If you have a VideoCD or CD-i movie, just launch the application, click in the window to dismiss the help screen, and stick in the CD the movie should start playing.
If it doesn't start playing, you probably don't have a CD that matches the format of the discs I support in this version of MovieCD Player.
What CDs Work?
There are a few users overseas that have the same titled movies I have, but my software does not work with these CDs. I'm working on this.
I have also had people ask for MovieCD support. These discs are NOT mpeg videos. They are Windows .AVI files compress with a non-standard CODEC. I have talked with the folks at Motion Pixels and at the moment (even with QuickTime 3.0s support for .AVI files) the Macintosh can not view these movies. You probably shouldn't hope for support in the future.
Keyboard Shortcuts.
Once the movie starts playing, the following keyboard commands are available.
Right Arrow - Increase the playback speed. This helps skip undesired sections of the movie.
Left Arrow - Decrease the playback speed. This plays the movie in slow motion and if pressed enough can even start the movie playing backward.
Command-Right Arrow - Skip forward one minute.
Command Left Arrow - Skip backward one minute.
P - Pause the movie (you can also click the mouse) press it again to start the movie. I added a feature that "rewinds" three seconds when you start playing again so that you don't miss anything.
Up Arrow - Increase the volume. You can "overdrive" the speaker up to 150% of normal. This should help with some quite movies. Remember that VideoCDs have pretty good dynamic range so a "loud part" of the movie could become VERY loud.
Down Arrow - Decrease the volume.
B - Blacklining off. To make playback smoother, by default, only every other line is displayed on the screen. This save LOTS of cpu time and almost doubles playback frame rate. If you have a "Wicked Fast" Macintosh, you might be able to get great looking playback without blacklining, but on the computers I have access to, the frame rate penalty is not worth the video quality.
D - Displays movie stats. The first column is minutes into the move, second is frame rate, and if you’re using a PowerBook, the third column is the current battery level.
S - Size change. Switches from 320 x 240 and 640 x 480. Although not as easy to see from far away, the picture quality is much better.
? - Display the help screen.
Command - Q - Quit the application. When you quit if you click the "Quit" button, the next time you run the MovieCD with the same CD inserted, you will be prompted to "Restart" from where you left off. This is a great feature, if the boss walks in, hit quit, save and after he leaves, you can continue right where you left off. Restart location, Size, Blacklining, and Volume are also saved. An entry is made for every CD you play.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q - Why right this application?
A - When Apple Computer first shipped the MPEG extension for QuickTime I thought how great it would be to watch VideoCDs on my PowerBook 1400.
Well the stock 1400 I had at the time was not quite up to the task, but after adding a 167mhz NewerTech upgrade, playback was more than acceptable using Apple's "Movie Player" application.
The only problem was, finding the correct MPEG file to play on each VideoCD or CD-i movie was a pain. Some times I needed to open a .DAT file in the MPEGAV folder, sometimes I had to open a .rtf file at the top level of the CD. Not very consistent and certainly not very "Mac Like"
Q - Where did you get information about CD-i and VideoCD formats?
A - I'm sure the right thing to do would have been to go out an purchase the "GreenBook" specs on CD-i and VideoCDs. That would have been way to easy... Instead I jumped right into HexEdit and started poking around in the data files on the disk.
After about two hours I had figured out how to open the files and find the names of the movie files. I wrote a simple little application that opened the correct files and MovieCD Player was born.
Well, that was about a year ago. Since then I’ve gotten a bunch more movies and lots of feedback from users.
Q - Where can I purchase VideoCD and CD-i movies?
A - Check out the web site <http://www.cdmovies.com> That's where I buy mine.
Q - What does Frames Per Second (FPS) mean?
A - A movie or television program plays still images that fool your eye into thinking there is motion. Movies play at 24 FPS, television plays at 30 FPS. The faster the frame rate, the less jerky the video appears.
Q - Why do the movies playback jerky? Is there anything I can do?
A - Here are five things effect playback performance (FPS).
1) Processor power. The faster the CPU, the more CPU cache, the better the frame rate.
2) Playback size. It takes the computer much less time to send smaller video to the screen. You can increase frame rate by choosing to view the movie in 320 x 240 size.
3) Blacklining - If you turn blacklining off, the computer has to do TWICE the work. On slow computers you can expect to get about 1/2 the number of frames per second. Keep blacklining ON to improve playback.
4) Background Applications - If your computer is busy sharing files or receiving e-mail, movie playback will suffer.
5) MPEG extension version. Always use the latest Apple software. Check <http://quicktime.apple.com> for new versions often.
Q - Why doesn't my CD work?
A - There are two reasons.
1) You might have a CD that is in the "European" format. I'm currently working on this format, it appears to be some kind of "karaoke" format this is different that standard VideoCD discs.
2) You have a non-mpeg based CD. Most of these are called "MovieCD" discs.
Q - Why call the application MovieCD Player if it can’t play MovieCDs
A - I named the application long before I knew that this format existed. There was already an application called VideoCD player and I was trying not to confuse the two programs.
Q - Why not fill the entire screen?
A - I tried this, but when I went to draw the text over the movie (like a VCR does) the playback performance was terrible.
Q - How much does it cost?
A - Nothing, if you like it send me an e-mail. If you find a bug, send me an e-mail. If you think of a feature, send me an e-mail (do you see a pattern here )
About the Author...
I’ve been programming the Macintosh since 1985. I remember the old days when you had to have a Lisa and program in Lisa Programmers Workshop! Wow I’m old!
The first commercial Macintosh product I worked on was FaxSTF. I think we shipped the first versions of that back in 1986. In 1991 I worked for Tenon Intersystems on MachTen. Starting in 1993 I worked on FAXcilitate a major rewrite of FaxSTF. In 1995 I designed user interface for Supra VoiceMail while I was a manager at Diamond Multimedia.
Currently I'm employed fulltime at GlobalCenter as the Manager of Software Development. GlobalCenter isn't in the Macintosh market anymore so I spend most of my time programming Suns.
This application was written on my PowerBook using CodeWarrior C++. Things sure have come a long way.
This application is dedicated to my lovely wife Madeleine. Sorry about the noise dear, I’ll turn it down, go back to sleep ;-)
MovieCD is freeware. Copyright 1996-1997 by Jeffrey G. Backes, all rights reserved.
You may give this application with the documentation to anyone you would like.
