Choppy video playback in Keynote

Question

Level 1

15 points

Choppy video playback in Keynote

I'm using Keynote to create a performance piece in collaboration with live musicians. For most of the work I'm using still images in sequence but I also want to have some "Ken Burns effect" pan and scan.

I've used iMovie HD to make a Quicktime movies of an image with those effects at 1529x860px and I was hoping to simply drop these into the keynote presentation, they play very smoothly in Quicktime. However the playback is very choppy in Keynote, unacceptably so. Does anyone have an idea how I can improve the performance?

Posted on Sep 15, 2005 2:33 PM

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Answer 1

Kyn Drake

Level 7

21,597 points

Sep 19, 2005 3:48 PM in response to Dom Tyler

Welcome to the discussions, Dom.

What codec are you using to export the video out of iMovie HD? 1529x860 is a LOT of data to process per frame and if you're exporting full-quality, then that may be your problem.

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Answer 2

Dom Tyler Author

Level 1

15 points

Sep 19, 2005 6:04 PM in response to Kyn Drake

Hi Kyn, thanks for replying.

I've had the best results using the Apple intermediate codec. I've also dropped the dimensions slightly.

I know it's a big chunk of data but when Quicktime player can run the movies smoothly why can't keynote?

Great software though, looking forward to the next update with independant audio, multi-display control and a duration calculator please...

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Answer 3

Kyn Drake

Level 7

21,597 points

Sep 19, 2005 6:13 PM in response to Dom Tyler

Oh, and don't forget about the feature where you double click on the icon, a text block comes up and you just type,"A cool presentation about igneous rock" and through the magic of applescript, automator, and umm, just plain magic it creates the presentation for you! 🙂

Keynote is already taking over the screen and doing it's own 3D thing (with transitions and stuff). Putting video on top of that (that you can scale, rotate, and change opacity of) begins to push the limits of Keynote's renderer. QuickTime is just playing the video. Or that's my take on it.

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Answer 4

Dom Tyler Author

Level 1

15 points

Sep 20, 2005 4:09 AM in response to Kyn Drake

I'm sure you're right. I'm afraid I'm one of those users who always wants the software to do just one more thing.

I should probably be using some hugely complex and expensive tailor-made software for this work but Keynote seems to do everything I need, reasonably well and very simply.

Thanks for your responces.

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Answer 5

Sep 22, 2005 12:49 AM in response to Dom Tyler

I've had good results by converting some of my video to the Apple Pixlet codec. It's half the size of full-motion video, but still looks great. Some of my animations that were very choppy ran much better after going to Pixlet.

Oh, and this is my 100th post. Do I get a cookie? 🙂

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Answer 6

Brian Peat

Level 6

18,216 points

Sep 22, 2005 6:28 AM in response to Adam J. Bezark

100 posts? Bah, yer just a yungin' 😉

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Answer 7

Dom Tyler Author

Level 1

15 points

Sep 22, 2005 7:47 AM in response to Adam J. Bezark

Thanks Adam, I'll try Pixlet.

For what it's worth I think you should get a cookie...

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