Cross-platform: flicker of crossfades

[nancyrbogen Profile Private messageWebsite]

I work on a pc. I recently completed a show and, with tech support from Jared Patterson of Producer, saved it as an avi (video clip) for projection in a 100-seat theater. I rented a small auditorium with tech staff for an hour; I handed my disk to a techie, and he disappeared with it, telling me and a small group of friends to go and sit in the theater.

Everything was great--my images looked awesome, even to me. But the crossfades shivered in instead of dissolving in.

At home, I played the avi on my computer, and it looked fine--indeed as it had when I generated it. I contacted the theater-folks about their equipment, and it turns out that it is all mac, and what they did was import my pc-created avi onto their mac computer that is connected to their projector, which is also mac-driven.

Back at home, I connected my laptop to an Epson projector I happen to have, and projected the same show from the same disk on a wall of my apartment. Neither I nor a techie I use could see any problem such as I had experienced at the auditorium with the mac computer and projector.

So now I am faced with a problem. I have received two invitations to present my works in small auditoriums, both located a good thousand miles away from my home. What should I do? How should I manage?

[gpsmikey Profile Private message]

I don't have any experience along those lines, but what I would do is contact the theaters and see what format they prefer video in (see what preferences they have). You might also consider sending them a test disk if they would be willing to try it. Transitions (or motion actually) tends to create the highest data rate in the video stream and anything that can't keep up with the higher rate will cause the image to either shudder or pixelate (blocky). It would be interesting to know if the one you had the experience with got copied to the hard drive before playing or if they played directly from the DVD you provided. That can make a significant difference - hard drives typically can be read much faster than a DVD can.

mikey

[nancyrbogen Profile Private messageWebsite]

Mikey,

They copied the file to their hard drive--remember, on a mac.

If I didn't say so before, I hope to go back there with my laptop and video projector, an Epson, to which the laptop was successfully wedded last night.

Will let you know the result.

Nancy