What is wrong with Ableton video ???

[bkruppik]

FIST OFF: THIS IS A PROBLEM WHICH HASN'T BEEN TAKEN CARE OF FOR SEVERAL YEARS WHILE HUNDREDS (if not thousands) USERS COMPLAIN ABOUT THIS SAME SAME ISSUE

I tested several video files in 4 different DAW's.
- Live11
- Studio One 6
- Cubase
- Reaper

The only DAW which could not play the videos (actually the same files) was Ableton LIVE !

This is such a shame, when products which are on the market just a half of the time (that Live is) have more major features served than Ableton which is on the market around 20+ years. Yes I have seen tons of documents and videos about all kind of workarounds but why do we have to deal with all kind of third party crap while LIVE MANUAL SAY - IT WILL PLAY VIDEO FILES !

I'm running Win10, not sure how much of the problems show up on a Mac but in general this is my question to the Forum admins and more to the developers which you people cannot fix this crap for so many years. I remember those issues from version 6 (or so).

Year ago I had to go through those tedious extra installations, dealing with Apple drivers (on a PC - quite insane) and for short time got the video playing, however it was showing up ine the very left top corner (cover4ing the Menu) and without any kind of control (no Play, etc). Few updates later this isn't working again. Basically this is a nightmare for somebody working with video music. Obviously there is nothing wrong with the videos and all comments, workarounds dealing with encapsulation, encoders, version etc have nothing to do with the problem . The fact is that ABLETON LIVE CANNOT PROPERLY DEAL EVEN WITH SIMPLE VIDEO while most of popular DAWs have no issues with exactly same files, on exactly same computer and same OS.

I am slowly leaning towards Studio One because Presonus seem to be much more robust and helpful in bug fixes and it is a company which really listens to the users, while Ableton does not. On top of that Ableton customer support is terrible and often does not even reply to messages.

I again went through installation of all kind of video related crap in order to make the video work and still unsuccessfully. Now when I try to play a Vid LIVE keeps crashing. I am really so sick an tired of dealing with this and I would appreciate it if Ableton Developers can really officially post some explanation why users have so many issues and when those issues finally be fixed. This is really a shame for a company with such a great product and history to have such a limitation !

[[jur]]

Never been a problem on Mac, but it's always been complicated on Windows unfortunately.
Seems like you already read all the info on the topic and I'm afraid I don't have any magical solution to offer.
Please make sure to report to Support if you haven't already. Of course they're aware of the situation, but complains need to be visible.
I'm making sure to forward this on my end, just like every time the topic comes up.

[Rivanni]

You probably already installed the Haali MatroskaSplitter from here: https://haali.net/mkv/ (top right on the page)

Note that the Haali Media Splitter cannot decode files with dimensions greater than 1080p (1920×1080). If you try, you'll get the message 'Could not decode video file'.


There's no need for Apple drivers.

.mov files are best converted to .mp4 beforehand.



That being said, it's all far from optimal on Windows


As for controls in the video window, there are none. As with audio you use the transport bar or navigate inside the clip. You can move (click and drag) and resize the window.

[[jur]]

.mov files are best converted to .mp4 beforehand.

I don't know on windows, but on mac .mp4 isn't a reliable format. You can deal with it if you're doing music, but for sound editing to picture the timing is not precise enough in my experience. Plus, on m1 the performance with .mp4 is ok, but with older machines it's always been a struggle.

[agamben]

Please make sure to report to Support if you haven't already. Of course they're aware of the situation, but complains need to be visible.
I'm making sure to forward this on my end, just like every time the topic comes up.

Do they really care ?
Come on, Live video support on Windows has been broken since the beginning of its existence.
Remember that before the Matroska codecs 'era', we had FFDshow, CCCP codecs packs, even before the 'Quicktime' problems, the 32/64 bits problems, etc...
So there's always been problems for Live handling video on Windows : how come, when cheap/open source programs can play video files flawlessy ?

If they REALLY DO care, why anything hasn't been done DURING ALL THOSE YEARS IN THIS REGARD ?

Isn't a proper VIDEO FILE SUPPORT in a PROFESSIONAL DAW at least AS IMPORTANT as adding yet another synth, reverb or compressor effect ?

What is wrong with Ableton video ???

answer : (on Windows:) EVERYTHING !!!

[avnu]

I feel this so much man. Video handling in Ableton on Windows feels like they havent improved anything in that area since the video feature first came out.

All the things you have to do to make video work (like described on their website regarding codecs, converting videos and so on) is just terrible. Especially because even when I did everything exactly how decribed, video would still make problems regulary. It has been super frustrating for me so far.

I am a sound designer and music composer and get more and more video projects on a regular basis. I love the idea to just use one tool like Ableton for everything which is why I still use it. I really hope that they will fix the video handling as I dont want to switch to other DAWs for projects with videos.

Pretty much every other DAW i tried and other stand alone programms handle video just fluently. You just take a video in whatever format, drag it into the program and it works! I really dont get why this is such a hard thing for Ableton.

[[jur]]

Hey Avnu,

I can only recommend you to contact Support about this.
Indeed they are aware of the issue since ages, but it's always good to add a voice.
This is the kind of forum topic i always forward to the team because I don't understand myself why it isn't getting more attention. Just like you I'm doing music and sound to picture, so even though I never had to use a Windows machine, this topic is dear to my heart and I feel your pain.

[menghi]

Hi guys,

What joke !

I am also a sound designer and just as disgusted as you about Ableton's policy on the use of video on Windows. Poor support, poor tutorial and poor skills. I did a test on REAPER and everything works perfectly with the videos. The daw costs $60. I'm a loyal Ableton user and I don't want to change..
but since years I can't do sound design on video with LIVE...

The only solution offered by Ableton and a software that has been abandoned for 10 years (Haali codec ...). I am disgusted by Ableton's incompetence in the use of videos on Windows: only DIY...
only advice download Haali codec... the prehistory of codecs which have not been maintained for years.

Live is rubbish with video on window and no one can say otherwise. I am disgusted.

[agamben]

This is unacceptable.
Live 12 just got announced, and nothing concerning video support on Windows. It's perhaps not worth the devellopers's time. They have to focus instead on 'sparking musical creativity' by 'introducing playful MIDI tools'. Hopefully Live 13 will compose the music for you from start to finish .

[102455]

Yes admittedly Live is quite restricted on the video side of things - but it's a DAW.

The middle letter A stands for audio. Video is a secondary feature. OK some other DAWs handle video better, but they're still primarily for audio.

Use the correct tool for the job. There are many programs designed for video work.

[AbletonMASCHINE]

Yes admittedly Live is quite restricted on the video side of things - but it's a DAW.

The middle letter A stands for audio. Video is a secondary feature. OK some other DAWs handle video better, but they're still primarily for audio.

Use the correct tool for the job. There are many programs designed for video work.

This! E. g. Davinci Resolve Studio! https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/uk/pro ... nciresolve

But then users will complain that they have to learn its workflow.

[agamben]

I don’t think you get the point. We’re not talking about complex video editing features. It’s just about being able to PLAY a video file on the timeline, in order to make and add AUDIO (the ‘A’ in DAW) or MUSIC to a video file, like Film Scoring for example. Resolve is a NLE and not a DAW indeed (it doesn’t support midi instruments for ex.).

By the way, as stated by Ableton :
« Video import and export is available in Live 10 Standard and Suite. In Live 11, video import and export has also been added to Intro. »

So we should be able to play video files on Windows, and whether it’s an important or secondary feature is up to each user.

edit : to make things even clearer: just importing a single mp4 video file (encoded as per Ableton recommandations) make the program freeze/crash/stutter.

[102455]

I know that historically Live has only supported MOV for video, and from what the Ableton help page states, that still seems to be the case (it's the preferred format).

They only recommend installing one codec pack, and to check via Windows Media Player which codecs are installed. Well I have a bunch of them listed, and I'm reluctant to remove any in case it breaks support in other software, so it does limit things.

Based on how fussy Live is about this, I simply use other software to do video stuff.

[railpressureflip]

Windows Ableton user here!

I discovered this one trick off reddit somewhere, okay for a work around for now;

Drag the video into the arrangement view, now render it as Ableton video export. Drag the new video back into Ableton. That should make it run smoothly! I think the only issue is that it’ll render a lower quality video but at least you’ll be able to have it play smoothly.
Hopefully this helps!

[agamben]

thank you for the tip.
it may work for some, but in my case Live just render a 'black' video, with just the sound working (so video export is broken too !)