Recommendations please: Fast and simple video file chopper / deleter

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 6/18/2020, 11:56 AM

Hi Guys! I am a new user of VMS 17 Platinum. I'm looking for your guidance on the best way to cleanse hours of uninteresting video from terabytes of MP4/H264 files BEFORE I start to bring the good stuff into VMS 17 for post processing. To explain, I use an OSMO Action camera as a dash-cam as well as for regular scene captures during our long historical back-roads adventures. In spite of my simple turn off/turn on protocol I still end up with hours and terabytes of pretty useless footage. Literally, I don't have enough storage capacity to keep it all and I sure don't want to drag multiple 5 gigabyte clips into VMS for 2 minutes of event. There has to be a way (a product) that will let me scrub quickly and cut and dump/delete easily, the endless miles of uneventful footage and to save the good bits.

I've tried some of the free video cutting apps out there but they seem cumbersome, slow (sometimes obsolete) and all seem to want to also be mini-editors which further complicates the process. This has to be something all of you professional/experts deal with continuously.

Thank you all for your participation on these forums. You give me hope that I can master this VMS beast <G>.

Comments

j-v wrote on 6/18/2020, 12:19 PM

Did you try the free Mp4 joiner/splitter?
It suites me very well for those tasks.
Look here: https://www.mp4joiner.org/en/

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 6/18/2020, 5:58 PM

Thanks j-v. I just tried to use MP4 splitter and for some reason it will not work on my system. I can load the mp4 files ok. See them ok in the viewer. I can scrub back and forth with the cursor. But as soon as I press the play button the whole application vanishes. For some reason it does not like my Windows 10 Pro 64bit system. Tried several different video files but same result. So still looking <G>.

Former user wrote on 6/18/2020, 6:04 PM

Musicvid is big on VideoRedo. It is not free, but if you have a lot, it might be worth it. I believe there is a free trial.

Jack S wrote on 6/19/2020, 4:23 AM

For MP4s my weapon of choice is Avidemux. It's free and, in copy mode, it's fast. You can select a section of an MP4 and save it, or you can cut it out.

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 6/19/2020, 9:44 AM

Hello Jack S. I jumped on your Avidemux suggestion, watched a couple of YouTube videos and thought that Avidemux would be a solution.... but! My videos are all 2.7K20 or 4K30. When played in Avidemux the video runs in a kind of slow-motion mode and the audio is wildly out of sync. I cannot see any adjustments within Avidemux that would fix this. I tested these same clips in VMS17P to be sure they were okay and they played perfectly. So I'm still looking for a quick and simple cut and dump cutter to remove miles of unwanted (and huge files) video. There has got to be something? It does not have to be free But it has to be simple and fast.

Musicvid wrote on 6/19/2020, 9:48 AM

Muxers don't correct stream errors, restore GOP integrity, resync bad frames, or reindex.

@Joe-Engel4655 VideoRedo has a free trial. I use it daily to to all of the above, plus cut commercials.

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 6/19/2020, 12:07 PM

Hi Musicvid. Thank you! I don't know what a muxer is, nor do I know what a GOP or all that other stuff is either but I will give VideoRedo a try. I think all of my video footage is good because it all plays back perfectly in my new VMS17P preview window. It is all in 2.7k30 or mostly 4k30 H.264/MP4/. I note that many of the "video cutter/joiner" type applications out there a very old. 5 years or more old. Some win 98 era. I assume that there have been many changes over 5 years or more.

j-v wrote on 6/19/2020, 12:15 PM

I note that many of the "video cutter/joiner" type applications out there a very old. 5 years or more old.

Maybe but it are not video PLAYERS, so if you type the exact time for cutting and splitting my proposed MP4 tools does a perfect and very fast job.
To know exactly which second and frame you want to spit you must find through a player that is made for playing files.

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 6/19/2020, 12:19 PM

Hi again Musicvid. So I looked at VideoRedo and it seems to be shooting an ant with a bazooka in my case. It apparently does a whole bunch of repair and conversion stuff and a whole bunch of editing stuff, none of which I think I need to do. I just want to trim and dump (permanently) a whole lot uninteresting footage. I can then bring the good stuff into VMS 17 and start the real editing work. Does this make sense? I understand that if I cut and dump from keyframes (another new term for me) the remaining footage should be intact? Well, back to the drawing board <G>.

Musicvid wrote on 6/19/2020, 3:06 PM

No, it's dirt simple. You add your stack of files to the Joiner List and press OK. Two clicks. The advanced options are just that, anytime you choose to learn more.

Regarding your observation, Muxer technology has not changed a whit in twenty+ years (including MP4Box, which is the backend for mp4joiner). The utilities get updated every so often to accept newer file formats, that's all. I have never had good luck with editing muxed (cocatenated) long-GOP files, but if all you plan on is playing it in whatever media player, then I see no real harm unless there are stutters or bad sync.

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 6/20/2020, 6:18 PM

Musicvid; Thank you for your help. I will take another look at that. I note that in another topic, you have mentioned you are stepping back and also Dot are stepping back from participation here. I have walked back through the many contributions you have made and I will miss your assistance as I learn to tame VMS. Thank you again!

Musicvid wrote on 6/20/2020, 10:00 PM

I won't abandon threads to which I've already replied.

Thanks for the kind words!

Joe-Engel4655 wrote on 7/18/2020, 8:03 PM

7/18/2020: For anyone who was interested in this thread I think we found the solution that best suits our requirements for this purpose.

To recap, we use an OZMO Action camera as a pseudo-dashcam on our auto adventures. The camera runs most of the time as we drive historical backroads. Because of this we amass exceptionally large files containing hours of uninteresting video with sections of interesting video we want to use in VMSP17 stories. For example, on our recent 10-day trip we acquired 1.8 Terabytes of raw OSMO video. We would probably discard 80% of that footage. In addition, we simply do not have the resources to store tens of terabytes of such video.

We use a Windows 10 X64 desktop for this purpose, and we needed a reliable, fast, simple, lossless cutter/splitter that could handle large (10 GB) 4k 30/60 files. We did not want a micro editor or a compressor or converter all the other stuff often included. We think we found that with the windows app Bandicut. So far, this app has exceeded our expectations. It costs $30.00 but they have a free (watermarked) trial available at www.bandicam.com. We have no affiliation with those folks.

Now, all I have to do is figure out how to use VMSP17 to create masterpieces from the remaining footage. So far it’s VMSP17 10, me 0, but we soldier on <G>. Thanks all!