I want to prepare a video for use on android and WhatsApp.

English Multimedia
1

Hi,

I want to upload a video prepared on my computer to my mobile phone, a
Samsung Galaxy Mini 2 GT-S6500D running Android 2.3.6.

The thing is that the phone does not recognize the video as video: it
plays fine on the android VLC app, but the native video player says
“sorry, we can not reproduce this video”. The .avi file is displayed
without an icon, and it is not even listed as a video in the list of videos.

Thus, I can not send it vía WhatsApp, which is my goal.

I have googled for how to convert videos for WhatsApp, with ffmpeg or
avidemux, and found nothing. Just one app to do it in Android, which is
not what I wish (but I might end doing).

http://www.themobimag.com/convert-formats-compress-video-files-free-android-sharing/

There is one photo of the app in there, which appears to be using
mpeg-4, with 480x360, and 800 bitrate, but using .3gp container.

I have tried avidemux, playing with different settings, with no luck so far.

MPEG-4 ASP (mpeg4)
Configure: single pass - bitrate (800)
Filter: Mplayer resize: 480*384 (bilinear, aprox to 16)
Audio: mp3 (lame), mono, CBR, Q 2, bitrate 80.
Format: avi.

I have tried variants with fixed or variable bitrate, 263 or mpg
quantizer, mp3 or ac3 audio. None worked.

MPEG-4 AVC
Single pass, avg bitrate, 800,
384*304 bilinear (mplayer resize)
mp3 (lame), mono, cbr, Q2, br 80

No go.

MPEG-4 ASP (Xvid)
single pass bitrate 800, H.263

No go.

MPEG-2 (mpeg2video)
single pass bitrate 800

avidemux refuses to create it.

Somebody knows of an ffmpeg or avidemux concoction, or something else,
to convert a video to something that my Android device recognizes?

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

2

On Mon 16 Jun 2014 11:03:06 PM CDT, Carlos E. R. wrote:

Hi,

I want to upload a video prepared on my computer to my mobile phone, a
Samsung Galaxy Mini 2 GT-S6500D running Android 2.3.6.

The thing is that the phone does not recognize the video as video: it
plays fine on the android VLC app, but the native video player says
“sorry, we can not reproduce this video”. The .avi file is displayed
without an icon, and it is not even listed as a video in the list of
videos.

Thus, I can not send it vía WhatsApp, which is my goal.

I have googled for how to convert videos for WhatsApp, with ffmpeg or
avidemux, and found nothing. Just one app to do it in Android, which is
not what I wish (but I might end doing).

http://www.themobimag.com/convert-formats-compress-video-files-free-android-sharing/

There is one photo of the app in there, which appears to be using
mpeg-4, with 480x360, and 800 bitrate, but using .3gp container.

I have tried avidemux, playing with different settings, with no luck so
far.

MPEG-4 ASP (mpeg4)
Configure: single pass - bitrate (800)
Filter: Mplayer resize: 480*384 (bilinear, aprox to 16)
Audio: mp3 (lame), mono, CBR, Q 2, bitrate 80.
Format: avi.

I have tried variants with fixed or variable bitrate, 263 or mpg
quantizer, mp3 or ac3 audio. None worked.

MPEG-4 AVC
Single pass, avg bitrate, 800,
384*304 bilinear (mplayer resize)
mp3 (lame), mono, cbr, Q2, br 80

No go.

MPEG-4 ASP (Xvid)
single pass bitrate 800, H.263

No go.

MPEG-2 (mpeg2video)
single pass bitrate 800

avidemux refuses to create it.

Somebody knows of an ffmpeg or avidemux concoction, or something else,
to convert a video to something that my Android device recognizes?

Hi
I use handbrake with the default mp4 settings, seems to work fine on my
Android tablet.

–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° SUSE Knowledge Partner (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 13.1 (Bottle) (x86_64) GNOME 3.10.1 Kernel 3.11.10-11-desktop
If you find this post helpful and are logged into the web interface,
please show your appreciation and click on the star below… Thanks!

3

On 2014-06-17 01:32, malcolmlewis wrote:
> Hi
> I use handbrake with the default mp4 settings, seems to work fine on my
> Android tablet.

I have installed it just now, from packman. It only allows me as output
formats MKV (.mkv) and MPK (.m4v) :-?

…]

But I see on the right hand side a list of presets, and one of then is
for Android 2.3, so just the thing. :slight_smile:

I changed the size to 384x310

It gives an absurd warning:

Destination filesystem is almost full: 10186M free
Encode may be incomplete if you proceed

That’s 10 GB, certainly not full! The source video is 20 MB. So I went
ahead, and it converted, to .m4v destination. 3 or 4 times smaller that
my previous attempts (from about 6 to 2 MB now)

Transferring to my phone… it works, it is recognized!
Send via WhatsApp…
Good!

Thanks!

Sound is a bit choppy, though :-?

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

4

the video file probably doesn’t need to be re-encoded - just put inside a more modern container.
If you currently have it inside a .avi container I would try using avidemux to remux it inside a .mp4 container.

In avidemux select Video - Copy, Audio - Copy

Container - MP4v2

and save

5

I use Handbrake and or VLC which can also do this

6

Carlos,
You might want to try Winff it’s in the Packman repos & has worked for me when convrting a 3GPP to mpeg2.
It may work the other way.
here’s a screen shot:
http://i.imgur.com/2gS3lEu.png

for the Convert to from the dropdown menu selsct Mobile Phones as seen
then click the Preset dropdown select the 3GPP codes & try them until you find one that works.

7

On 2014-06-19 06:06, farcusnz wrote:
>
> the video file probably doesn’t need to be re-encoded - just put inside
> a more modern container.

The original was 25 MB, the converted one is just 2. I do need
conversion :wink:

> If you currently have it inside a .avi container I would try using
> avidemux to remux it inside a .mp4 container.

I tried mpeg, no go.

> In avidemux select Video - Copy, Audio - Copy
>
> Container - MP4v2

I’ll try.

But you see, handbrake has a preset for Android, no thinking needed :wink:

Avidemux is obsolete, it lacks many features. For instance, I have many
mpeg videous with double language audio tracks. I have to choose one. A
second audio source mandatorily has to come from external audio file.
Absurd.

There is a new version, but crashes as much as being unusable, last time
I tried.

Even the current one crashes if I request any double pass conversion.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

8

Yes, if a smaller file size is required / desired then of course re-encoding is necessary . . . but a smaller file size didn’t seem to be a requirement from your original post. :wink:

> If you currently have it inside a .avi container I would try using
> avidemux to remux it inside a .mp4 container.

I tried mpeg, no go.

an .mp4 container is not to be confused with the mpeg2 / mpeg4 codec.
.mp4 is just like a box that holds your video and audio together that has a more modern spec and more features than the .avi container.

Avidemux is obsolete, it lacks many features. For instance, I have many
mpeg videous with double language audio tracks. I have to choose one. A
second audio source mandatorily has to come from external audio file.
Absurd.

There is a new version, but crashes as much as being unusable, last time
I tried.

Even the current one crashes if I request any double pass conversion.

actually, Avidemux has many more features than Handbrake - but the tradeoff is that it is much slower at encoding.
The current version of Avidemux is Avidemux3 (avidemux 2.6.xx in packman) and I find it to be very stable. I cannot recall the last time it crashed on me - which is in contrast to avidemux 2.5.xx which crashed regularly, particularly when dealing with h264 content.

I rarely deal with multiple audio tracks - but when I do I usually de-mux them from their original source before encoding to a new file so do not find the avidemux limitation there a problem.

But yes, Handbrake is very good so if it does what you require then best to stick with that. :slight_smile:

9

On 2014-06-19 16:16, farcusnz wrote:
>
> robin_listas;2649713 Wrote:

> Yes, if a smaller file size is required / desired then of course
> re-encoding is necessary . . . but a smaller file size didn’t seem to
> be a requirement from your original post. :wink:

Oh, sorry, I thought it was obvious. You need to reduce the size a lot
when using WhatsApp.

When I make a video on my mobile phone and send it on WhatsApp, it is
compressed a lot, but I don’t have it clear if it is done locally, or on
WhatsApp’s servers - in which it takes a chunk of bandwidth from my
monthly quota, if I’m not at home using WiFi.

>>> If you currently have it inside a .avi container I would try using
>>> avidemux to remux it inside a .mp4 container.>
>>
>> I tried mpeg, no go.
>
> an .mp4 container is not to be confused with the mpeg2 / mpeg4 codec.
> .mp4 is just like a box that holds your video and audio together that
> has a more modern spec and more features than the .avi container.

Ah, ok.

>> Even the current one crashes if I request any double pass conversion.
>>
>
> actually, Avidemux has many more features than Handbrake - but the
> tradeoff is that it is much slower at encoding.
> The current version of Avidemux is Avidemux3 (avidemux 2.6.xx in
> packman) and I find it to be very stable. I cannot recall the last time
> it crashed on me - which is in contrast to avidemux 2.5.xx which crashed
> regularly, particularly when dealing with h264 content.

I’ll keep trying the version 3 now and then :slight_smile:

> I rarely deal with multiple audio tracks - but when I do I usually
> de-mux them from their original source before encoding to a new file so
> do not find the avidemux limitation there a problem.

Most of the videos I pull from TV are double audio track here; and when
they are, I like to keep both tracks.

> But yes, Handbrake is very good so if it does what you require then best
> to stick with that. :slight_smile:

In this case it is, because it has an Android preset. I simply had never
tried it, but it seems that there is no perfect video conversion tool,
and you have to use a different each time.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

10

Hi frnd ,

I know with what problem you are dealing with as your android device and WhatsApp doesn’t play your normal videos because that video format is not well supported on these. To make videos according to it you need to convert it to the supported format that is supported by Android device. When I got the same issue I personally use this** Android video converter tool** as according to me it’s the best tool to convert any video into android supported format](http://android-video-converter.weebly.com). You must try it once…!!!