So, Drew Keller, professor of the “Web Strategies for Storytelling” course in the MCDM this summer, asked that I write up a little post about what to do when your editing program (Premiere, FCP, Vegas, etc.) won’t play nice with your source files for your final project.  Often the problem is related to the software not being able to recognize the encoding in your files, or the files are of an unrecognized container format, or maybe your computer doesn’t have certain codecs installed, and so forth.  Instead of spending hours trying to get your editing program to do what you want it to, my suggestion is that you convert your source files to a format that you know the editing program will like.  There are a number of free and open source programs available on-line for handling conversions of various kinds depending on the type of file you are trying to convert.  The rule of thumb is that you keep your footage as close as possible to the original in terms of encoding, bitrate, and quality.  It’s inevitable that you might get some drop in quality, but that’s the price you pay sometimes for working with a diverse range of file types.  I won’t be able to cover all varieties and situations, but I’ll list some programs you can download and you can test things out.  Trial and error is the way to go until you get something that works.

VirtualDub – (PC only) This is great for you Flip users out there dealing with that pesky 3ivx codec in your camera’s AVI files.  Assuming 3ivx is installed on your machine, you should be able to open your files in VirtualDub and save them as regular AVIs without the 3ivx encoding.  However, you’ll likely wind up with massive files afterwards, so proceed with caution.

MP4Cam2Avi – (PC only, I think…) So you’ve got some Quicktime .mov or .mp4 files from your Point-and-Shoot that don’t behave in your editing program.  Try using this to convert them to AVI.

AVIDemux – (PC, Mac, Linux) A very popular program for doing simple conversions from various formats to various formats.  Also let’s you do simple edits.  An essential for any video editor.

Handbrake – (PC, Mac) Did you shoot with a camera that, for whatever wild reason, records directly to DVDs that you can immediately stick in your home entertainment center’s DVD player and watch?  Handbrake gets your stuff off of regular video DVDs and in to formats you can use.

VLC Media Player – (PC, Mac, Linux) Not only a nifty replacement for Windows Media Player or Quicktime Player, it now does conversions from various formats to various formats!  Hooray!

Mencoder (Part of Mplayer) – (Linux) Assuming I’m not the only Linux geek in class, this beaut does everything… albeit, command line only (no REALLY good GUIs have been made for it yet).

Any Video Converter – (PC Only) Freeware that does loads of different types of conversions… however, I think there is a length restriction until you buy the full version.

FLV Crunch – (Mac Only) Don’t let the “FLV” part fool you in to thinking this is restricted to dealing with .FLV files.  Nifty, though not robust.

MPEG Streamclip – (Mac and PC) This thing is wonderful, and so far it’s my favorite.  Seems to do almost anything, including very clean conversions of Quicktime files to Windows Media Video.  A must!

Now, as an aside, it might be helpful, depending on your program or the converter, to install certain codecs that you might be lacking to your machine.  However, with Windows, I highly recommend a registry backup because installing certain codecs that were not officially installed by your editing program or Windows itself COULD screw up your OS – proceed with caution.  The K-Lite Codec Pack seems to have every codec on Earth.  For Mac, Perian seems to be the codec package of choice.

There are plenty more converters and codec packages out there.  Post your recommendations below, and good luck!  It’s a trial-and-error game, trust me!

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