Canon : TV Paint Application Crash

[D.T. Nethery]

I am also experiencing this same problem using TVPaint 9.5 and Canon ZR960. Has anyone resolved this issue yet?

Mark S -

I hope you can run the test that Fabrice suggests, using an older version of TVPaint , to see if we can isolate when this bug occurred. The Canon ZR 960 was tested with TVPaint and worked fine with both Windows and Mac. Which version of TVPaint are you using , Windows or Mac (and is your version TVPaint 9.5.18 or earlier ) ?

Can you also describe precisely what happens when you try to capture frames using the Canon ZR 960 -- does it crash immediately upon trying to grab frames, or does it crash randomly/unpredictably , or does it crash upon trying to save a sequence of captured frames ?

If you could upload screen captures of your TVPaint Video-Input settings that would help, too.

[Fabrice]

Thanks David,

Indeed, the more informations and helping people we can get, the sooner we can fix bugs.

[D.T. Nethery]

Thanks David,

Indeed, the more informations and helping people we can get, the sooner we can fix bugs.

Fabrice,

I am also in touch with Mark off-forum . It turns out he is one of our students at AAU online. I hope to speak with him on Skype later today to help troubleshoot the issue further. I've urged him to contact Elodie to try the test with the older versions of TVP using the Canon ZR 960 mini-dv camera , so we can try to isolate the bug in 9.5.18 . Or find out if it is some other system conflict that is causing the crashing. It's puzzling to me because not all students using the Canon ZR 960 report the crashing behavior , so I can't figure out what the common factor is that causes the crashing. (by the way , do crash reports help you ? If the student saves the crash report as a text file and emails it to you will that help isolate what the conflict is that is causing the crashes ?)

Here is what I know from my email communication with Mark :

Operating system : Windows 7 Home Premium edition, 64 bit mode.
Camera: Canon ZR 960 , attached to computer via firewire (IEEE 1394)
TVP version : 9.5.18

He has tried the camera using the freeware frame-capture app "MonkeyJam" and it worked . He was able to capture frames using MonkeyJam, so we know the camera and firewire cable are functioning correctly.

When he opens TVP Video Input window he can see the live video feed from the camera in the preview window. However, when he clicks on "Grab Input" to grab a frame there is an error message which pops up saying that TVPaint has encountered an error and then the program quits.

-DN


Screen captures below from Skype session to troubleshoot issue with TVP Video-Input crashing with Canon ZR960 mini-dv.
Device is showing as: "WDM".
Input: "Microsoft DV Camera" (does not show as Canon ZR 960 ... why ?)
Format: 720 x 480 DVSD
Clicking on Settings only brings up a single panel "Digital VCR Control" , nothing else. This is very different from Mac version of Settings panel
which brings up ability to adjust image as well as select the input device and set the compression codec (H.264 or whatever) . That surprised me , but I only know the Mac version , not Windows version.
We changed the Startup from Last Project Settings to Start Up Panel.

Could this be an issue with the WDM driver ? Does it need to be updated ?
I'm at a disadvantage here because I am not on a Windows computer, I'm on Mac, so I don't have
the experience working with Windows .

[D.T. Nethery]

Fabrice, (and anyone else following this issue)

I sent out an email to all the students at my school who are using TVPaint for stop-motion frame capture , to ask if anyone else was experiencing problems capturing frames with Canon ZR 960 or any other mini-dv camera .

This morning I just heard back from one student who writes:


"I am using a Canon ZR 600 and it works great with the TVP software".


So there is at least one other student who confirms that TVPaint works great with a Canon mini-dv camera.

I checked the Canon Support website and the specs on Canon ZR 600 show that it is very similar to the recommended Canon ZR-960. In terms of the frame-capture function the two cameras are basically identical , both use dv-out IEEE 1394 .

I have asked the other student to confirm that he is using TVP 9.5.18 (or earlier version ?) and if he is on Windows or Mac.

-------

*EDIT: the other student who reported to me:
"I am using a Canon ZR 600 and it works great with the TVP software" has confirmed that he is running TVP 9.5.18 on a Macbook Pro with Mac OS 10.6.8. He has had no problems with frame-capture in TVP using his Canon ZR 600 (very similar camera to Canon ZR 960) .

-------

Hopefully we are getting closer to solving this mystery of why sometimes TVPaint is crashing when frame-capturing with Canon (or other) mini-dv cameras.

Does this provide a clue:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows ... 54502.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I did some searching on the internet and apparently Microsoft changed their IEEE 1394 drivers , which has caused reports of some other applications crashing when attempting to capture images from devices connected by firewire.

Read this post:

http://forum.corel.com/EN/viewtopic.php ... 08#p217708" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

where the user suggests:

"Right click on the firewire host controller entry in the Device Manager and choose Update Driver Software

Browse My Computer for driver software

Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer

Select 1394 OHCI Compliant Host Controller (Legacy) and then Next "

[Fabrice]

Hi David,

I received everything.
I can't answer deeply today, but I will try tomorrow for sure.

[D.T. Nethery]

Hi David,

I received everything.
I can't answer deeply today, but I will try tomorrow for sure.

Hi, Fabrice,

I received your email (and the one from Elodie) confirming that there is in fact a bug in the Windows version of TVP 9.5.18 which causes the application to freeze/crash when attempting to capture frames using a mini-dv camera connected via firewire/IEEE 1394. (for example Canon ZR 960 mini-dv) . At this time it appears that the Mac version of TVP 9.5.18 is not afflicted by this bug.

I realize the you are currently in Ottawa for the animation festival, but hopefully there can be a fix for this bug soon. I will stay in contact with you about it via email and advise the effected students.

-DN

[Fabrice]

hello David,

At least, we should be able to provide an old version of TVPaint Animation 9.5 to your affected students.

But I guess the dev team will track and find the bug, at least by comparing the code of the current version with the code of the older one.

Please forward me the email address of the people having problems.

[Fabrice]

ok, bug found and fixed.

Please update your software to the version : 9.5.20.

Thanks again Mark S, David, and everybody for your help. (Mark S, check the good news in your email )