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Video Splitter: What's the best AND easiest?

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4wd:
I think you mean AVIDemux.

AVIDemux does lossless splitting, like so:



1. Open your file.
2. Enter your time.
3. Hit 'A' for the start of the clip.
4. Hit 'B' for the end of the clip, then use Control-X to remove it.
5. Save file.

Points to note, starting from top and going down, left -> right:
* Volume control for preview playback
* Set Video to Copy
* Set Audio to Copy
* Set Format to same as input file format
* Play/Pause button
* Stop
* Frame type - this is important - if the initial cut frame type is not I, (key frame), then no matter what program you use the first few frames will have to be re-encoded until the next key frame.

You will see three type of framesw represented by the following three letters:

* I - frames are the least compressible but don't require other video frames to decode.
* P - frames can use data from previous frames to decompress and are more compressible than I-frames.
* B - frames can use both previous and forward frames for data reference to get the highest amount of data compression.
I always aim to start a cut on a key frame.

If you don't start the cut on a key then when you go to save there will be a dialogue asking if you want to enable Smart Copy - choose Yes if your cut doesn't start on a key frame, otherwise you can safely choose No, (if that doesn't work, save it again and choose Yes).  Just answer OK for the next dialogue about quantizer.

Any program that allows frame-accurate cuts will need to re-encode any section of video if it doesn't start with a key frame.

ADDENDUM:
If the program detects a packed bitstream when you open the file, it will offer to unpack it - the correct answer is NO.
If the program detects H.264 video encoding, it will offer to open the file in a 'Safe' manner - the correct answer is CANCEL.  Be aware that this might cause the program to crash, however the alternative 'Safe'  method can cause a loss of sync between video/audio streams.

I suggest the following preferences for opening of files:



I use AVIDemux for all my MPEG4-ASP editing without a problem.  I also use it for some MPEG4-AVC edits but I now upgraded to VideoReDo TV Suite H.264 from v3 which can do frame accurate on MPEG2 and now MPEG4-AVC.

superboyac:
Thanks 4wd!  That's very helpful.  I was doing most of those things, the part that confused me was that more often than not, when I opened a video file to split, I'd get a message about reindexing or some other technical jargon.  If I said "no", then sometimes the split file would be bad in some way.  If I said "yes" then I was worried that it was doing recoding and other things that would make it not lossless.  Actually, i said yes to one of those messages, and after that, I wasn't able to select the "Copy" setting in the video part.  So I knew that meant lossless was not going to be possible.

This stuff is all too technical for me.  I just want to split a video.  I just want to enter the start and end point, press split, and it splits it in a lossless way.  Whatever it has to do to reindex and get the AV syncing right, just do it.  Don't ask me about it, don't tell me about it, just do it.  I just want the clip split.

4wd:
Actually, i said yes to one of those messages, and after that, I wasn't able to select the "Copy" setting in the video part.  So I knew that meant lossless was not going to be possible.-superboyac (December 23, 2010, 09:30 PM)
--- End quote ---

That would have been the question about unpacking a packed bitstream, as soon as you answer Yes the output format changes to AVI-Unp, (IIRC).  It doesn't actually encode it, if you then hit Save the file will be saved as an uncompressed AVI resulting in a file many times larger than the original - no video encoding is applied so it's effectively RAW.

This stuff is all too technical for me.  I just want to split a video.  I just want to enter the start and end point, press split, and it splits it in a lossless way.  Whatever it has to do to reindex and get the AV syncing right, just do it.  Don't ask me about it, don't tell me about it, just do it.  I just want the clip split.
--- End quote ---

A little more involved with AVIDemux since it wasn't really aimed at that kind of one shot wonder appliance.

To split the file you need to cut the end bit off of the first section, save it, Edit->Reset Edits, cut the start bit off of the second bit and then save that.

However, you can queue these things up in the joblist and have it do numerous files all together.  Otherwise, I could possibly look at modifying one of the scripts to make it a bit easier, ie. select a split point and then run the script to have it do the above steps.

delwoode:
I've always found Virtual Dub easy to use

MerleOne:
I got a low cost license of Solveig Video Splitter.  Works usually well and is very easy to use.

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