My video editor suddenly can't see my video clips ... HALP!

January 15, 2009 12:33 PM

All of a sudden Premiere Elements doesn't know what to do with my AVI files. GAAHH!

So about two weeks ago, I created this really elaborate video in Premiere Elements (7, the latest version, Vista). Lots of edits, lots of clips from lots of different source files, all of which were taken on a Flip camera. No problem, it worked great.

Today, I go back to make edits ... and all of my AVI files in the timeline are sound only, no video. (Actually, a tiny little bit of squiggly color along the bottom - it's like the whole video has been smooshed down to about ten pixels tall). I've got some still photos in this project, they're fine. It's just my AVIs.

When I open the source files in WMP, they play just fine. So there's nothing wrong with the AVIs. And the fact that I can play them in WMP means there's no missing codecs or anything like that (doesn't it?)

So, why is Premiere Elements doing this - and more to the point, how can I salvage this edit file with all of those dozens of edits and crossfades and so on? Is there some trick to re-associating them? I'm wracking my brain to think of something/anything on my computer that might have changed or been installed in the past two weeks, but I'm not aware of anything.

posted by jbickers to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

This may be the result of installing a codec pack, one of those bundled deals that comes with its own application for decoding the codec. examples of such codecs would be ffmpeg or mpenc. often you can go into the app and assign a different application to do the decoding for whatever codec you're using for these video files. I'm a little soft on the specifics, though, since it's been a while since I've had a problem like this. whatever codec these video files are in, you may want to simply reinstall it to see if that'll reassign itself to be the default decoder. I hope I'm making sense. A good thing to look out for is, when you try to play the sequence back in Premiere Elements, do you notice any new icons in your system tray (on the far right side of your taskbar)? if so, hover over them and see what they're called and see if it's something you really need. Try uninstalling them and reinstalling the codec for your avis. hope this helps. sorry I can't be more specific.
posted by shmegegge at 2:05 PM on January 15, 2009

Response by poster: You know what did install itself, as recently as today? That awful upgrade to the Flip Video program. I bet that's the culprit.

So, I suppose then the only thing to do is to reinstall Premiere Elements, and hope it places its proper codec over top of the offending one? Or is there a better way to ferret it out?
posted by jbickers at 3:00 PM on January 15, 2009

So, I suppose then the only thing to do is to reinstall Premiere Elements,

I feel your pain. I would try a system restore to some point in the last few days first if you've made no other major changes. Just to make sure, you didn't move *anything* associated with the project did you? Premiere hates that.
posted by mrmojoflying at 6:00 PM on January 15, 2009