Chapters in MP4

Hello, any ideas if it is possible to create an MP4 file with chapters? I have a video of a concert and I'm looking to have each song be a chapter. I believe its possible to do with MP4s (movies from iTunes have chapters), but I haven't been able to figure out how to do it in PrE 8. Thanks.

Welcome to the forum.
The only way, that I can think of, to get the interactivity, that you describe, would be to create a BD (Blu-ray Disc), but instead of an iPod, you would need a portable BD player for the disc.
I have not encountered any file format that has interactivity and navigation on its own. Now, perhaps with an XML companion file, or some sort, the metadata could be read by the right program, but I have not encountered such. I have video iPods, but have never seen such navigation in any file, however I do not download much video content from iTunes, so certainly do not know all that is available. If you have such files, maybe with a bit of poking around, you could reverse-engineer how it works.
Perhaps post to the iPod forums, and inquire on how this is done by others, and what software they use. Please post any findings to this thread, as it will certainly educate me, and will likely help others.
Good luck,
Hunt

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Chapters? Where are the chapters?

Can't you add chapters before export to idvd?

Can't you add chapters before export to idvd?
Of course you can. Actually, there are several different ways to do so.
1) From within an editor - Apparently the most common/only known method employed by the majority of users. In this case, the chapter module is built into editors like iMovie '06 (and earlier), FCE, FCP, etc. While this may be handy for anyone who edits their content before chaptering and converting their files to a final form for distribution it can be inconvenient for those who only want to chapter their content without need for editing or re-compression.
E.g., I make 4 or 5 DVDs for the family a year but turn out 400-500 TV shows, movies, podcasts, slideshows, etc. a year which never need to see the light of an editor for iPhone, iPod, TV, and online viewing. So for me, having an external application for chaptering is ideal.
2) Manual Chaptering - the second and probably oldest method, is to simply use a "plain text" editor to manually create a "Text" track containing the chapter times/chapter names and merge it with your edited or unedited content in an MOV file container. Apple provides the step-by-step instructions for accomplishing this on their web site. However, since the process of locating and entering chapter points can be somewhat tedious and many of us are somewhat lazy, this approach usually has little or no appeal.
3) External Graphic Chaptering - This would probably be the normal/preferred workflow for individuals using iMovie '08 and those individuals having no need to edit their content before chaptering. In this case, the edited or unedited content is simply dropped to GarageBand's "movie timeline" and chaptered as most users have always done in the various Apple editing applications -- i.e., you movie the playhead to the point where you wish to add a chapter and simply press a button. When done, the chaptered content can be "sent" to iDVD just as it used to be in previous versions of iMovie without re-compression, exported to your hard drive in an MOV file container without re-compression, or converted/re-compressed to MP4/M4V file containers with the chapter track in tact for use with external "artwork" in iTunes as many users requested. Frankly, I don't see why people are complaining since this single solution is compatible with the original iMovie-to-iDVD workflow, allows the chaptering movies without editing, and now allows the chaptering of MP4/H.264 files -- all of which are features requested time and again by various QT users.
4 External "Capturing" of Chapters - Another, lesser known, workflow employs the use of an external utility like Metadatahootenanny which, like GarageBand, can graphically chapter files but which allows the user to also extract/use "chapter" information directly from a DVD or VIDEO_TS folder, online source, or text file. While this utility is sometimes a bit "quirky," it does work... most of the time. And, while chapters may shift a few frames due to conversion of compression formats. it is still much faster than chaptering a movie manually or graphically "from scratch."
So basically there you have it. The workflows are there if you choose to use them rather than simply lament the fact that it cannot be done from "within" iMovie '08 or complain rather than using iMovie '06 which is included as an alternative to '08 for those who really prefer the older, more familiar workflow.

ITunes COM interface and iPod Chapters

Hello everybody
Does anyone know how to make Chapters through the COM interfaces for iTunes? Looking at the documentation there's no such functionality as far as I can see, but double checking anyway.
If not, is there any other way to make chapters for MP4 files that are supported by iPod? I am on Windows so ChapterTool is not available to me.
Thanks!

I don't think the COM interface supports what you want to do. You can get the documentation here:
http://developer.apple.com/sdk/itunescomsdk.html

Trouble downloading continuous mixed albums on iTunes

I recently purchased some mixed albums, iTunes downloaded the individual tracks just fine, but when it came to the continuous mixes it came up with an error (-1450) It said to check my connection, which is fine, and try again, but still the same result?
Can anyone offer any solutions?

For gapless playback on Windows, it's as easy as foobar2000.
It's a pity that iTunes doesn't play back albums as one would expect, and I've communicated with Apple about this in a number of ways over the years, as have countless other users. I think the thing to keep in mind is that even if Apple corrected the inherent problems in iTunes and iPod, true gapless playback could still not be achieved except for files ripped directly from audio CDs in a gapless and lossless format (AIFF, WAV, Apple Lossless), or with files encoded using LAME or Nero's AAC encoder. This also means that every single album ever sold on the iTMS will never have the possibility of playing back without encoder-introduced gaps between tracks. Somehow I think it would go over like a lead balloon if Apple put out a huge press release stating that iTunes and iPod were now gapless playback-compliant, with the exception of any music bought from the iTMS or encoded with iTunes' MP3 and AAC encoders (in other words, pretty much anything in a given user's iTunes library). Well, I'd still be happy to hear the news, as I use LAME and Nero AAC
I finally bought my first iPod the other day, and knew what to expect from it. I've spent a vast amount of time preparing my music for gapless playback on the iPod, and I have to say it was a chore. My best friends along the way were PlexTools Professional, foobar2000 + foocuesheetcreator, Nero Digital Audio Reference Quality MPEG-4 & 3GPP Audio Codec, my PowerMac G4, cuetools, and AudioBinder.
So, now I've got perfect gapless playback on my new iPod and in iTunes.
What I'm waiting for at this point is for <a href="http://music.morbo.org/wiki/dop:start"foo_dop</a> to make some more progress reading Nero chapters in MP4/M4A album images.

Homemade movies with chapters question? I have numerous VHS movies converted to DVD and then are converting the DVDs into MP4 via HandBrake. I am now trying to find the chapters within the converted DVDS with no luck using QuickTime 7. Help plz.

How do I find the chapters within a Homemade DVD when it has been converted via Handbrake to MP4 and editing ready on Quicktime Player. I want to get chapters only out of the movie that has 23 chapters so I can edit one chapter at a time. . Found it once when it said divide into chapters (or something like this) , but can't find it again. Thanks for the help.

How do I find the chapters within a Homemade DVD when it has been converted via Handbrake to MP4 and editing ready on Quicktime Player.
If you included the chapter information originally contained on the DVD as part of your HandBrake conversion, then it will be located in the "Text" track of your converted file. Did you actually check the "Chapters" tab in HandBrake before converting the DVD content to ensure the chapters were to be included in final export? I.e., not all HandBrake presets automatically include a "Text" (Chapter) track.

How can I make more than 9 chapters in IDVD? None of the themes will let me..

I am making a dvd of our home movies for each year. I have divided the movies up by month and am trying to make a simple dvd using one of the themes and have one chapter for each month. For example I made an imovie of all the january videos and saved it as an mp4 file. I drag that into the dvd menu screen for the theme I picked on IDVD and name that chapter "January" Everything works great until I have the first 9 months and it won't let me drag any more movies over to make the last 3 chapters for the last 3 months. I haven't been able to find a theme even going back to the oldest ones that allows 12 chapters.. can anyone help me on this one?

I suggest you repost your question in the iDVD section.

After IOS 4.1 update, some of my user generated MP4 files no longer play.

You can see them correctly in the play menu in home sharing, and you can fast forward through the file, but they won't play.
The same files worked flawlessly in IOS 4.0 and now they are broken. It's not all files, only some. I have a case opened on this with Apple Care and the response so far from Engineering is: "they only support Apple generated content".
Does anyone have any more insight in to what perhaps was "fixed" that might have caused this degradation (or lack thereof!) in playback of certain MP4s?
Is anyone else experiencing file playback issues with any of their MP4's?

Yup. This is a known issue but it's not known to that many since most of the customers get all their content straight from iTunes. There's only ONE way to get the non-iTunes HD MP4s to play. When you are staring at the blank screen, waiting for the video to buffer (which for the majority of the time, will never happen), press Down on the controller to pull up the timeline with chapter marks. Now, press Forward to skip chapters. With the original 4.1 update, you can skip all the way to the end of the last chapter, give it a few seconds, and then skip all the way back to the beginning of the first chapter (same chapter timeline, but you press Back until it goes to the start of the first chapter). With the recent 4.1.1 update, it's a little trickier. When you skip all the way to the end of the last chapter, if you don't immediately skip back, it will take you back to your videos list because it registers as you having finished watching the video. Now, keep in mind all of this takes places on the timeline with the CHAPTER MARKS.
Second thing, be sure you have chapter marks set on the MP4 file or else the chapter skip workaround will not work (since there's no chapters). You can most probably use any metadata utility you wish to set the chapter marks but I personally am using iSubtitler. I also set the chapter marks for every 10 minutes.
I don't know exactly what has changed since the original 4.0 firmware on the ATV but it has messed up the buffering for large HD non-iTunes purchased videos.
Message was edited by: DookieX

Imported MP4 clip from my HD will not thumbnail

I created a new project then imported an MP4 clip from my HD as a new event but it does not thumbnail. When the event is selected the event window says "video not found" The same clip playsjust fine on Quicktime. I tried closing iMovie and reopening to no avail. I also tried deleting and reimporting. It still says video not found and I cannot drag the event into the project window.

I have the same camera, and I have imported mp4 videos at 30p successfully into iMovie 9.09.
However, I'm running Mavericks (10.9.1), and I pull the SDHC card from the camera and plug it into the slot in the back of the Mac. I did consider importing directly from the camera, but to do that you have to put the camera into Playback mode, select the AVCHD playback, and only then connect to the Mac via USB; if the camera doesn't give you dire warnings after the USB connection, iMovie won't be able to import anything: See http://www.amazon.com/review/R2KMTEI2HV1E8M/ref=cm_srch_res_rtr_alt_1 The camera import dialog in iMovie 9.09 has a dropdown menu at the bottom of the dialog on the left allowing you to choose the AVCHD or MP4 selections from the camera.
I'm now moving to iMovie 10 which while it has its problems and editing is not very intutitive, is much faster at importing from the camera and exporting the edited movie. I use mChapters from the App Store to add chapters to the exported movie (after changing the exported file suffix from mp4 to m4v in the Finder). So for my purposes, I can pretty much use iMovie 10 for the same applications as I did with 9.09.
As suggested earlier on this Thread, upgrading to Mavericks and at least iMovie 9.09 will likely allow you to use your camera as you wish. iMoive 10 will give you expanded options with the camera.

How can i convert .mov to .mp4?

Hello again
I have made a large promo dvd for an upcoming seminar and the national organization would like to put it on its website.
I broke it down into chapters so that it is not one long cumbersome piece, and visitors can watch just the parts they need.
On our local website, I was able to share to media and then use iweb to upload them in an album.
However, the national webmaster uses a different web program so I need to create the chapters as self-contained movies for her to download first from our downlload site. She says that the .mov files hang up when she's downloading and wants them as mp4.
How can I convert them?
Thank you
Elizabeth

hello .... sorry it's taken me so long to return here ....
To separate it into chapters, I brought it into Final Cut pro, and marked the In and Out for one chapter, then exported just that selection.... as an mpeg4 (Quicktime conversion) . As one chapter was finished and exported (Self-contained movie) i moved the In and Out points to the next chapter, and continued along this way.
If you don't have Final Cut, then you should be able to do the same in iMovie: import the whole movie, then select the portion of the movie that belongs in one chapter, drag it to the timeline, edit as necessary (fades, etc) then export (Share) that chapter. Repeat for each portion of the movie you want to isolate. When you export/share, you can choose the option of size that you want it to be.
Hope this helps and that I'm not too late for you !!

Chapters

I have made a dvd using idvd5. There are 7 mp4 movies (each about 20 minutes long) imported and each one is listed on the menu (title) page of the dvd. According to idvd chapters should be created automatically and there are no options for chapters.
However, when playing with Apple's dvd player the on-screen controller does not do anything when clicking on the chapter or title arrow. On the drop down menu only the 7 titles are available and then not in the order they are placed on the menu. No chapters are displayed on this drop down menu. The same happens when the dvd is played on a PC.
Are there any explanations for this? If not are things better in later versions of idvd?

Roxio Toast has an automatic chapter feature -- based on time intervals if I recall correctly. So it can play all your independent movies consecutively and add markers every 5 minutes. Check the web site to make sure it's still featured. You give up iDVD's nice menus, but perhaps that's not so important to you.
Apple's pro software can add chapter markers during the DVD burning process (DVD Studio Pro) but that's a whole different cla$$ of software.
John

Chapters and Sound in iMovie

Yes I know that for some stupid reason Apple have moved adding chapters to Garage Band, makes absolute complete sense to do this when trying to make movies.....but having put up with this I find that Garage Band has moved my sound from the iMovie and deleted some of the sound....
Now the movie and sound doesnt match up.
Alsoin Garage Band when adding markers the video at the top doesnt match with the video window on the right side, making adding chapters difficult.
Any advice welcome....
thanks Colin

Which is the best quality result for doing the above work ?
Ideally, the work flow requiring the fewest re-compressions.
Better to share to iTunes in full quality, from iMovie, followed by dragging to garage band for chaptering and then share to iTunes the final movie from garage band ? ... The normal procedure would be share to media browser in iMovie to work in garage band and finally share to iTunes from within garage band. But I don't know nothing about loss of quality. Any advice ?
Do you have specific requirements regarding the final file container?
1) If not, then you could share your file from iMovie '08 to the Media Browser using the specific preset for your final target compression format -- e.g., iPhone, iPod, or TV. You can then open Media Browser file in GarageBand, chapter it, and Export or Share it using the "Full Quality" option. This work flow will place the chapter track, the original video, and the audio into an MOV file container which is compatible with iTunes.
2) On the other hand, if you want the final chaptered content to be in an M4V file container, you would probably do better to export the iMovie '08 project via the "Export using QuickTime" option as a high quality/high data rate compressed file, open it in GarageBand, chapter it, and then "Send" it on to iTunes using a selected target preset. This option re-compresses the audio and video and places them in the M4V file container along with your chapter track.
Note: Different file containers have different features/capabilities. For instance, if you use an internal frame as the "Poster" frame, then an MOV file would be fine here. If, on the other hand, you want to associate an external image file as your "Poster" frame in iTunes, the you would need to use an M4V or MP4 file container.

How to have the m4v chapters back?

Hello,
iTunes is a great app. I have been using it for some years, but since some updates ago chapters are no long available for .m4v or .mp4 files. Now I am unable to point a specific chapter inside the .m4v or .mp4 file, or chapter names are misspelled.
Chapters are shown correctly for iTunes on Leopard (not Snow Leopard), but it does not work for iTunes on Lion or Windows.
Chapters appear using QuickTime, but we can not see the actual names. I wold like to see them on iTunes.
Recordings download from:
http://www.jw.org/index.html?option=QrYQFVTrlVlYR&selLang=LSB
Does someone know what to do? Or may it be a bug? Thanks!

It seems to be a bug.
Suggestions here -> http://www.apple.com/feedback/

MP4 Maximum File Size?

I just ripped my Blu-Ray version of Planet Earth to MP4's.
Each Chapter was burned as a separate MP4 file.
There are 10 Chapters in total, so I have 10 separate MP4 files.
Each file is around 1.78GB at 3700kbps at 720p.
What I want to do now is merge them together into one file. Then add custom chapters. Anyways, I have Quicktime Pro 7 and basically have been copying them all into one file, but once I try to copy the 7th file/chapter into the cumulative 6 previous files that are now in one continuos file, it doesn't really add anything.
Is it not working because there is a limit on the file size of the file of an MP4? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

That's true. I have a similar question that doesn't involve backing up my own Blu-Rays for viewing on Apple TV, sorry about that, I'll create a new thread for that one.

How to merge .m4v files with chapters included?

I am unable to merge two .m4v files in quicktime pro and keep their chapter structure. Is this even possible? I take a lot of time to build chapters into movies I make and I would like to be able to combine some AND keep the chapter structure.
Here is what I have:
Movie A: 12 chapters
Movie B: 10 chapters
open movie A in quicktime pro
open movie B in quicktime pro
copy movie B (command+A, command+C)
select movie A
push needs to end of movie A
paste clipboard (command+V)
Result:
Movie A now has it's original 12 chapters and then the added movie B is just one long section added on to the end of Movie A's last chapter.
Any help would be appreciated. This seems to be an ongoing question on many forums.
-i

1) is there any way to use your method that give me a final .m4v?
Well, your questions are certainly getting harder. How a bout no, yes, and maybe.
a) No, I do not know of a direct approach for simply changing the file container. As you may have noted, QT now checks the Video Track "Sample Description" and if the extension does not match the description, QT sends you a "nastygram" modal message and refuses to open the file.
b) Yes, it can be done indirectly. In this case I used the SimpleMovieX ($35) from Aero Quartet of Catalonia, Spain. While I tend to use QT Pro and MPEG Streamclip for most day-to-day work, this application does have some unique features to which I resort when needed. One is the "Keyframe" combined indicator/skip option, one is its audio manipulations, and another is the way it handles H.264/AAC MOV file container conversion. (I also do a lot of "track management" work that leaves me in an MOV file when I actually want MP4 or M4V file container features like being able to associate external "artwork" images in iTunes.) In any event, this application does actually go through and correct the descriptors before it copies the appropriate data to the new container making QT ever so happy with the new MP4 container. At this point, if I modify the MP4 Extension to M4V in the Finder, QT then does not issue the modal message and does use iTunes as the default application to open the file.
c) Maybe the file is considered to be a real M4V file and maybe it is not. I have not, for instance tried to add a "Passthrough" AC3 secondary audio track and check to see if the resulting file will play correctly via TV. So there may yet be some internal distinctions of which I am yet unaware. Other than that, the file does indeed seem to function as any other iTunes file created by direct M4V data compressed export.
Anyway, this is from the "for whatever it is worth" department and you can invest $35 in the application or try to find another application capable of doing the same thing. MPEG Streamclip, for instance, will not work here but I have not actually looked around for anything else.
2) if I use the final .MOV that you get at the end of your tutorial, will exporting as "apple tv" or mpeg 4 etc. compress it again?
Yes, it will. In addition, depending on the application used to perform the export, you may lose the chapter track also.

Is a 17GB mp4 file too BIG for Adobe Send ??

I have a file containing photo images, video and music files which have been mixed together using Corel Video Studio Pro X6 to form a "movie".
There are 18 separate chapters within the folder file, with the total file size being just under 17GB saved in mp4 format.
I now wish to share this "movie" file with recipients around the world (fellow travellers), and would like to know if Adobe Send is suitable, and if so, would I be able to send the entire file in one, or would I need to send the smaller individual files in blocks.??
Cheers for any advice. AAABigDog

We don't support files that large. You would be advised to keep your files to less than a couple of GBs.

Chapters in MP4

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