INTERACT FORUM

More => Old Versions => Media Center 16 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: wer on June 09, 2011, 09:06:17 pm

Title: SOLVED: Can't use video as background in Theater Mode
Post by: wer on June 09, 2011, 09:06:17 pm

Any idea why MC 16.0.105 won't play video as the background in theater mode for me?

I've tried a couple of different WMV files, and even tried Matt's "Dynamite" theme as shown in this thread: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=63734.msg426415#msg426415

Having a WMV file in there just provides a black background for me...

I've tried putting the WMV in a subfolder called "Root" that is inside the main theme folder.  I've also tried putting it in the top level of the theme folder.  Both methods just produce a black background.

Is there anyone who has this working that can tell me what I'm doing wrong?

Thanks very much!

Title: Re: Can't use video as background in Theater Mode
Post by: Moe on June 09, 2011, 10:04:31 pm

I hope you can get some help here because I have the same problem as well.

I have two computers running MC.  On one of them video backgrounds work great, but on my HTPC (the one that I really want them to work on) they don't work.  The videos I am trying to use as backgrounds play just fine inside of MC they just don't work as backgrounds.

Title: Re: Can't use video as background in Theater Mode
Post by: wer on June 10, 2011, 08:58:02 pm

Well I've been playing around with this myself, trying everything to get it to work, changing directshow settings, etc.

What I have found is that contrary to the other posts by Matt and others, including Matt's dynamite example theme, this current version (105) only looks for .MPG files.

If you have valid video files with any other extensions, it ignores them, resulting in a black screen.

Rename Matt's .WMV file to .MPG and it works fine.  At least it does for me.  I'm not sure if this is your problem too Moe.

But judging from the documentation and other threads, this only scanning for .MPG extentions would seem to be a bug in the current version.  The problem's not with the actual file type, just what extenstions are looked for; any type of file will play, but only if it is named .MPG

Perhaps Jim could comment on if this is a bug or if it was a change.

Title: Re: Can't use video as background in Theater Mode
Post by: Moe on June 10, 2011, 09:12:04 pm

I don't think that's the case, at least not for me. WMV files work just fine as backgrounds on one of my computers. I'll try an mpg on my HTPC to see if that works sometime tomorrow.

Title: Re: Can't use video as background in Theater Mode
Post by: Moe on June 11, 2011, 04:49:35 pm

I just tried an MPG as a video background on my HTPC and it works!  WMV files don't work on my HTPC but they do on my main desktop computer.

Something is definitely amiss but at least I can get video backgrounds on the HTPC as long as they are MPG files.

Title: Re: Can't use video as background in Theater Mode
Post by: wer on June 11, 2011, 05:17:13 pm

I'm sure you'll find you can use any video you want as long as you rename it to .MPG

Hopefully JRiver will take note of this and fix it for a upcoming release.