I am finding that my alldayvideo.wmv only contains snapshots over about the first 3 hours of the day. The last hour video is always good. Snapshots are being gathered for the whole day.
So my guess and my question is this: when producing the alldayvideo is there a time limit on how long that might take? Put another way, if there is another WD timed event - perhaps an upload is due - would that cause the production of the alldayvideo to stop before all of the snapshots have been incorporated into the video?
The video starts about 7am and finishes around 10am. After that, new files are being produced and uploaded, so the web site time stamp on the wmv file is as expected, but it still only covers from 7am to 10am approx.
If it’s doing this every day and only running to the same time each day then that would normally indicated that you have a corrupted image file at, or around, the time that the movie stops.
You’ll normally find that the corrupt file has a vastly different file size to those around it.
Try deleting all the image files in the “webcam” & “alldayvideo” files in the wdisplay folder and let it build a new set. It’s only the timestamped files that need removing, things like saved movies etc are fine to remain.
I have done that on several occasions and it makes no difference. Also, all the images are the same size. I still think it’s a timing issue and that it doesn’t get the alldayvideo done in the time allowed.
I would be interested to know what timing other people use. I use VideoGS to capture an image every 25secs. WD is set up to rename that image every 30secs. The all day video dialog says that the alldayvideo will be produced at 11 minutes past the hour. My Wunderground update is set at 15 and 45 mins past the hour (not using rapid fire). My normal file upload times are on the hour and 30 mins.
I suspect that the process runs out of time and either stops or the file gets uploaded before it’s completed or something along those lines.
It’s also funny that the tick box is set for a moviemaker log but it never creates a log.
And I don’t understand the alldayvideo tick box that says “Use this file name to produce movie from” because it’s underneath the non-timestamped JPG name. Now elsewhere we have ticked to say we want the movie and that we’re using this particular file name for our JPGs, so what happens if we don’t tick that box?
Also near the top of the alldaymovie dialog there are a group of 3 tick boxes that say:- Create video hourly (videolasthour.mpg)
I have WME and want videolasthour.wmv, and
Also upload videolastday.wmv
I have the last two ticked but not the first one. Yet it seems to make the MPG file anyway and then convert it to WMV files. So what’s the point of that first tick box if you’re using the second two?
It’s not that clear to me what the various options on this dialog mean.
Finally my movies seem to play too fast - I “borrowed” my settings from someone who kindly share their, but I’m wondering if there may be a more suitable set of settings that perhaps uses less resources?
I only use WD with capture the images so I don’t about using other software for that.
I capture every minute right through the day & in the summer I have is producing a movie from 0100 until 2330 without a problem so I don’t think it’s a timing problem as mine takes ages to make the movie & upload it, even using wmv.
Mine creates the last hour movie at 03 minutes past and the allday movie at 23 minutes past the hour.
The moviemaker log is not in the logfiles folder, mine is in the main wdisplay program folder next to the moviemaker.exe file, is yours not there?
I don’t know what the “Use this file name to produce movie from” does but I don’t have it ticked.
With the mpg files being produced even though you don’t have that ticked, I think you have the right take on that one in that the wmv movies are produced from the mpg file. I have the same setup as you for those three boxes and I have an alldaymovie.mpg & a lasthour.mpg file so I wouldn’t worry about those.
As for the speed that the movie runs at, alter your frame rate (left hand side under the start/stop times) to suit your own movie. I run mine at 13 but, as you’re using 30 second capture, then you may need it at around 6 or 8. It’s a case of playing with it until it looks right for your movie, there are no set numbers.
When the moviemaker is working, try opening it at the start and see what it does. If you have a corrupt file somewhere then it will normally stop making the movie at that file. If you’re watching it then you’ll see the time for that.
You could also test it by switching to WD’s own capture program and see if you get different results using that instead of VideoGS.
Thanks for the help. I’ve found the log file now - thank you for the pointer - and it shows that my system picked up images all day. Yet the video plays from at 7:00am to 2:00pm but no more.
All the video files are the same size so there’s no obvious sign of an error.
I think I’ll play with the capture rates and see what happens.
One thing just occured to me Steve, now I don’t know whether it makes a difference or not:
You’re collecting a timestamped image every 25 seconds.
Moviemaker is using the 30 second image rate to create the movie.
So, if you think about it, the timestamp on the images will get further ‘out’ as the day goes on e.g: 00:00:25, 00:00:50, 00:01:15, 00:01:40…
If Moviemaker is looking for the timestamps within a few seconds of the minute & half-minute then it could be getting confused by these other times and that’s why it’s not doing a full run.
It’s just an idea but I know that my own timestamped files are always within a few seconds of each other right through the day.
Maybe try setting your VideoGS to 30 seconds instead of 25 and see what happends.
Edit: Just noticed that you have WD renaming the files every 30 seconds, so at some points during the day there will be 2 files to rename in the same 30 second period?
That may well be the answer. Just for one day I’ve set all the parameters to once per minute to see what happens. I’ll report back tomorrow when I see the results. Thanks again.
The 310 is a timer allowing 310 secs (5mins and 10secs) for the video to be converted from MPG to WMV.
My Weather Server takes just over 10 minutes to do the conversion.
So I changed that value to be 1240 and now the alldayvideo contains the whole day.
The 310 figure is fine for the hourly video but not for the allday video with the frame rate, quality level and fairly low power server that I’m using.
If it’s taking over 10 minute to convert then it’s a very slow server you have there Steve. My decktop does it in 2-3 mins.
Still, you’re sorted, that’s the main thing.
That is indeed the case. My weather station is connected to a fairly low powered server that can stay on 24/7 - but it only has a 500MHz CPU and 500Mb RAM. It does the job fine but the alldayvideo does take about 10 mins to complete - building the MPG is fairly quick but the conversion to MWV takes quite a long time. Perhaps that’s because I use the best quality image from the camera. The whole set up is silent running and consumes 5W so it is left on all of the time.
