CliePet Releases Clié Fullscreen Movie Player (Beta)

[Reggie]

CliePet has done it again. With the limitation of the Clié Movie Player application to play videos in full screen with no option to remove the the control bar, CliePet has decided to create his own app to play videos in full screen, and provides detailed explanation on how to create the videos. [details (http://www.1src.com/?m=show&id=579)]

[strider_mt2k]

Awsome.
CliePet, you are to be praised yet again!
Soo, where would one go to obtain the additional codecs for the TH55? :)

[Reggie]

The files are in the grey area but here's the discussion on them:

http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69393

[coolride]

Wow, great job! I can't wait to try it sometime this weekend (too much school and work during the week to fiddle around with it).

[winexprt]

I've tried this app and all I can say is nice work, and thank you CP! :D Works as advertised.

[Gazpacho]

All hail to Cliepet!!
There is definately a performance gain when using Cliepet's movie player as opposed to the built in one. One MPEG that just didn't play smoothly in the built in Movieplayer in landscape mode does so in Cliepet's movieplayer.
Kudos to Cliepet!
One request though. The movies captured by the camera of a Clie cannot be played fullscreen. 8/3 just doesn't fill it up nicely. Could you fix that, please? Pretty please? ;) And it would be nice to be able to search for movies yourself instead of relying on the standard directories.

[jjesusfreak01]

It works better? Thats nice to know, not that I use any other player at the current time. I guess this means I can install the UX-50 codec to play the SHQ movies. I think ill try that. By the way, you can try if you want to, but I am advising against trying to install the VZ-90 codecs. Ive tried and followed directions, but I cannot get it to install, and I end up causing myself to have to hard reset. We can already play mpeg4 movies, we dont really need these codecs anyway.

[Yuriv]

Hey Cliepet,
I had been surprised at the lack of notice of the earlier version of FullMoviePlayer , but I guess that you were holding off on wide publicity until v0.3 was ready. All I can say is WOW - I am really in awe of you guys that get into the lines of code and make things better for the entire community.
Thank you!

One note, I wonder about the "4/3 clipped" mode on the player. I originally assumed that this mode is supposed to clip the top and bottom of the picture so that it will fill the whole display instead of having white lines on the left and right. I notice from your homepage however, that it is actually supposed to show the video in 426x320 (which would still have white bars on the sides).

I am using a QVGA MQV file made via IC 1.X, and, on my TH55, the "4/3 clipped" display is exactly the same as "standard 4/3" - the white lines remain the same size on the left and right of the video and none of the top or bottom of the video is "clipped". Is this the way that it is supposed to be?

I would especially love it if the player would physically clip the top and bottom so that the screen would be filled horizontally at the cost of some vertical image loss. This would be be valuable as IC 1.X letterboxes widescreen movies to make QVGA res files - meaning that the 2/1 and 8/3 modes stretch the video horizontally instead of maintaining the proper aspect ratio.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this.

[khad_o]

all i can say is....WOW!! you're always coming up with great solutions/apps etc.. BRAVO cliepet :D

[billegal]

I've tried this on my TH55 and have come up short. I installed all of the codecs from the VZ90 and I get a crash when I try to pull in a sample mp4 copied to /MOVIES/

Anyone have some pointers to offer?

I'd really like to use ffmpeg on my Mac to encode movies. I can't run IC on the Mac.

[m8rk]

WoW! Amazing app CliePet! Thanks so much for sharing this marvel. Movies look just perfect now with those damn annoying controls removed!
mqv filenames are displayed in thier numerical format rather than having "real" names. Is it possible to do that??

billegal - I don't think you need any of the codecs. Delete them from your handheld and you should get movies playing...

[jjesusfreak01]

WoW! Amazing app CliePet! Thanks so much for sharing this marvel. Movies look just perfect now with those damn annoying controls removed!
mqv filenames are displayed in thier numerical format rather than having "real" names. Is it possible to do that??
billegal - I don't think you need any of the codecs. Delete them from your handheld and you should get movies playing...
You do NOT need the codecs to play MP4 movies on the TH-55?

Edit: Notice the ? mark at the end of my post, it is a question.

[billegal]

I'm a little puzzled by not needing the codecs for FMP. The cliepet site specifically notes that they are required.

Do you have specific experience in setting this up on a TH?

[delsolman]

This is a great app! but only thing I would see is allow user to see movie description instead of filenames like mov000#

also the forward backward button, maybe a setting to allow user to forward 10, 30 or 60 sec. Sometimes 1 min is too big of a gap

but all in all, a great app!

[m8rk]

You do NOT need the codecs to play MP4 movies on the TH-55?
Edit: Notice the ? mark at the end of my post, it is a question.

I wasn't referring to MP4 movies, though I did read in a sister thread that this was the case, i'm certainly no expert so don't quote me!!! :D :p ;)

[Yuriv]

Delsolman,
You can go into Clie Files and rename the filename to be anything you want (with the MQV extension of course), and FMP will show that name in its list. Of course this means that the built in Clie Movie Player will no longer be able to recognize the file.
As for the "forward/backward" buttons, they are there for the convenience of seeking forward or back by predetermined gaps. If you want to see forward or backward by second intervals, pause the movie (press the jog dial in) and then turn the jog dial to go forward or back.
Enjoy!

[loverboydre16]

you are the best CP, you have done it again........works like magic.

[winexprt]

Hey Dre! Long time no see...how's my old NX80V holdin up? ;) :)

[JAmerican]

Great app CP, but I have some suggestions. Can you make the background of the video playing field black instead of white. Can you change the Shortcut buttons to (from left to right on the UX series) Previous video, Play/Stop, Next video. I think beng able to move from one vid to another is better when the screen is on top of the keyboard. Also, I have replaced medialaucher with your app, which saves a lot of RAM I might add. I had like 29K free, now without Media laucher and with FMP, I have like 1MB free. Thanks a lot :)

JAmerican

[loverboydre16]

hey whats up Rob.....the NX is still going strong but i am trying to get a wifi card, so i can use it at my school. all i really use if for right now is for music, games and Avantgo.....occasional movies.

[tsensei]

Thank you CliePet, you are really impressive :)

I think I've found a bug : When I put a MP4 file in the MOVIES directory, FM returns an error (can't remember the code) and ask me to soft reset and try again.
But if I put the same movie in the MP_ROOT directory, it wil work.

Strange, no ?

BTW, don't put all the codecs of the VZ90 on your TH55 otherwise the movierecorder will not work any longer

[CliePet]

(batch responses)

You do NOT need any new codecs to use FMP !

It should play any MPEG-1 or MQV movies you have on your PDA.

However, you *do* need extra codecs to play MP4 movies on the TH/UX. IMHO: MP4 and MQV files are both MPEG-4 video, so in many cases the hassles of MP4 codecs are not worth it. Stick to MQV files converted with Image Converter 1.

If you want to experiment with MP4 (including gray area pirated codecs and Image Converter 2), please read this thread:
http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=70005
As well as Imame's thread on how to install them (NOTE: a little tricky, requires certain versions of McFile]

jjesusfreak01 wrote:
> We can already play mpeg4 movies, we dont really need these codecs anyway.

I concur. If you are happy with Image Converter 1, don't bother with codecs or IC2.
FullMoviePlayer will work with MQV files on the NX/NZ/TH/UX/VZ CLIEs, no additional codecs or software required. You already have MPEG4 video and MPEG4 audio.

---
> The movies captured by the camera of a Clie cannot be played fullscreen. 8/3 just doesn't fill it up nicely. Could you fix that, please? Pretty please?
Sorry no, that's built-in to the device (only a fixed set of scale factors 1X, 2X, 4/3X, 8/3X, 3/2X and also 1/2 and 1/4 which I don't use)

> And it would be nice to be able to search for movies yourself instead of relying on the standard directories
Will look into that. In general I prefer the app to find them for you (important for MQVs that have info in MAI files)
----
> I wonder about the "4/3 clipped" mode on the player. ...
The 4/3 clipped mode is only for 320x240 videos played back full screen (more or less). It is a work around since I haven't yet found a reliable way of clipping the outer edges (eg: drawing in black).
If you have a different sized video it will not do anything different.

> Can you make the background of the video playing field black instead of white.
Still trying to find a reliable way of doing this (related to the clipping part).

> Can you change the Shortcut buttons to...
I will make this configurable

tsensei wrote:
> I think I've found a bug : When I put a MP4 file in the MOVIES directory, FM returns an error (can't remember the code)
Can you please try again and email me the error code (FWIW: I do that all the time, no problems).
If you were playing music in the background, that is a known bug.

[FMP User]

CliePet:

Can you give us the option to rotate the screen clockwise. On the NX80 the audio output jack is on the right side. If I put the NX down on a table it's easier to use if the jack is on top.

Thanks

[jjesusfreak01]

Built in scaling ratios. Sony obviously did something right. Adding non-needed APIs for us to use. If they had only included the rotation api in the TH-55.

[CliePet]

> Can you give us the option to rotate the screen clockwise.

Sorry, that doesn't appear to work. Only 0 and 270 degrees from the natural orientation of the PDA - and only for video playing.

---
Full Movie Player Beta version .04 is now available:
http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?p=734974

Please post any comments or questions regarding Full Movie Player on that thread.

[olo]

Hi CliePet!

Apparently it works for others and the seem to be raving about it, but on my NZ nothing works! :(

Ok, it sees the movie (*.mov) but then when I tap play it says unsupported movie format... What does that mean? I thought mqv and mov are supported!!!

Makes me puzzled... :rolleyes:

cheers Nicolas

[CliePet]

> Ok, it sees the movie (*.mov) but then when I tap play it says unsupported movie format...
All .MQVs are .MOVs
not all .MOVs are .MQV/CLIE compatible.

Sorry, it won't play arbitrary .MOV files (that's a system limitation). An Image Converter step is necessary.

MoviePlayer and FMP will only play QuickTime movies converted with Image Converter 1.x (or equivalent -- normally saved with the .MQV suffix).
I like renaming them to .MOV to make them play properly on the PC (probably a mistake since it raises expectations)

[olo]

and MAC user are once more excluded... too bad!

cheers Nicolas

[Egalus]

and MAC user are once more excluded... too bad!

cheers Nicolas

once more is not right, they are still excluded cause FMP uses the systemfeatures the clie has and as it can't play native mov files sony leaves you alone on mac.

[RichieRichDolla]

Clie pet could u also include a playlist in your next version. I notice that if u have a lot of movies it does not always put them in order.

[olo]

once more is not right, they are still excluded cause FMP uses the systemfeatures the clie has and as it can't play native mov files sony leaves you alone on mac.

well thats only half the truth... if the movie converter was for MAC as well, no one would complain...

But what I do NOT understand: why is everyone raving about this application when it does not play native mpgs or mov?
With Kinoma I had to convert too and it was full screen, but a drag with very poor result!!

Please enlighten me :rolleyes:

cheers Nicolas

[Egalus]

well thats only half the truth... if the movie converter was for MAC as well, no one would complain...

But what I do NOT understand: why is everyone raving about this application when it does not play native mpgs or mov?
With Kinoma I had to convert too and it was full screen, but a drag with very poor result!!

Please enlighten me :rolleyes:

cheers Nicolas

First, like I said, sony leaves you in the dark, not cliepet cause he didn't reinvent anything, he just took what sony gave him and made a nicer player out of it.

What's so good about FMP?
- no freaking useless controls on screen while playback anymore
- customiseable hardbuttons - so now you can for example seek around in the movie without using the stylus
- support for usable filenames, no more MOV0001.MQV ****
- seeking with CF (just started to work but I am sure Cliepet will improve it over the time ;) )
- more scalingfactor you can choose from
- less memory wasted

[archangel]

well thats only half the truth... if the movie converter was for MAC as well, no one would complain...

But what I do NOT understand: why is everyone raving about this application when it does not play native mpgs or mov?
With Kinoma I had to convert too and it was full screen, but a drag with very poor result!!

Please enlighten me :rolleyes:

cheers Nicolas

For one thing I can convert 90 minutes of video in about 30-40 minutes with Image Converter 1.5 and only use about 200mb. The same video takes 5-6 hours with Kinoma and the file size for Kinoma is more than double. Why anyone would pay money to use Kinoma is beyond me. It is a terrible program.

Cliepet's program just makes the built in movie player a lot better. Why pay for kinoma or MMplayer when Sony gives you such a good built in movie player and free converter?

[jjesusfreak01]

I agree, Kinoma is nice, but is is terribly slow with very bad video quality. With the new upgrades for IC, Kinoma is completely outdone. IC 1.5 can now do more types of files than Kimona.

[CliePet]

re: encoding movies MQV/MP4 on the Mac

Check the forums. From what I read it has been done, either running IC 1.x under Virtual PC (apparently slow, but slow on a regular PC) or using Mac native tools
eg: http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=51827
Don't know if anyone has tried IC 2 running under Virtual PC on a Mac

----
> ...could u also include a playlist in your next version
Wasn't planning on it.
Work around: It displays them in order it finds them. If you have a preferred order, you can set it up on the PC. Delete the /MOVIES folder, then re-create it, then copy the .MQV/.MP4 files into the /MOVIES folder in the order you want them displayed. The order of the filenames in the directory should be reflected in the playlist (the /MOVIES folder is always searched first)

BTW: That and other features (like displaying seek and volume status) are on my maybe later list. With the next big release, .05, I will post the source code if someone else wants to add more features.
----
> But what I do NOT understand: why is everyone raving about this application when it does not play native mpgs or mov?...

With very few exception, playing movies on a PDA (or portable player) *requires* conversion/recompression of the movie.
[FWIW: Playing arbitrary movies you find on the Internet is hard enough with a PC (with dozens of codecs installed). MMPlayer tries to play movies without conversion, but for proper operation, conversion is necessary]

The main reason I wrote FMP was for full screen video (480x320 generally, or perhaps 320x240 scaled). It is a replacement movie *player* for people already bought into the CLIE MoviePlayer 'strategy' (including people who use IC1.x, IC2, the Sony video recorder, Sony cameras, download CLIE ready movies from the Internet, ...).

If you are happy with an alternative movie strategy, like MMPlayer or Kinoma, then more power to you.

IMHO: the CLIE movie strategy is superior for many reasons including: amazingly smooth playback and low battery consumption (especially in the UX/TH/VZ models)

[a TH55 user]

re: encoding movies MQV/MP4 on the Mac

Check the forums. From what I read it has been done

CliePet, I think mac users (including myself) are wishing they could play back MOV files created by QuickTime Pro directly. Can anyone talented (like you) make a codec for MOV or a java application that converts MOV files to MQV or MP4?

[CliePet]

> ...wishing they could play back MOV files created by QuickTime Pro directly.
It should/may be possible. It has been talked about a lot on this BBS, but I don't know if anyone has found the magic settings to use QuickTime Pro directly (on PC or Mac)

Image Converter 1.x is using the PC QuickTime codecs behind the scenes to create the correct format QuickTime file (simple profile, MQV compatible, only certain bitrates and audio formats)

Also remember that all MQV files are in reality MOV files
Not all MOV files are MQV compatible

Video compression/conversion has been discussed to death in other threads