Video Stream module bug?

[tomwhite]

Hi

I tried to use the video stream module and it works ... at first sight.
But when I save the scene with an active video stream module, waiting for a stream input and reload the scene, without the stream being active, Magic hangs while loading. No chance of reloading the scene.
@Eric, can you reproduce this behaviour in the actual version of Magic?
I forgot to post it after my last gig with Magic, where I had to kill Magic via the task manager several times :-/
That was a real pain!
Now I have the next gig on sunday and don´t know how to find a solution to that problem, because I saved the last setup and can´t reload it anymore.
I´d really appreciate any help!

Best
Tom

[Magic]

Hmm, no I can't seem to reproduce that...

One thing you can try is disconnecting your machine from the network, and then loading the project. If you don't have a network connection, the VideoStream module will just ignore the URL and load with nothing. Let me know if it helps at all...

[tomwhite]

Hi ERic,

I am disconnected from the network but still the same issue.
I´ll have a new look at that tomorrow and get back to you ...

[Magic]

Ok. Also, another thing you can try is renaming the VideoStream module (inside the Magic/Modules/Media folder). This way, when you load the project, the module won't load at all.

[tomwhite]

Renaming the videostreammodule works
Now I can at least reload the last scene, delete the stream module inside the magic-file and try to setup the stream again.

my syntax in the streaming module looks something like this:
rtsp://username:password123456@192.168.178.111:554/live/ch0

But the problem for my next gig will be the same:
I allways have to deactivate the sream module inside magic, before I turn off the camera that is streming to magic. Otherwise magic stalls, I have to kill it via the taskmanager and restart it.

[Magic]

Ok, I'm glad you got it to work at least . I will have a look at the module to see if I can find any reason for the hanging.

[Rosenbor]

Ok, I'm glad you got it to work at least . I will have a look at the module to see if I can find any reason for the hanging.

This was happening to me too yesterday but it seems to be working fine right now.

[Magic]

Thanks. I think I've identified the cause of this problem and I'll post a fix in the next Beta.

[calartsci]

Please also note that if the WiFi is off, a video file will not load either. On my laptop, even if i close MAGIC and connect to the network, the video file remains unavailable when I reopen MAGIC. The video file option does not appear in the add Media menu, until I reboot the computer. So, if I want the network off during a live performance, I cannot use a video file.
Thanks!

[Magic]

Hmm, just to be clear, are you referring to the VideoFile module? I can assure you that it works without a network connection:

Capture.PNG (29.76 KiB) Viewed 16537 times

In fact, all the modules in Magic work without a network connection, except for the ones that are explicitly network-related, such as the VideoStream module.

Are you sure there isn't something else going on?

[calartsci]

Perhaps my MAGIC is corrupt.
The disappearance of the "VideoFile and Video Stream" options from the media drop-down menu may have been related my failure to change the video file path from a network source to a local source. With the network off, it couldn't load the file...but, along with getting the loading error message, the menu choices disappeared, even after turning on the network. I had to reboot with the network on to get MAGIC back to normal.
Now, however, after several recreations of the situation, I reassigned the video path to my local file, but MAGIC is no longer returning the VideoFile module option to the drop-down "add" menu. It seems broken, even after rebooting several times.
Help?

[Magic]

I'm not sure, but you might want to try reinstalling Magic. If that doesn't work, it might be a conflict with some other software on your system. Did you install anything else around the time this problem started happening?

[calartsci]

There is a story where anything could have gone wrong over the past 2 weeks. I crashed my disk. Had to re-initiate from factory default and reload all programs. Magic and others seemed to work fine. Then decided to substitute a SSD for the suspect disk, because I am trying to optimize an old laptop to run a live MAGIC performance that won't run at a reasonable frame rate/without stuttering with the quality I want by using double buffering & vertical synch. All seemed to be OK, although still stuttering and slowing down. But now, this strange behavior in MAGIC. My desktop PC version works fine...although it also slows and stutters with this performance program, just not as badly as the laptop.

So, I will reload the laptop 2.01 Pro.
Should I just uninstall it, then do a fresh download from the get-full-version webpage and use my existing license key?
Will that work?

Thanks!

[Magic]

Yup, that's what I'd recommend, although I can't say for sure if it will fix the problem. If it doesn't, let me know.

[calartsci]

OK...same issue. I removed MAGIC from my laptop, reinstalled, and everything looked OK. The video module was there.
I loaded the last file I was using prior to the reinstall, and immediately it produced the could-not-load-video file message. When I right-clicked on ADD and selected the media drop-down, Video File & Video Streaming options were missing. I rebooted the computer and everything was OK.
I then loaded an older version of the same file, and it loaded and worked fine. I ran the file about 10 times to test the effects on frame rate and stuttering on various on-off combinations of double buffering and vertical synch for both 80% screen size and full screen. All seemed OK...then control-F stopped working. I looked at the ADD media function again and the Video File & video Streaming options were again missing. I rebooted the computer and everything is back and working.
I then tried loading an unrelated project that also contains a video file. It loaded and played correctly, however afterward, the ADD Media drop down no longer showed Video File & video Streaming options. I had to reboot the laptop to get the video file option back...again.
So, perhaps the glitch is generally video-file related?..or its my laptop!
This is not happening on my desktop running 2.01b1, using the same files.
Is there a way to load 2.01b1 on my laptop?
Thanks!

[Magic]

Well, I looked at 2.01b1 and I can't see any differences that would affect your situation. But you can just copy the Magic folder directly from your desktop to your laptop if you want to test.

Are any other apps giving you problems or is it just Magic?

[calartsci]

Well, back to the drawing board.
I tried running 2.01b1 on the laptop, and it ran fine, once. After closing the app & reopening 2.01b1, I immediately got the failure to load video message, along with the disappearance of the video file option in the media drop-down menu. This is just after successfully running it on 2.01.
So, I closed the 2.01b1 application, and opened 2.01..it also was missing the video file option in the media drop-down menu and would not load the video file.
I then rebooted the laptop, and both 2.01 and 2.01b1 showed the normal media drop-down file including the Video File and Video Stream options.
So it looks like they will both run normally, as many times in a row as I want, just so long as I do not close the application. If I close the app & reopen it, it (typically, but not ALWAYS) will fail to load videos. If I reboot the laptop, Magic will usually open correctly, but sometimes it won't recover even after a reboot.

Since this laptop crashed, and I had to do a new install of Win 10, Norton, and Office, I replaced the hard drive with a SSD & updated the memory to 8GB DDR3 (max config. possible). Everything works great...except for this MAGIC intermittent very-specific failure to load the video file. Perhaps there is some conflicting setting in Windows, but hard to imagine what it could be, and why the magic media module would drop the video file option.

So, I am at a loss. I was on a mission to try to be able to use this laptop for a live performance, but it really cannot generate an acceptable frame rate in full-screen mode. I was working on trying to improve that somehow, but now, this strange new issue has derailed me from the first problem of stuttering, etc, as it's a deal-killer if I can't reliably load the video. Since my desktop runs fine, that's my backup.

Well, if something magically changes, I'll let you know!
Thanks for your thoughts.

[Sadler]

If this was me having this problem I would install a codec pack (maybe k-lite) and see what happened. The I'd use process explorer to see if files were failing to load. I'd look at task manager to see if processes were staying in memory and what CPU, memory and disk they were using. I'd see if ffmpeg could load and play the videos in question outside of Magic. I'd also look in the event manager for application errors. Also disk check, virus check, memory check etc.

I'm not saying doing any of these things will solve or find the issue and these or not very sophisticated debugging methods but it might help you and might help the devs find the issue.

[calartsci]

Sadler,
The video loading issue is not specific to the particular clip. When loaded, a clip runs fine. whether any clip is allowed to load seems to be an intermittent problem. I will look closer at the system resource monitors during execution, and look at where the various bits are stored.
Thanks for the tips!