How does one view .avi video files on a Pi running Buster?

I've an old Canon A460 that captures video clips in .avi
format. When I connect the camera to the Pi it's recognized
and I can copy the files to the Pi, but when I try to open
them vlc player comes up with a black screen showing an orange
and white traffic cone.

Thanks for reading, any suggestions appreciated!

bob prohaska

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On Tue, 2 Aug 2022 15:30:48 -0000 (UTC), bob prohaska wrote:

How does one view .avi video files on a Pi running Buster?

I've an old Canon A460 that captures video clips in .avi format. When I connect the camera to the Pi it's recognized and I can copy the files to
the Pi, but when I try to open them vlc player comes up with a black
screen showing an orange and white traffic cone.

Thanks for reading, any suggestions appreciated!

bob prohaska

AVI is not a format, it is a wrapper around the file that specifies many
things including the format & codec in use
you probably do not have the correct codec installed




--
Be careful! Is it classified?

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alister <alister.ware@ntlworld.com> wrote:

On Tue, 2 Aug 2022 15:30:48 -0000 (UTC), bob prohaska wrote:

How does one view .avi video files on a Pi running Buster?

AVI is not a format, it is a wrapper around the file that specifies many things including the format & codec in use
you probably do not have the correct codec installed

If I open the media file using VLC Media player and open tools > codec I see: stream 0
Codec Motion JPEG Video (MJPEG)
Video reolustion 64x480
Buffer dimensions 640x480
Frame rate 10
orientation top left

stream 1
Codec: Araw
Type: Audio
Sample rate 11024 Hz
Bits per sample: 8
Bitrate: 88kb/s


Meanwhile the progress bar moves back and forth, as if something's
running. If I click the play button nothing changes.

There's no prompt or error message saying a codec is needed.
If I open current media information all values are zero.
The file size is nearly six MB, so it's not empty.

I'm baffled.

Any suggestions appreciated!

bob prohaska

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On a sunny day (Wed, 3 Aug 2022 14:45:38 +0100 (BST)) it happened mjb@signal11.invalid (Mike) wrote in <tcdu62$n0u$1@posie.signal11.org.uk>:

In article <tccgul$1r3gi$1@dont-email.me>,
A. Dumas <alexandre@dumas.fr.invalid> wrote:

To see what ffmpeg thinks of a file, don't specify an output file name: >>"ffmpeg -hide_banner -i input.avi" (hide_banner just to skip the annoying >>program info header). But really, that should be the same as the stream >>info from VLC.

Or just use

ffprobe (filename)

which dumps its opinion of the file content, streams, codecs, resolutions ...

If you are using the "other" toolset -- avprobe does similar

I use mediainfo

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bob prohaska <bp@www.zefox.net> wrote:

I tried using
ffmpeg -i MVI_0001.AVI -r 24 2nd_home_screen.mp4

That seems to run without errors and produces a file, but still
VLC player renders a black screen. The progress bar behaves normally,
and the sound is played back. Just no picture....

If I try to use Firefox ESR to open the .mp4 file it reports the
file is corrupt. The Chrome browser reports no errors, but delivers
neither picture nor sound. Not even a progress bar.

mplayer shows the video just fine.

Huh. What does ffprobe say about both files?

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Mike <mjb@signal11.invalid> wrote:

A. Dumas <alexandre@dumas.fr.invalid> wrote:

To see what ffmpeg thinks of a file, don't specify an output file name:
"ffmpeg -hide_banner -i input.avi" (hide_banner just to skip the annoying
program info header). But really, that should be the same as the stream
info from VLC.

Or just use ffprobe (filename)
which dumps its opinion of the file content, streams, codecs, resolutions ...

I didn't know about ffprobe, but it seems it's simply an alias for 'ffmpeg
-i' (almost; it doesn't warn about a missing output file). It even prints
the same annoying banner which can be hidden with the same option
-hide_banner.

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FWIW, it turns out openshot, which is in the apt repository, converts
.avi files that aren't browser-viewable into mp4 files that play just
fine in the chrome browser.

Thanks for everyone's help!

bob prohaska

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bob prohaska <bp@www.zefox.net> wrote:

FWIW, it turns out openshot, which is in the apt repository, converts
.avi files that aren't browser-viewable into mp4 files that play just
fine in the chrome browser.

Thanks for everyone's help!

I bet that's just an ffmpeg wrapper. Which is fine, if it works.

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