PRG Mbox Designer Manual 3.9 - Manual (Page 172)

164 MBOX ® MEDIA SERVER USER MANUAL
Mbox File Converter
In some cases, Mbox may not be able to play custom
QuickTime movie content. In this case, as long as the "No
Diagnostics" option is not checked in the Setup tab (see
"Setup: Options" on page 62), Mbox will display the broken
movie image (shown at right). This image indicates that there is a
problem with the movie file.
If the broken movie image appears or if poor playback is experienced,
first confirm that the movie uses one of the Mbox preferred codecs.
(Refer to
"File Type Specifications" on page 46). If it is not using one of
these codecs, it should be converted before doing anything else. If the
movie is already using the one of the preferred codecs, then the Mbox
File Converter can be used in an attempt to eliminate the problem. In
some cases, even movies that do not use one of the preferred codecs can be converted.
About File Conversion
The Mbox File Convertor will accept file drops of more than one file at a time. It processes four files simultaneously
and will queue additional files. The application creates new copies of the original file in the same location as the
original file. The new files will have the same numerical prefix and name as the original, but will have either "_Mbox or
"_PMA" appended to the end of the file name (prior to the file extension). "_Mbox" is appended for movie files,
"_PMA" for still image files.
023.My Content.mov would be renamed as 023.My Content_Mbox.mov
or
011.My Picture.png would be renamed as 011.MyPicture_PMA.png
After conversion, be sure to manually remove the old files from the folder, so there are not two files with the same
index value.
File Conversion Settings
There are five settings that can be modified when using the Mbox File Convertor: Intent/Codec, Quality, Pre-multiplied
Alpha (PMA), Gamma, and Copy Audio. The Quality setting only applies to a movie that is converted to Photo-JPEG.
The "Use PMA" setting only applies to the conversion of Animation codec movies.
+ Intent: This setting has seven possible values: preserve, Photo-JPEG, and five different ProRes codec choices
listed from lowest to higher quality. If you choose one of the five quality settings, any movie processed by the
application will be converted to the Photo-JPEG codec, if possible. If anything other than "Preserve" is chosen,
the movie will be converted to the selected codec using the quality slider's value when converting to Photo-JPEG
only. If "Preserve" is chosen, the processed movie will not be converted to another codec, but rather the
application will attempt to "fix" the file so that Mbox can play it. The changes made do not affect the codec or
quality of the movie. However, no matter which quality setting is selected, the application will always attempt to
correct any errors in the file. It may be necessary to test several levels of quality to get the desired results.