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redandwhites · Oct 19, 2001, 07:27 PM

Hi there,

Ok, so I've sucked down a dozen MPG music videos (appx 50Mb each), now I want to playlist them and make them run one-after-another, full screen would be nice, and do it until they're done, and maybe (just maybe...) get the playlist to loop to the start again.

My friend on a PC does this fine in RealPlayer (yuck!) but I've had no joy with this using RealPlayer on Mac, maybe I need to pay a subscription fee to Real for this "bonus" feature?

What are my options? Quicktime 5.0.2 does not have a playlist facility - or one I've found anyway.

Any assistance appreciated.

Cheers, John

King Chung Huang · Oct 19, 2001, 09:15 PM

You could create a SMIL document that plays each video sequentially. Here's an example that I whipped up.

<BLOCKQUOTE>code:<HR><pre><smil xmlns:qt="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/resources/smilextensions"
qt:autoplay="true" qt:chapter-mode="clip" qt:time-slider="true">
<head>
<layout>
<root-layout width="322" height="242" background-color="black"/>
<region id="theRegion" left="1" top="1" width="320" height="240" />
</layout>
</head>
<body>
<seq>
<video src="BritneySpears_Slave.mpg" region="theRegion" qt:chapter="I'm A Slave 4 U" />
<video src="OTown_AorN.mpg" region="theRegion" qt:chapter="All or Nothing" />
</seq>
</body>
</smil>[/code]

Here's what the above code does.

xmlns:qt="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/resources/smilextensions"
This uniquely identified the QuickTime SMIL Extensions.

qt:autoplay="true" qt:chapter-mode="clip" qt:time-slider="true"
These are some QT SMIL Extensions. autoplay="true" makes the movie automatically play when opened. chapter-mode="clip" causes the controller bar to show only the duration of the current chapter being played. If you want the controller bar to display the total duration of all your videos instead, simply set this to "all" instead of "clip". time-slider="true" activates the slider/controller bar so that you can jump around the videos like normal.

<root-layout ...
This defines the main layout of the movie. I've assumed that the clips are 320x240, and made the total movie 2 pixels wider & higher to compensate for a strange QT compositing bug when the layout is the same size as the video.

<region ...
This defines a region in the layout where we can place items. This is where the video is going to go. Here, the region has been offset from the top-left corner by 1 pixel, so the video will be surrounded by a pixel-wide black border (see the root layout above)

<seq ... /> <video ... /> </seq>
Here's the part you need to customize. For every video you wish to put in the playlist, duplicate one of my example <video src ... /> lines and fill in the details. src="..." is the name of the file. The qt:chapter="..." is there so that the videos will show up in a pop-up list (QT Chapters). I've filled it in with the name of the music video in the example. This makes it really easy to switch between videos. Also, the chapter-mode="clip" works with this tag so that the controller bar only shows the during of each clip, rather than the entire movie sequence (see above).

Once you've finished typing this out in a plain text editor (eg: BBEdit or TexEdit in Plain Text mode), save the file with .smil extension, and open it in the QuickTime Player.

Let me know if you need more help.

(edit: made post more readable)

[ 10-19-2001: Message edited by: King Chung Huang ]

King Chung Huang · Oct 19, 2001, 10:20 PM

Some more tips:

For full screen, you can use one of the following QT SMIL Extensions:

qt:fullscreen="fullscreen_normal"
qt:fullscreen="fullscreen_double"
qt:fullscreen="fullscreen_half"
qt:fullscreen="fullscreen_full"
qt:fullscreen="fullscreen_current"

Choose one and place it with the other extensions in the <SMIL ...> line (first line). The different options match the same options you get when you choose "Present Movie..." in the QuickTime Player.

For looping, you can simply choose "Loop" in the QuickTime Player.

redandwhites · Oct 20, 2001, 01:56 AM

Ah, King Chung Huang, thanks...but what I was meaning isn't there an App which will playlist video? Is it such a tall order for a G3 500?

redandwhites · Oct 20, 2001, 01:58 AM

but your script might prove useful should my only option be xfr the movies to the PC beside my Mac and do it that way... eeek!

Scrod · Oct 20, 2001, 02:31 AM

If you've registered QuickTime 5, just do select all, copy, and then paste each movie in the sequence you desire into one movie. Then, don't save it as a self-contained file (to save space) and you now have a movie that contains references to each of your other MPEGs. Then, type command-m and choose full screen to begin your presentation.

King Chung Huang · Oct 20, 2001, 02:45 AM

Originally posted by Scrod:
If you've registered QuickTime 5, just do select all, copy, and then paste each movie in the sequence you desire into one movie. Then, don't save it as a self-contained file (to save space) and you now have a movie that contains references to each of your other MPEGs. Then, type command-m and choose full screen to begin your presentation.

The only problem with this method is that QT 5 won't let you copy and paste MPEG tracks directly. Also, a benefit to my method is that you get a pop-up menu allowing instant access to each individual video, and the controller bar will show the timescale of each individual video, rather than all the videos as a whole.

Originally posted by redandwhites:
Ah, King Chung Huang, thanks...but what I was meaning isn't there an App which will playlist video? Is it such a tall order for a G3 500?

It would be pretty easy to wrap the SMIL code up in an AppleScript that automatically generates it from a bunch of files. Then, you could create an AppleScript applet that would automatically create the SMIL document, ready to be played in the QT Player. I'll try whipping one up, if you'd like.

Jacke · Oct 20, 2001, 09:14 AM

MVP can do this (if I remember correctly)! Just drop the videos into the playlist and press play!
Go to: http://www.mvp.qdesign.com

redandwhites · Oct 21, 2001, 03:18 AM

No, that d/load doesn't work

the playlist tells me that the filetype is not recognised; even Qtime vs MPEG vs ...I think the script above is my only hope.

King Chung Huang - Is there a way to make the script read the MPEGS to play from a directory vs me manually listing them? If we can nominate a target directory then I can launch the script and point at the MPEG directory, and whola, I have a playlist. Ideas?

Come in King Chung Huang....

redandwhites · Oct 21, 2001, 03:38 AM

At http://hem.passagen.se/deep9/ there is MPLAY, a multimedia player for MacOS.

I have tried using this app as well, but the option under preference to run video full screen doesn't work (ATI Rage Mobility 128 with 8Mb VRAM) and I can't imagine upgrading to a G4 would make much difference. As the software is shareware/beta perhaps a bug, can anyone recreate the same problem if using MPLAY?

Jacke · Oct 21, 2001, 10:57 AM

Originally posted by redandwhites:
No, that d/load doesn't work

the playlist tells me that the filetype is not recognised; even Qtime vs MPEG vs ...I think the script above is my only hope.

*Sigh* Press the "Options"-button and unmark "Audio files only", then it should play them.

Oct 22, 2001, 02:50 AM

ok, I've got them running via MPLAY, all video options are ticked + and the movie size is set to 200%; I'm guessing that's what means full screen..thanks all, any followups plse post...