken  ? (beyond repair maybe ?) Is it possible to fix this ?

 

Answer :

Even though your first reaction might be that your battery or maybe even your Sony miniDV cam is broken beyond repair… you are probably in luck if you haven’t used your Sony miniDV cam for a while and you get the “For InfoLITHIUM Battery only” error message… in that case, the solution is simple most of the time :

you probably got this error message because of the battery contact surface of your cam, your battery or your power adapter is greased or slightly corroded… so just clean it with a cleaning foam or cleaning fluid that is suited for use on electronic devices :

a good option is Multi Foam cleaning foamer by C-Inco, but others that are suited for use on computers and electronics should do as well :

D.RECT Cleaning Foam 400ml   buy it on Amazon UK / Amazon DE

CRC 1 VisiClear Foam Cleaner 6.9oz buy it on Amazon US / Amazon UK / Amazon DE

LogiLink RP0012 Foam Cleaner 400ml   buy it on Amazon DE

Weicon Cleaning Foam 400ml   buy it on Amazon US / Amazon UK / Amazon DE

Directions for use :

  • unplug the power adapter from the wall power
  • take the bottle of foam cleaner and shake well
  • then, spay foam on the contact area of the battery on the cam
  • then, spray foam on the contact area of the battery itself
  • then, spray foam onto the contact area of the power adapter
  • then leave it to dry
  • when all foam has dried, reconnect the battery or power adapter
  • then switch on your camera

That’s it !

enjoy 😉