Help. I am trying to use Blender to edit and apply visual effects to videos that I shoot with my camera. However, blender doesnt like to import the videos from my camera. I like to use blender for lightsaber effects and such, so I need to import video in the 3d window and in the node editor. When I used to use Windows, I would export a quicktime movie from Premiere, and open in Blender. Now, I use Ubuntu. I was able to import the video into open movie editor, but I didnt know what format I could export it to so I could add fx in Blender. I would love to use image sequences, but I dont know a way to make one in linux.
Thanks
Bruce
you can convert it into a png sequance with WAV audio using ffmpeg, which is lossless but takes up a lot of room. you want to avoid repetitively encoding to lossy formats, as what you export in the end will be super lossy compared to the original.
sudo apt-get install ffmpeg
ffmpeg -deinterlace -i /home/you/in.whatever /home/you/out/%4d.png /home/you/out/audio.wav
will deinterlace a video and convert into a png sequance
ffmpeg can encode to and from many formats, however you may need to recompile it to enable some propitiatory codes.
you can encode into mov if you wish, just use .mov on the outfile, but codecs like h264 are not compiled into the ubuntu binary.
How are you capturing your video from your camera with Ubuntu Linux?
Are you using dvgrab?
Try capturing from dvgrab to RAW DV or .mov and try with the sequencer again.
My camera uses flash drives, so after I shoot some material, I copy it over onto my computer. I don’t have firewire anyway. Anyway, here is the final result of the test, I used the terminal commands that hessiess gave.
Bruce