Help converting MPEG image

September 10, 2008 10:07 AM

Making scrapbook of grandson. Need help getting the initial "frame" of an MPEG file converted into a JPEG or TIF "still shot." Also need help making a CD dub of his favorite tunes for him.

Looked at previous posts. Too advanced for me. My tech skills are focused on just things that I need for work. Otherwise, I am a bit dyslexic and get stuck generally with tech instrux, esp. as products and formats change so swiftly these last 12 years or so. I was taking pix of grandson with my daughter's camera but inadvertently had it on "movie". So I ended up with several very short MPEGs. I would appreciate learning the following:
1. get the initial frame, what I see when I open the MPEG in "Go Live," converted into a TIF or JPEG.
2. save the whole MPEG "movie" on a CD (what? ... just put the MPEG file into the burn "project"? Will the users of the CD just dbl click it to see the little movie? CAN YOU PUT BOTH movies and music dubs on same CD??? or does Bill Gates need to have it be one or the other?)
3. general help dubbing a CD with grandson's favorite songs... all from different sources. Some are MP3s, but some are different formats, downloaded from web; some from commercial CD's. I tried following Roxio instrux, but got confused.

If a responder would like to be REALLY KIND to me, and could give help by a 15-min. phone chat, that would be super. Email to set up a date. My email's in my Profile.

posted by yazi to computers & internet (8 comments total)

For the static shot (note: this is entirely from memory, someone with the program might do a better job):
1- Download VirtualDub.
2- Open MPEG in VirtualDub.
3- Move to the frame you want to save.
4- File-> Save Frame as Image (or something along the lines, I don't have a copy on my work PC.)
posted by griphus at 10:36 AM on September 10, 2008

I'll try what griphus says, and report back later this afternoon. Anyone else, though, pls. submit whatever help you think is appropriate.
posted by yazi at 1:02 PM on September 10, 2008

What was wrong with the old days, when web activity was simple?????? Griphus: I logged into that hyperlinked site, and was confronted with terms about "mirroring" and "64-bit," yikes. So I clicked something that said download somethjing for XP OS's. Then a window came up with a DELL advert on it, and it said "You are downloading ...." But absolutely nothing happened. Can you tell me how a dummy can acqure VirtualDub?
posted by yazi at 1:09 PM on September 10, 2008

http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/virtualdub/VirtualDub-1.8.5.zip?download

Direct link above. By the way, if Virtualdub is not to your liking, you can download Media Player Classic (direct link to zipped program), open the file you want a shot of, and once it is paused at the appropriate frame, go to File>Save Image...and select the location, name, and format of the image you want. The "Save Thumbnails" option will create contact-sheet style screens of the whole clip and so is probably not what you want.

As far as burning the CD, iTunes is pretty near foolproof. It should automatically convert MP3 or AAC files to CD audio (basically WAV files) automatically. You will be able to store both the movie and music (assuming in total the size doesn't exceed 700MB) on the CD, but setting up the CD for (example) standalone DVD player playback is more complicated. Bottom line, if you put all the files in the same directory and burn that to a CD with Roxio, most any other computer should be able to use the CD much as it might use a hard drive, though obviously with read-only access.
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 2:00 PM on September 10, 2008

I think I can help with the initial frame part.

Why not just take a screen shot of the movie when it's open in "Go Live"? If you're just doing this once, and not for, say, 1000 movies, this is the easiest way.

Instructions for Windows:

• Open the movie


• Press "PrtSc" on your keyboard


• Open Paint: Start Menu > All Programs > Accessories > Paint


• Once blank Paint canvas is open, do Edit > Paste (in menubar)


• Crop down to just the part of the screen shot that you want:


• Select rectangular selection tool (top right tool in toolbar)


• Draw selection around the part you want


• Do Edit > Copy To...


• Name file and select format in resulting Save dialog

posted by dammitjim at 2:11 PM on September 10, 2008

This is great. But also, I found a solution that seems to be good. Yet, I will investigate others just mentioned. Here was mine: I opened an Adobe program I know nothing about, called "ImageReady". I simply opened the MPEG file, and figured out that I could save one frame, then that was convertable to a PSD file, which I worked on in Photoshop and saved as a TIF. Now, the only drawback is that the quality of the snap saved from the MPEG was quite low, sort of like a highly compressed JPEG. Is this the fault of my settings when I originally took the MPEG on my daughter's very fancy and expensive camera? Or, will the two other methods revealed, above, be ways that I can get snaps off those movies that will be higher resolution?

Thanks, once again.
posted by yazi at 2:49 PM on September 10, 2008

Now, the only drawback is that the quality of the snap saved from the MPEG was quite low, sort of like a highly compressed JPEG. Is this the fault of my settings when I originally took the MPEG on my daughter's very fancy and expensive camera?

The movie itself is low quality and/or you overcompressed the JPG. Try going directly from the capture to BMP. After that, play around with JPG compression.

Media Player Classic will save either to BMP or direct to JPG; Virtualdub will probably do the same.
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 3:03 PM on September 10, 2008

Hey, I just now successfully popped into iTunes a folder with my grandson's tunes that we got from a website. It loaded into the library called "Music". And they play beautifully enough. OK. but if I want to add other things, from different sources, they will all go into the Music Library, right? Then how do I get all those burned onto a CD? In Roxio how do I load all those in the iTunes Library into a burn "project"? Anyone, anyone?

PS: after absol. no action when downloading VirtualDub... I noticed that it belatedly arrived on the desktop. I guess she's just slow.

thnx
posted by yazi at 3:16 PM on September 10, 2008