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mkv (and other formats) screenshot thumbnails in Finder

K

kanketsu

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 15, 2007
71
0
Hello,

I have Perian 1.1 installed. As you can see in the attached screenshots, the .avi files now show their respective screencaps in Finder. But the .mkv only show as VLC icons. Is there a way to make it appear naturally like the avi files?
(actual screenshots instead of generic icons)

P.S. It should be mentioned that the .mkv can be played in Quicklook (although it somehow strains my Macbook).
 

Attachments

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Both quicktime player & quicklook.

The .mp4 files which show as generic icons won't play in QL/QT, though.
 
kanketsu said:
Hello,

I have Perian 1.1 installed. As you can see in the attached screenshots, the .avi files now show their respective screencaps in Finder. But the .mkv only show as VLC icons. Is there a way to make it appear naturally like the avi files?
(actual screenshots instead of generic icons)

P.S. It should be mentioned that the .mkv can be played in Quicklook (although it somehow strains my Macbook).
Click to expand...

Quicklook or Quicktime? I can play MKVs in Quicktime, but they need to fully load before i can play them, and even then, they are a little stuttery, they play much better in VLC.
 
TheStu said:
Quicklook or Quicktime? I can play MKVs in Quicktime, but they need to fully load before i can play them, and even then, they are a little stuttery, they play much better in VLC.
Click to expand...

Both. No thumbnails in Finder, though - just generic icons.
 
richthomas said:
download Perian and install it. then set your mkvs to always open with QuickTime Player in their get info window. then download Perian Type Installer and install.
Click to expand...

richthomas, I've already installed Perian 1.1. But I followed what you said anyway (the second & third step, although when I opened Peian Type Installer, it said that .mkv is already installed). Unfortunately the result is not very pretty: some generic icons, albeit different ones.
 

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kanketsu said:
richthomas, I've already installed Perian 1.1. But I followed what you said anyway (the second & third step, although when I opened Peian Type Installer, it said that .mkv is already installed). Unfortunately the result is not very pretty: some generic icons, albeit different ones.
Click to expand...

hold the option key and right click on the mkv files and choose "Always open with -> QuickTime Player". if QuickTime Player isnt in the list click "Other…" and choose it in the window that opens.
 
richthomas said:
hold the option key and right click on the mkv files and choose "Always open with -> QuickTime Player". if QuickTime Player isnt in the list click "Other…" and choose it in the window that opens.
Click to expand...

That's exactly what I did. I'm afraid the result is what I posted in previous post's attachment. I restarted the Macbook twice to see if they would somehow"refresh" their thumbnails.. alas, no such luck.
 
kanketsu said:
That's exactly what I did. I'm afraid the result is what I posted in previous post's attachment. I restarted the Macbook twice to see if they would somehow"refresh" their thumbnails.. alas, no such luck.
Click to expand...

do they play with QuickTime? i dont have any mkvs atm but when i did some had Quick Look previews and some had an MKV QuickTime icon from the Perian Type Installer. try removing mkv from the Perian Type Installer and just use VLC to open it or QuickTime using open with.

ill backup one of my DVDs to mkv using HandBrake now and report back to tell you if they have an icon.
 
same here,
i can't even got proper icon preview, got some "white document" or "exec" icons ... :mad:
 
kanketsu said:
So there is no working solution yet.. :(
Click to expand...

i found this guide which tells you how to get mkvs to play in Quick Look. but apparently theres currently no way to make mkvs have icon previews.

muitommy said:
same here,
i can't even got proper icon preview, got some "white document" or "exec" icons ... :mad:
Click to expand...

have you followed the steps above to make mkvs have a QuickTime icon?
 
oh:D, i missed the perian's type installer, thanks!
hmm, that's left me the thumbnails fix and it's all i want:)
 
i have gone through that post :)
i really insist that Apple should put more effort to develop Quick Look ...
 
muitommy said:
i have gone through that post :)
i really insist that Apple should put more effort to develop Quick Look ...
Click to expand...

Mac OS X's QuickTime layer only supports mpeg natively just like Windows only supports wmv natively.

mkv, divx etc are open source so Apple doesnt have to support them and either does Microsoft. codec packs like k-lite enable windows to play open source codecs and Perian allows these codecs to play in QuickTime in OS X. of course theres also VLC which is open source and plays all these codecs too.

for mkv icon previews its up to an open source developer to create a Quick Look plug-in. maybe Perian will develop a Quick Look plug-in in its next release?
 
http://www.quicklookplugins.com/2007/12/16/mkv-matroska-video-files/

this plist edit of quicktime shown above allows quicklook to view mkv files. there is a bit of a glitch when watching mkvs in finder coverflow but the video play fine.

however....

the icons still don't show with a preview of the file (thumbnail) like the other file formats such as .mpeg, .mov, .mp4 and even .avi. Is this because Perian has to load the entire mkv into memory?
 
lately, i find that the icon preview can solved by simply convert the mkv to mov. but i wonder if there will be any disadvantages doing in this way?
afaik, it's just the change of container, but will the quality of video and audio, and the extend functions like subtitle be affected? i'm not quite familiar, please someone share, thanks!
 
paxman said:
http://www.quicklookplugins.com/2007/12/16/mkv-matroska-video-files/

this plist edit of quicktime shown above allows quicklook to view mkv files. there is a bit of a glitch when watching mkvs in finder coverflow but the video play fine.

however....

the icons still don't show with a preview of the file (thumbnail) like the other file formats such as .mpeg, .mov, .mp4 and even .avi. Is this because Perian has to load the entire mkv into memory?
Click to expand...

um… i linked that same page and explained that icon previews for .mkv are still not possible in post #15.

muitommy said:
lately, i find that the icon preview can solved by simply convert the mkv to mov. but i wonder if there will be any disadvantages doing in this way?
afaik, it's just the change of container, but will the quality of video and audio, and the extend functions like subtitle be affected? i'm not quite familiar, please someone share, thanks!
Click to expand...

did you save it as a self-contained movie with QuickTime Pro or did you simply give it a ".mov" extension. if the later then there wont be any quality loss and this could be the "work-around" for giving .mkv an icon preview.
 
Have you tried renaming the file to .avi? Im not in OSX right now so I cant try it, but it works fine in Windows when you have mkv or ogg's that wont create thumbnails despite playing fine in WMP. Quicktime might be more picky about file extensions unlike WMP which could care less, if the extension is not exactly right then it may just give an error, so I dont know if it works.
muitommy said:
lately, i find that the icon preview can solved by simply convert the mkv to mov. but i wonder if there will be any disadvantages doing in this way?
afaik, it's just the change of container, but will the quality of video and audio, and the extend functions like subtitle be affected? i'm not quite familiar, please someone share, thanks!
Click to expand...
The disadvantage would be if you ever need to play it in Windows then you are **** out of luck. It will just give an error and theres no way to fix it afterwards. So I would never do that to files I want to keep for years, you never know what OS you might be using or have to use. I have one file I did that to that I wish I didnt. Quicktime for Windows has no third party codecs and probably never will, this is all Apple's fault for making Quicktime so closed off to the rest of the world and not using installed codecs that all the other players use.
 
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