The dreaded "the filter graph manager won't talk to me" only, no reason this time...

[Nazo]

Ok, surprise, surprise, yet another person with the error "the filter graph manager won't talk to me." Thing is, I read up on it, dug around through all the unanswered people asking for help and those who got partial answers but never got things working and I just don't see any solution. Supposedly if you build a filter graph in graphedit, check that it renders, then remove the renderer and leave the last filter's output open, save that to a graphedit file, it SHOULD open in avisynth via DirectShowSource. Should. Ok, since AVISynth is so darned picky on it's requirements as to what constitutes an acceptable filter for it to "talk to" could someone please define to me just what exactly is required? I mean, I have the video all decoded and everything just waiting to go into a renderer or whatever else wants it, but, AVISynth still just refuses to touch it. I even added overlay mixer like someone said before in one of those threads, but, no go (I think this should have to do more with actually visibly rendering, so I don't think it should be necessary.) The thing to remember is, all I have to do is attach directshow video renderer at the end and nothing else, and when I hit play in graphedit it works 100%. By all the faqs and such, this means it should work with avisynth so long as I remember to remove the video renderer (and I have remembered to do so.)

Is there ANYTHING I can do to get DirectShowSource capable of working?

[Wilbert]

1) Could you post your graph? What's your source?

2) Did you try to add both Overlay mixers (not in the same graph of course)?

[Nazo]

1. Source? You mean the video file? In this most recent case, a 704x396 23.976 FPS XVID AVI file. However, I have tried DirectShowSource on numerous occasions to get a failure (and just now I double verified this by testing another unrelated video.) Remember, they playback just fine in graphedit and my video players without a single hitch, only AVISynth seems to have troubles. I could post my graph if you give me somewhere to post to, but, atm, it's as simple as "AVI Source (input file) -> MPEG4 decompressor -x" (with -x being the disconnected output pin that I can hook directly into the renderer to test the video.)

2. Yes. The original suggestion I saw said something very close to "one of the overlay mixers, I think the second" which made it pretty clear that that was uncertain, so I tried each, one at a time of course. It insists that directshow's graph won't talk to it no matter what I can think to try.

[lamer_de]

Uh, a recent thread with the same problem as mine's :) I can't get grf files to work either; independent of the filetype/content (tried avi, mkv, ogm, mpg4-asp, avc).

Basically, all I want to do is to open avc in mp4 and some ogm files with directshowsource, but it isn't working. The weird thing is that avc-in-mkv is working via dss, but I can't get the same file load when using a .grf. AVC-in-mp4 never works though, and avc-in-ogm does neither. Although on all occasions I get a working filter graph in graphedit (it plays the file when I hit play).
Anyway, here's the graph for a simple file: AVC-in-MP4, no sound (ignore the lagarith in the filename, it's just coming from a lagarith file).

The file dropped onto graphedit gives:
http://xs72.xs.to/pics/06114/graphedit-1.png.xs.jpg (http://xs.to/xs.php?h=xs72&d=06114&f=graphedit-1.png)

Removed the renderer, so that there's an open pin:
http://xs72.xs.to/pics/06114/graphedit-2.png.xs.jpg (http://xs.to/xs.php?h=xs72&d=06114&f=graphedit-2.png)

Gives the following message:
http://xs72.xs.to/pics/06114/vdub-error.png.xs.jpg (http://xs.to/xs.php?h=xs72&d=06114&f=vdub-error.png)

Stripping the ffdshow filter away effectively leaving only Haali's splitter doesn't help either. Avisnth file is only

directshowsource("H:\GPO-04-Lossless\star.grf")

Any ideas would be appreciated.

CU,
lamer_de

[Nazo]

Did you say that it works when you use DirectShowSource on the original file, just not when you use the graph?

I wonder, is there any tool that might actually allow you to view the directshow graph of something in use? For example, I could open up the video file in my media player and see what is connected to what. Or, in the case of lamer_de, if I understood him correctly and the original worked, he could check to see what graph AVISynth ends up using on the original file.


BTW, I wonder if it might not be a bad idea to support XML graphs? Seems like that could be pretty handy since you can do simple things like switch the filename when you have a batch of encodes all about or exactly the same. I don't know, maybe you could use a hex editor, but, obviously that is going a bit far. Don't know if anyone has noticed, but, Graphedit has an option to save as XML.

[foxyshadis]

The 2002 or 2003 version does, all of the newer ones have removed it for some lame reason. nggg. I made the suggestion to do that a while ago, too, it's a good idea if you have the old version.

[Nazo]

Hmm, I tried searching around. Well, it looks like the K-lite codec pack includes it, but, I can't get to the files without installing I think. Don't know, maybe later on I'll set up a VMWare session or something. In theory I should be able to install a bunch of them on there until I find the right one. Unfortunately, since it's the k-lite codec pack I'm talking about here, I absolutely cannot install to my real PC since I like the fact that things actually work right now. (I say k-lite because it would take 5 years to get all the huge SDKs from MS and install one by one, including many of which have probably been removed from download on their site and some of which might even refuse to install.) I don't suppose you'd know a build number? Well, I don't guess you would, just checking.

I think mine's pretty old, so this may not be present in newer ones, but, I see an option which says "Render File." When I use that to open the video file, I suspect the graph it produces is basically what you get in things like Windows Media Player. Well, there is one difference versus what I originally came up with. I originally connected the video file straight to ffdshow, but, when I choose that option in graphedit it tosses the avi splitter in there between the file and ffdshow. Unfortunately, if I remove the render filter and then try that graph in AVISynth, it still fails to work. Oh well, it was worth a try, but, I suspect it's just to split the audio and video, so I'm not surprised it didn't work.

[lamer_de]

While grf files are still not working, I managed to get the "regular" directshowsource to work with all files now. ffdshow was the culprit, I had to uncheck Output->Allow output format changes during playback-> Connect to compatible filters only. Apparently, avisynth isn't seen as a compatible renderer (tooltip lists overlay and vmr modes only). Well, grf files still don't work, but it's not that important, because the regular directshowsource() now does and I don't need any dss-only filters.

CU,
lamer_de

[deets]

oh thanks!! i was getting this problem with my avc mp4 and i couldnt fix it for ages, but it your suggestion has worked :)

yey!