imovie - mpeg 1 and 2?

Hi all,

My boyfriend is converting some old VHS-C tapes to his computer for me (he's connected the video recorder to his pc, and recording them with showbiz 2, which saves them as mpegs)

Now when I try to view them or open them with imovie or quicktime - they won't open on my mac. I've had a look in the help menu and it says that imovie doesn't support muxed mpeg 1 and 2 (whatever that means!!)

How can I be able to use them and edit them in imovie - is there something that my boyfriend can do to convert the files on his pc that will do the trick?

Oh and why can't I open the files in quicktime, as I can't view them either?

Thanks all - p.s. I don't know much about movie files etc - so if you could explain in idiot language so that I can understand!!!

Anyone????

Unless anyone has any suggestions of how I can get the film onto my mac? Or is there another mac editing software that can handle muxed films?

Can't believe this is such a palava - but its really simple to do on a PC!!

i have a lot of trouble working with video files between PCs and Macs. If you need to be able to view them only, I would try the VLC player. search for it at www.versiontracker.com if you need to edit them, either upgrade to QT Pro, which supports more formats ( i think will support muxed mpeg1 and 2, but don't quote me on it) or download BBDemux, also available on versiontracker last time I checked.

damontgo said:

i have a lot of trouble working with video files between PCs and Macs. If you need to be able to view them only, I would try the VLC player. search for it at www.versiontracker.com if you need to edit them, either upgrade to QT Pro, which supports more formats ( i think will support muxed mpeg1 and 2, but don't quote me on it) or download BBDemux, also available on versiontracker last time I checked.

Click to expand...

Could also try using ffmpegX to demux the MPEG files or convert them to a format iMovie could work with.... http://homepage.mac.com/major4/

Also, see if your boyfriend can capture to AVI or MOV format from Showbiz, according to the website, he should be able too.

Hope it helps!

Thanks for your replies guys. I've downloaded your links - but when I've look at the apps - its not very clear to me what I need to do - as a neebie to movie editing etc - I don't really know what I'm doing, so don't really understand the technical stuff I've had a play and tried converting stuff - but to no avail - they still won't play in imovie.

I've downloaded VLC media player and I can now at least play my files on my mac - but this isn't an editing programme.

Is there something else I can use instead of imovie - something that has a simple interface but will play muxed files, just so that I can edit them - basically does exactly what imovies does - but something that can read my files.

Any advice would be very greatfully appreciated - I'm on the verge of giving up now!