watermark

That watermark most certainly was inserted by whichever software you used to make those avi files.

It is not surprising. I suppose you used some shareware that works in free mode but creates watermarks unless you pay for it.

If you have the originals then that is what you should use.

There is really no "getting rid of it" if you mean restoring the clips without the watermarks.

You can try to work around the problem by, for example, inserting some stills as connected clips.

rlib3 wrote:

Thank you Luis!

The strange thing is, the free trial (which gave me 5 minutes of free converted video) DID NOT have the watermark. It wasn't until I paid $50 to purchase the full version did the watermark appear. Should be the reverse, correct?

Yes.

Anyway, the company is telling me it's not a conversion issue, that it's FC. There's an unconditional 60 day money back guarantee that I've put in motion.

That statement is absurd. You see a watermark in the video. There is no way FCP X is putting it there. And furthermore that is easy to dismiss by just playing the converted video in a different software.

On that note, any good conversion software out there that you would recommend? I really appreciate any feedback. Thanks!

Why do you want to convert to avi, to begin with?

This is an obsolete container format that was mostly used in windows, and it is not adequate for video production.

Let me reiterate this: if you have the originals, import those into FCP X and use them. No need to use avi for anything - just avoid it.

It would be useful to know the exact specs of these mp4 files.

As a matter of fact, mp4 by itself does not say much about the file. This, just like avi, mov, wmv, is a container that can hold material encoded in many different ways.

It is possible that you may need to convert these mp4 files to something else, if they are not supported; but avi (with the divx codec, as is apparent by your last post) is not what you want, ever. The preferred container is mov (the Quicktime container).

In order to progress, it is important to figure out what these files contain.

Let me suggest a few easy things to try.

1) Does the file play in Quicktime Player? If so, with the file open in Quicktime Player, hit Cmd-I to show the Movie Inspector, and post a screenshot of what you see.

2) Try opening the file with MPEG Streamclip (this is free software, and a handy tool that can easily convert from a number of different formats).

If MPEG Streamclip can play the file, you should be able to do File->Export to Quicktime... and get a mov file suitable for use in FCP X.

3) Open the file with VLC. This can play almost any video file. If it does, click Cmd-I to show the Media Information. Choose "Codec details" and twirl open the disclosure triangles so that the codecs are visible, like this:

mp4 is a container or 'wrapper' - doesn't tell what codec is in use.

From your description, I assume, DivX is the culprit - fancy in the early 90ies/last cent. 😉

To read DivX a free plug-in was avail. Unfortunately, conversion is a bit more than just 'read' ..

Install Mpeg Streamclip (most recommended, free converter at this board and within the video-community), follow advice given on its site http://www.squared5.com/svideo/mpeg-streamclip-mac.html concerning 'Requirements/DivX', mentioning the 3ivx (reversed engineered DivX) plug.-in. Convert straight from your original mp4 to proRes422.mov (=FCPX internal codex)... fingers crossed those old plug-ins work under your actual set-up.-

forget avi and all that obsolete stuff ......... 😝

Like Karsten said, MPEG Streamclip is a handy tool to have.

I would go and try it on the original mp4 files, as he recommended - going straight to ProRes is a good idea.

And even if you just use it to create mov files with H264 codec, it should work.

There are many converters out there, but not all seem to produce the most compatible results, as you are experiencing.