INFO: Audio on Linux with OpenQuickTime
On many projects, you may want a quick and easy way to view your animation with audio. For example, animators working on lip-syncing need to be able to synchronization of video and audio clips.
On Linux, the only Capture Movie format that supports sound is QuickTime (.mov).
On Linux, the XSI QuickTime parsers (for both import and export) use a GNU open-source library called OpenQuickTime (http://www.openquicktime.org). This library is not distributed with XSI, so you must install it yourself.
Installing OpenQuickTime
Update A 64-bit compiled version is available here (http://community.softimage.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=110).
Sblair 06:17, 1 Aug 2008 (EDT)
We support only OpenQuickTime version 2.0 Do not install version 1.0.
A proper install of openquicktime 2.0 is critical! If 2.0 is not properly installed, XSI will seg fault when it reads or writes QuickTime files on Linux.
To install OpenQuickTime version 2.0
Download openquicktime-2.0.0a1.tar.gz (http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/openquicktime/openquicktime-2.0.0a1.tar.gz?download).
A 64-bit compiled version is available here (http://community.softimage.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=110).
- Log in as root (required to install properly).
Change directories to the directory where openquicktime-2.0.0a1.tar.gz is located, and run these commands:
tar -zxvf openquicktime-2.0.0a1.tar.gz cd openquicktime-2.0.0a1 ./configure make make install
The library is now installed in /usr/local/lib/libopenquicktime.so.1.0.0. To allow XSI to find the library, do one of the following:
Copy the library into your XSI Application/bin directory (you need to do this once only for each installation).
Important Remove ".1.0.0" from the copy of the libray you put in the $XSI_HOME.
cp /usr/local/lib/libopenquicktime.so.1.0.0 $XSI_HOME/Application/bin/libopenquicktime.so
Add the location of the library to your LD_LIBRARY_PATH (must be done each time you source .xsi)
source .xsi5.0 setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH /usr/local/lib/:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
Linux OpenQuickTime FAQ's
- Why doesn't OpenQuickTime capture work on Linux? It tries to capture one frame and then quits!
- Follow the above install instructions exactly. XSI cannot find the libopenquicktime.so library. Make sure that the library libopenquicktime.so is either in your $XSI_HOME/Application/bin directory or that /usr/local/lib is in your LD_LIBRARY_PATH.
- As soon as I try to capture a .mov or change the codec, XSI seg faults.
- This happens if you have in incorrect version of libopenquicktime.so (XSI requires version 2.0), or if the code libraries are missing. Follow the above install instructions exactly!
- Why doesn't my OpenQuickTime movie have audio?
- The first thing to check is that you selected the Capture Audio checkbox before capturing. If you did select Capture Audio, then it is possible that the .mov player you are using doesn't support our audio codec.
- XSI segfaults at the end of the capture
- This is a known problem. Try using different end frames (for example 101 instead of 100).
Quicktime Players for Linux
XSI by default launches mplayer to play .mov files. You can override this with the XSI_PLAYER (http://softimage.wiki.avid.com/xsidocs/ani_play_CapturingAnimationinaViewport.htm) environment variable.
Here's a list of some players for the .mov files generated by XSI.
| Media Player | XSI QT Video | XSI QT Audio | Frame by Frame (video) | Frame by Frame (audio) | Price |
| Cinelerra (http://www.heroinewarrior.com/cinelerra.php3) | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Free |
| Xine (http://xinehq.de) | Yes | Yes | No | No | Free |
| FrameCycler (http://www.framecycler.com/) | Yes | Yes | Yes | ?? | ~$250 |
| Xmovie (http://heroinewarrior.com/xmovie.php3) | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Free |
| Mplayer (http://mplayerhq.com/) | Yes | No | Yes | ?? | Free |
| Xanim (http://xanim.polter.net/) | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Free |
