Iphoto/Itunes movie audio problem

[jewelz22]

OK here's a weird problem I'm having. I created a slideshow in iPhoto and wanted to add music to it. The songs in iTunes that I bought in the iTunes store work great when I export to QuickTime, but the songs I actually own (which I moved over from my CDs) have audio for 2 seconds and then quit.
I created the movie for my MBA class and showed it at a graduation ceremony to Green Day's Good Riddance (bought from iTunes and yes I know it's overused ) and I moved it to my laptop but when I launched QT, it told me I had to have iTunes and that song in my playlist!
2 questions:
1) how can I fix it so I can use songs that I actually own so I don't have the "rights issue"?
2) is there any way to convert to a different format? Some of my classmates want to see it again and I think if I burn it to a CD or make it available on a website I'm worried they'll be asked for iTunes and that song.

Any suggestions would be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Jewelz22

 

[Greenjeens]

OK here's a weird problem I'm having.1) how can I fix it so I can use songs that I actually own so I don't have the "rights issue"?
2) is there any way to convert to a different format?

I can't comment on copy right usage.

However first thing I do when I purchase an iTunes song is is to burn it to a CD-RW. A lot slower (~2X) than a CD-R burn, but I reuse he CD-RW over again.
Then reimport the songs from that CD into Itunes as an Apple Lossless file aa(or AIFF). Takes up lots of space, but the goal is to try to keep artifacts down and quality up. ANY conversions to he original 128 AAC file will degrade sound quality. That's why I keep a copy of all my CD burns as Apple Lossless files, so I can make MP3, AAC or whatever from a Lossless original CD file.

Just because I turn the 128 itunes song file into an Apple Lossless file won't increase quality. Lots of bits have been thrown out, never to be recovered, in the first conversion to the 128bit purchased file, but at least by burning to CD (orCD-RW) all the Digital Rights Management crap is stripped (but at some sonic price).
I don't notice a huge loss in quality, over the orignial, but I'm sure that depends on the kind of music geting multiple codecs applied, playback equipment resolution and one's sensitivity to particular coding errors.

I suspect, but can't prove, that recording to apple lossless or even straight AIFF will minimize destructive multiple codec processing interactions, say compared to reimporting the 128 AAC as an MP3 file.
128 AAC isn't all that great to start with anyway. Ideally, any further conversions to other formats should be avoided, for best sound quality.

Apple has some good tutorials, but most of the settings are in the advanced section.
One tricky point, in order to convert files, making the "advanced" selections available, one needs to set the codec in preferences> advanced and then highlight the individual files in the playlist, to make the setting active.
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Dave