Clip was fine before, now says “Codec could not be opened”??

[Walter Biscardi]

[Elysia Cryer] “We brought in some .avi clips and they seemed to be fine during the editing process but now some of them say “Codec could not be opened.” “

AVI’s are not supported formats for editing in FCP. They need to be converted to Quicktime before you start editing.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.

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[Elysia Cryer]

Thanks for your response. So, there’s nothing I can do to recover what I’ve already done? We spent hours editing and it would be a major drag to have to start over! But at least now we know never to use .avi’s again!

[Don Greening]

[Elysia Cryer] “So, there’s nothing I can do to recover what I’ve already done?”

Convert your .avi files to .mov files first. Then make what you’ve already done “offline” in the sequence and then replace with the converted files. You’re edits should remain in place but will now be accessing the converted files.

– Don

[Rich Ronald]

I’m having similar issues. I have a .mov clip that views just fine in quick time viewer on my mac and when I import it into FCE, I get a white screen on the left and a red screen on the right with “Code could not be opened.”

The original clip was edited on another mac with Final Cut Pro. Are there special settings within .mov that need to be set as it is being initially saved/exported by the other editor on the other mac?

Thanks,

[Tom Wolsky]

What version of FCP was it edited on and exported from? What version are you using?

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP6,” “Basic Training for FCS2” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Rich Ronald]

FCP is version 6 ? FCE is version 4. My mistake in that I couldn’t view this clip in my QT viewer, just the audio could be heard. I have installed ProRes 422 codec and that now works on this file… it’s SD instead of HD but that will work for now.
Thanks!

[Tom Wolsky]

FCE does not support ProRes and will not work without rendering in the timeline. The ProRes codec is only available with Final Cut Studio. The installation of the codec on another system is wholly illegal and a direct violation of the licensing agreement for use of that software.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP6,” “Basic Training for FCS2” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Torbjorn Sassersson]

“Codec could not be opened” – here is one solution

This problem delayed my project a long time before I sat down to fix it. Finally I found a solution. What happened was that I tried to play the .MOV clip that caused the error message “Codec could not be opened” in QuickTime player. The sound was ok but no video.

QuickTime than suggested me to download a codec called “XviD_Codec Component 1.0 alpha”. So I downloaded it and followed the installation instructions. I put the codec inside the QuickTime folder in the Library among the other codes. Note! You must not put the codec inside the QuickTime Library folder within the systems folder.

I restarted QuickTime player and now video was fine. Then I restarted FCP and wonders above all wonders, video was perfect in FCP. No more “Codec could not be opened” when I rendered it.

a Sasser Media Lab solution… established 7 years before the Sasser Worm 😉