Converting mpeg-2 to mpeg-4

FirebarUK

FirebarUK

FirebarUK

Soldato
Joined
9 Dec 2004
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Dorset
I have a load of holiday video's taken on the parents-in-law's sony handycam(shakes fist at sony). Unfortunately it encodes them as mpeg-2, so bar using the sony software (which doesn't work under Mac OS X), I can't view them using Quicktime (VLC works of course). I'd like to be able to use quicktime (to play in front-row) and also iMovie to edit these films.

What piece of software will allow me to convert these mpeg-2 files to mpeg-4 or similar, with the greatest of ease? Does the mplayer for Mac OS X include the mencode utility?

Help would be greatly appreciated :)

p.s; Solutions must be free :D
 
I think visualhub would do it. Fantastic bit of software for converting videos between codecs.
 
I just got the latest version of MPlayer/MEncode to compile.

You need XCode tools 2.4.1 (BSD libs and X11 libs need to be installed as standard) and the latest source archive from here:

http://www.mplayerhq.hu/design7/dload.html

Move the file to the root of your home directory

Code: 
cd ~
tar -xvf MPlayer.....
cd ~/MPlayer......./
./configure --disable-mp3lib
make

A few minutes later you should have a copy of mplayer and mencode in the ~/MPlayer.... directory. You can then run

Code: 
make install

If you want. I think it installs into /usr/local/. I just left mine in the compile directory, works fine. The one thing that doesn't work is MPlayers Codec wrapper for using the third party windows codecs. It might work if you compile from SVN, but Mac OS X really isn't their priority.
 
Oh the download on the website doesn't seem to include MEncode, although it does have a much nicer interface than the version I managed to compile.

I've been playing around with the version of MPlayer I compiled and I wouldn't really rate it over Perian/Quicktime or VLC. Its MEncode which is the useful thing to have I think.
 
Visual Hub is by far the easiest solution.

E1mo, the MPlayerOSX project has been around for ages and have a pretty good OSX version of MPlayer. I used to use it for everything before finding NicePlayer.

FFMpegX is a pretty good front-end for MEncoder and a few other thingies, all of which it integrates a smooth download and install for on your first run. I used to use it religiously before VisualHub.

I seem to have a habit of switching from really powerful apps to really easy-to-use apps ;)
 
hiya, have not looked into these utils, but just wanted to ask if they would convert .wmv to .mov?
I have some HD wmv movies, but would like to play them through my mbp on the tv, but when the mac goes to play the wmv file it scans the whole file (8gb for example) and then plays. If it was a .mov file then i think it would be ok and just play.
Just after a piece of software that will convert wmv to mov and keep all the settings as original. :D
 
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