Every time I try to use this with an .AVI file, I get an error like "AVI001: Open file error nr.-2147221164 on file....".

I read the suggestion that pops up which tells you to install the 'VfW video codecs', and I went to http://www.free-codecs.com and installed the K-Lite Codec Pack FULL version.

I rebooted the computer and reran AndreaMosaic, but that feature still doesn't work.

What do I do to get it working? Within the K-Lite Codec Pack folder there are programs called "Configuration", "Help", and "Tools". Do I need to run any of these and do anything else?

I'm using Windows Vista, and I tried disabling the UAC (User Account Control) feature but that didn't help...

When you install the K-Lite codec pack you need to select only the 'VfW video codecs'
See this video for an installation example

or
1. Download the Full version
2. Run the setup and click Next until you reach the Select Components Window
3. From the list box choose the last profile option: Deselect All
4. Then scroll down the list and select only the VFW Video codecs. Click Next until installation is complete.

Reboot is not necessary.

Are you using the latest pack from here?
http://www.codecguide.com/download_kl.htm

I followed the steps above exactly, but I am still having the the same error message - AVI001: Open file error nr.-2147221164 on file...

I am using windows vista, any suggestions?

Thanks

We must be sure that you have a VfW codec installed for your AVI file.
Download GSpot program and open the AVI file with it
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/GSpot.htm

See this sample screenshot:


Around the red rectangle you can read the codec used for the AVI file, it's DX50 in this sample.

Then we must find a 'VfW codec' for the 'DX50'.

Andrea

I installed the new codecs per your video instructions (thank you by the way, very helpful), but still no good. Then I downloaded GSpot and loaded my AVI file into it. The code I get says "WMV3" and in the status box it says "Codec Status Undetermined"...still not getting it to work.

Any ideas?

The WMV3 is the Microsoft Windows Media Player format version 9. So we need a 'VFW codec' for the WMV3 format (it is not included in the K-Lite codec pack).
Using Google we get some links here

One of the links suggest to install
http://download.microsoft.com/download/9/8/a/98a6cb2d-6659-485e-b1f9-2c0d9bf6c328/wmv9VCMsetup.exe

A description of that codec is described here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0C99C648-5800-4AA3-A2FE-3DE948689DB8&displaylang=en

I did this, and still no luck...

What about this one?
http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/6/1/461e47d9-bff9-4d3f-b97c-93476581f6ef/wmp6cdcs.exe

And if that doesnt work then the last one I suggest is this:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/a/0/3/a0398036-25b9-410c-b371-c59957c1b0f4/WM9Codecs.exe

Neither of these worked either. Maybe your program isn't compatible with Windows Vista?

It's not a Vista problem. I just searched for a WMV3 video and I tried to open it with AndreaMosaic without success. I start to think that Microsoft didn't release any 'VfW codec' for the '*.wmv' files. I may update the program to reflect this.

As a workaround I suggest you to convert your video to an AVI file. I just tried the freeware Prism Video Converter.

1. Download the free version (very small, only 230 kbyte)
2. Don't install any suggested/related video programs (you don't need them)
3. Just add your WMV file to the main window.
4. You may select the 'XVID Codec' and 'MPEG Layer 3' using the 'Encoder Options...' button for a reduced file size of the output video. The conversion will be somewhat slower. You may select the output directory where to save the new video.
5. Press the big button 'Convert' to start the conversion. The Prism Converter will download the required codecs from it's web site, but only once.
4. Extract the frames from the AVI file using AndreaMosaic

Andrea

Hurrah! - An answer for those struggling with video problems (and this works on Vista and Windows ME, and probably others too)

I too had the same problems as those posting on this thread (although I didn't try out the extra links you've added Andreas - downloading was painfully slow today for some reason)


Instead, I remembered how I got around this problem last time I used AndreaMosaic some years ago in an earlier version.

I downloaded VirtualDub downloadable at http://virtualdub.sourceforge.net/ with main site http://www.virtualdub.org/ and simply loaded up my desired videos and saved them using "Save as AVI..." in the file menu. BE SURE TO CHOOSE A DIFFERENT FILE NAME IN CASE OF PROBLEMS!!

Magically it can change avi files that dont work into ones that do, plus it handles a bunch of other file types, so hopefully you can get all your videos apporved by AndreaMosaic - hurrah!


On the downside, of course creating avi files takes up a lot of room (and for large ones a lot of time), so you might have to keep deleting files once you've finished with them. However, I discovered that you can seemingly abort at any time and the result is still an AndreaMosaic compatible video, so you could even do your conversions via small bits at a time.


If VirtualDub can't open your files (I remember I did have some files not supported once upon a time), there are other programs which can do extra conversions for you. Annoyingly for some videos I had to convert them to a type that VirtualDub could handle, before they then got converted to an AndreaMosaic compatible type. I think I used FlashMPEG conversion software to help there, but can't remember right now, as I don't need it anymore.


Andrea, I hope this little bit of advice helps your community and serves as a token of my appreciation for your software - it should hopefully help me create a great Christmas present for my missus!


Oh, as a final note it would be good to have some sort of summary for what colours are represented by our tile sets. Perhaps a 2 box diagram showing in one box a palette of colours on one side and in the other box some representation of tiles matching those colours. That way we can see what colour areas our tile sets are weak in, and then it is easy to start photographing more blue seas, green grasses, yellow buttercups etc to create better mosaics with less duplication.

As a rough illustratiopn perhaps something like:
Pal. --- Tiles
### --- XXX
### --- XXX
### --- XXX

Assuming that dark pink on the right hand box represents strong representation within the tile set, I could see I have plenty of light pinkish types of tiles, but not so many blueish ones. I could then think that extracting pictures from a yachting trip video would probably be a better idea than yet another video of my baby girl strutting around in her pink outfits. Would save a lot of time by making me more efficient!

Ho ho, you could've posted that before I started typing out my own answer!

It would've saved me some time!

Andrea

Yes! this is a good suggestion

Also forgot to mention that in the same way, possibly some people might find dark/light combos within a tile useful.

Eg I might be missing tiles which are light on the left-hand side and dark on the right-hand side.

Obviously quite a lot more complicated to represent effectively and usefully, but definitely possible.

Eg Split a square into 4 sub-squares, allow 4 shades from black to white and you get 256 possible square types for tiles to be matched against. Easily displayable in 16 x 16 grid on screen.

Only light in bottom right corner
##
##

Light in botton left, dark in top right
##
##


Or even further as a 3x3 split with just dark and light gives 512 square types.

Eg I commonly have dark pictures with something bright in the middle:

###
###
###

but could do with some tiles more like this diagonal type to make better mosaics:

###
###
###


I've gone off topic I know, but I strangely had the ideas while reading this video thread.

AndreaMosaic seems to have a 2gig limit on avi files, but luckily VirtualDub can skip frames for you so that you have a smaller video for use in AndreaMosaic. I also only got it to work under VirtualDub's default 24bit colour setting

Use Video -> Frame Rate -> Decimate
I used 25 as a value for one of my videos so only 1 frame per second was converted and saved, allowing me to easily beat the 2gig limit with no performance issues. (As I would've just done the same in AndreaMosaic anyway)

Also Filters -> Add
has some useful things - I only needed resize to help reduce the file size.


Hope that was helpful too.

Thank you for the help guys, converting the avi files to the different version did the trick.