What's a good free Windows video editor that crops out data in the MP4 video frame?

Paul wrote:
Big Al wrote:
On 09/28/2017 12:05 PM, harry newton wrote:
He who is Big Al said on Thu, 28 Sep 2017 10:49:08 -0400:

I did a lot of editing years ago with a paid version (yes I know,
the OP wanted free, but..) of Magix Movie Maker in Win7 or 8(?). It
allowed multiple video layers (as well as audio). It had no
ability to edit the video as you want, but I would think you might
be able to make a transparent PNG image of a black rectangle(s) and
put it in a 2nd video track or overlay or whatever the programs term
is. It would be an engineering feat to get the black spots to fit
in one PNG but...

I've used Avidemux lately but only to convert formats, trim and
brightness levels.

One of the two great advantages of Payware is that Payware tells you the
possibilities of what can be done with freeware. The second great
advantage
of Payware is that it gives you a *technique* for solving the problem
(and
usually lots of good search keywords).

So this overlaying of a black PNG rectangle technology makes sense
for the
task of blocking out or blurring out certain areas of a video.
But would only be successful if the video does not move around on the
screen. Or at least much, as you could reposition the PNG now and
then but you'd like it to be as simple as possible.


I found another way to do it, using Imagemagick.

*******

big.bmp # some picture with text to remove
small.bmp # just the text string plus some border area
blank.bmp # image the same size as small.bmp, to be used to erase the
field

magick compare -metric rmse -subimage-search big.bmp small.bmp result.bmp

0 (0) @ 501,285
[Also returns two files result-0.bmp and result-1.bmp ...]

magick convert big.bmp blank.bmp -geometry +501+285 -compose over
-composite result.bmp

[returns result.bmp, not to be confused with the other two (useless)
files]

In this picture, you can see the portion of the image
it zapped. I picked a Google address, similar to the one
above it, but only differing in one digit. And it found
the string OK and the coordinates of where to put the box.

https://s26.postimg.org/xzgf91dm1/result.gif

But the first command was slow, so... don't try this
at home. If you had to do that 60,000 times to fix
every frame in the video, you would be old and gray
before it finished. It would take around 2000 hours.
Even with a ThreadRipper, it's going to take a while.

The "rmse" stands for root mean square error, and I suspect it
moves the small image to every possible position inside
the dimensions of the big image, then computes an error number
based on summing the squares of the differences of all the pixels,
then taking the square root. Comparing all the positions,
and taking the position with the least error. An error of "0"
in this case. If you had multiple instances of the string
to remove, you would run it multiple times. As long as
each run removed an instance, it should find all of them
sooner or later.

It's a lot easier to just drop a rectangle on the video
and have a video editor remove it. As long as the location
it needs is fixed. If the location of the text string
was moving around in the video, then the extra work of
tracking it like above, might be worth it.

Paul

I found another utility to find the text to
blot out, within a larger picture. This is a Linux
package called xautomation. This is probably a
hundred times faster at finding the coordinates
of the area to blot out. (But it might not be
noise resistant.)

visgrep big.png small.png

501,285 -1

That program uses PNG files, so the files may
need to be converted, before doing the actual
command to blot out the area. Maybe my original
photo was a .bmp .

magick convert big.bmp blank.bmp -geometry +501+285 -compose over -composite result.bmp

Now I'm down to maybe 33 hours to automatically
edit a movie (a frame at a time). With the advantage
that if the window containing the text was moved
around, it would be automatically covered. What
the method might not cover, is if the window
was partially obscured (and the text to be covered
was only partially exposed).

Paul

He who is Stan Brown said on Thu, 28 Sep 2017 21:01:23 -0400:

Don't use Google. Use DuckDuckGo, or Startpage, or one of the other
search engines.

I actually don't (normally) use Google for my googling.

In fact, in this very thread, my search results were presented as:
This gets too generic a result:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=best+freeware+video+editor+crop+blur+tool+Windo ws+10
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=best+freeware+video+editor+redact+blur+tool+Win dows+10

However, I did use the word "googling" as a generic expression for
"searching using a web-based search engine", which anyone can be forgiven
for thinking I actually use Google, but I default to DuckDuckGo for the
well known privacy reasons.

I haven't performed scientific studies, but, just as others intimated, I
also feel that google.com search results are flawed in so many ways that
DDG searches aren't - but - it seems sometimes (and perhaps most times) -
the google.com searches do reveal that which DDG can't.

As someone else noted, the google.com searches seem to be overly stacked in
favor of meaningless results, so I'm often finding myself starting half a
page down and even on the second page when using Google.com and less so
when using DDG.

I haven't run any side-by-side studies, so, this is just a hunch, where 90%
of my decision not to use google.com searches is due to the privacy set of
reasons and not the results set of reasons.

On Fri, 29 Sep 2017 18:15:45 -0400, nospam wrote:

Startpage.com should give you the same results as Google without

the user

actually connecting to Google.

it can't give the same results unless it connects to google,

See above.

and a
quick check indicates that the results are close, but not the same.

Sponsored links are left out if I'm not mistaken.

--
s|b

In article , s|b
wrote:


Startpage.com should give you the same results as Google without

the user

actually connecting to Google.

it can't give the same results unless it connects to google,

See above.

then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

and a
quick check indicates that the results are close, but not the same.

Sponsored links are left out if I'm not mistaken.

i'm not talking about those, plus, it's much better for the user to
decide whether they're relevant and whether or not to ignore them.
sometimes they're useful, sometimes not. same as any other search
query.

On Sat, 30 Sep 2017 16:38:56 -0400, nospam wrote:

then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

Sponsored links are left out if I'm not mistaken.

i'm not talking about those, plus, it's much better for the user to
decide whether they're relevant and whether or not to ignore them.
sometimes they're useful, sometimes not. same as any other search
query.

I could be wrong, but sponsored links are also part of the results, but
not always on top.

--
s|b

In article , s|b
wrote:


then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

they don't do anything that users can't do on their own.

there's also a downside, because targeted search results are often what
the user wants.

why sift thru dozens or even hundreds of irrelevant links when what the
user actually wants to see can be at top of the list?

for example, if a farmer and a technologist search for 'apple', the
results should be weighted differently. startpage won't know what to
do, so both will have to deal with irrelevant crap.

On 1-10-2017 1:22, nospam wrote:
In article , s|b
wrote:


then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

they don't do anything that users can't do on their own.

there's also a downside, because targeted search results are often what
the user wants.

why sift thru dozens or even hundreds of irrelevant links when what the
user actually wants to see can be at top of the list?

for example, if a farmer and a technologist search for 'apple', the
results should be weighted differently. startpage won't know what to
do, so both will have to deal with irrelevant crap.

If i search for `apple` i get a full page of a ****ty computer firm.
Appel gives me info about a healthy fruit, what i wanted in the
first place........

In article , Sjouke Burry
wrote:

On 1-10-2017 1:22, nospam wrote:
then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

they don't do anything that users can't do on their own.

there's also a downside, because targeted search results are often what
the user wants.

why sift thru dozens or even hundreds of irrelevant links when what the
user actually wants to see can be at top of the list?

for example, if a farmer and a technologist search for 'apple', the
results should be weighted differently. startpage won't know what to
do, so both will have to deal with irrelevant crap.

If i search for `apple` i get a full page of a ****ty computer firm.

dell shows up?

Appel gives me info about a healthy fruit, what i wanted in the
first place........

that's nice.

On 09/30/2017 07:22 PM, nospam wrote:
In article , s|b
wrote:


then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

they don't do anything that users can't do on their own.

there's also a downside, because targeted search results are often what
the user wants.

why sift thru dozens or even hundreds of irrelevant links when what the
user actually wants to see can be at top of the list?

for example, if a farmer and a technologist search for 'apple', the
results should be weighted differently. startpage won't know what to
do, so both will have to deal with irrelevant crap.


You are assuming that the farmer will ALWAYS be searching for 'apple' in
the context of agriculture, and the technologist will ALWAYS be
searching in the context of technology.

What if the farmer is looking for a new computer, and the technologist
wants to bake a pie? The weighted results will be irrelevant to both.

This is a common error for you. You consistently assume that what works
for you will work for everyone else. You assume that your way is the
only way.

Maybe the Google user wants to see results that might be inconsistent
with his previous searches. Maybe the Google user wants to make his own
decisions about what is relevant for him. In that case, Google's
'filtering' is a disservice.

--
Ken Hart

On 09/30/2017 05:20 PM, s|b wrote:
On Sat, 30 Sep 2017 16:38:56 -0400, nospam wrote:

then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

Sponsored links are left out if I'm not mistaken.

i'm not talking about those, plus, it's much better for the user to
decide whether they're relevant and whether or not to ignore them.
sometimes they're useful, sometimes not. same as any other search
query.

I could be wrong, but sponsored links are also part of the results, but
not always on top.


While I am not thrilled about Google using my searches monetarily,
someone has to pay for that 'secret location' server farm. So startpage
doesn't have the expense of doing the searches, they do have some
expenses. Who is paying them?

Follow the money.

--
Ken Hart

In article , Ken Hart
wrote:

then startpage connects to google for the user. no point in that.
either way, users are connecting to google, directly or indirectly.

might as well connect to google directly and skip the middleman.

You're missing the point. Go to https://www.startpage.com/ and click
on the circle below 'How we protect you'.

they don't do anything that users can't do on their own.

there's also a downside, because targeted search results are often what
the user wants.

why sift thru dozens or even hundreds of irrelevant links when what the
user actually wants to see can be at top of the list?

for example, if a farmer and a technologist search for 'apple', the
results should be weighted differently. startpage won't know what to
do, so both will have to deal with irrelevant crap.


You are assuming that the farmer will ALWAYS be searching for 'apple' in
the context of agriculture, and the technologist will ALWAYS be
searching in the context of technology.

i'm not assuming anything. i'm explaining an algorithm, one which is
apparently well over your head.

What if the farmer is looking for a new computer, and the technologist
wants to bake a pie? The weighted results will be irrelevant to both.

learn what weighting means. also learn what hypothetical example means.

This is a common error for you. You consistently assume that what works
for you will work for everyone else. You assume that your way is the
only way.

wrong on that too. this has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with me
or anyone else. it's an algorithm.

Maybe the Google user wants to see results that might be inconsistent
with his previous searches. Maybe the Google user wants to make his own
decisions about what is relevant for him. In that case, Google's
'filtering' is a disservice.

the point you fail to grasp is that google gets it right far more often
than it gets it wrong.

nothing is perfect, and the user *always* makes the final decision.

In message , s|b
writes:
[]
I could be wrong, but sponsored links are also part of the results, but
not always on top.

I think there are at least two forms of what might be called sponsored
links:

1. The sort that have a little "[Ad]" box. These I don't _really_ mind,
as I presume they go towards funding the service, and are honest about
it. I've seen them both at the top and the bottom, though not sure if
both at once or both on the same system (i. e. settings - including
cookies - may affect where they appear). They _do_ seem to have a poorer
matching algorithm than the non-[Ad] search results, i. e. they pop up
where they're not only not wanted but not relevant, but I tolerate that.
2. The more insidious ways, which we can only surmise, by which
companies (etc.) get their sites to come higher in the (non-[Ad])
rankings. This _could_ just be clever (and evil) scripting and the like,
or could - depending on the thickness of the tinfoil in your hat - be
related to other payments to Google. (E. g. for tracking services.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Thay have a saying for it: /Geiz ist geil/, which roughly translates as, "It's
sexy to be stingly". - Joe Fattorini, RT insert 2016/9/10-16

In article , J. P. Gilliver
(John) wrote:

I think there are at least two forms of what might be called sponsored
links:

1. The sort that have a little "[Ad]" box. These I don't _really_ mind,
as I presume they go towards funding the service, and are honest about
it. I've seen them both at the top and the bottom, though not sure if
both at once or both on the same system (i. e. settings - including
cookies - may affect where they appear). They _do_ seem to have a poorer
matching algorithm than the non-[Ad] search results, i. e. they pop up
where they're not only not wanted but not relevant, but I tolerate that.

those are easy to see and optionally block.

2. The more insidious ways, which we can only surmise, by which
companies (etc.) get their sites to come higher in the (non-[Ad])
rankings. This _could_ just be clever (and evil) scripting and the like,

it's called seo, and if it's too evil, google will derank it.

or could - depending on the thickness of the tinfoil in your hat - be
related to other payments to Google. (E. g. for tracking services.)

it isn't.

"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote

| I think there are at least two forms of what might be called sponsored
| links:
|
| 1. The sort that have a little "[Ad]" box. These I don't _really_ mind,
| as I presume they go towards funding the service, and are honest about
| it.

Those are kind of sleazy in that the search engines
usually try to make the distinction as slight as possible,
clearly hoping that people won't notice it's an ad. Though
Google seems to be going the other way. I rarely use
Google, but if I try it now I find the ad is on the right
side, like the old style. *That* I don't mind. It's clearly
an ad. While DDG still tries to make the ads look like
listings.

| They _do_ seem to have a poorer
| matching algorithm than the non-[Ad] search results, i. e. they pop up
| where they're not only not wanted but not relevant, but I tolerate that.
| 2. The more insidious ways, which we can only surmise, by which
| companies (etc.) get their sites to come higher in the (non-[Ad])
| rankings. This _could_ just be clever (and evil) scripting and the like,
| or could - depending on the thickness of the tinfoil in your hat - be
| related to other payments to Google. (E. g. for tracking services.)

A good example of sleazy SEO was the eplastics.com site I
mentioned earlier:

http://www.eplastics.com/Where-to-buy-Plexiglass

That page is scam SEO. It's just a long list of keywords
pretending to be a store locations page. Since the site
is online-only there's no excuse for a store locations
page in the first place. (At one time the SEs cracked
down on the exact same thing done in text to match
the background. That is, lists of keywords would be on
the page white-on-white. The page linked above is no
different. They just didn't hide the list and ironically
that helps to avoid a demerit.)

That site also had an ad on the
search page and showed up twice, something like
5th and 17th, despite being largely irrelevant to my
search terms. Accident? Highly unlikely. I think it would
be naive to think Google advertisers don't get an extra
kick. But it could be *seemingly* innocent. For instance,
buying an ad when someone searches for "lexan" may
be counted as the site being relevant to a "lexan"
search. Seems logical. Games the system from the
inside in a way that can be defended.

Another problem that gets past the SEs is nonsense,
computer-generated text that appears to be coherent
at a casual glance. People create those sites as a frame
to hang ads on. They're cheating advertisers but also
adding to bad search results.

Procter and Gamble recently decided to cut back on
online ads in general after finding they seem to have
no effect!

https://www.wsj.com/articles/p-g-cut...ads-1501191104

With SEO, I don't think there's any way to entirely protect
from cheating. And dishonest vs honest is a hard line to draw.
I used to go to a dentist who had paid for a website.
His pages had giant META tags that listed all of the cities
and towns within 20 miles. That was kind of dumb SEO.
It provides no real benefit and could cause a demerit with
Google. But the idea was OK. Listing relevant search terms in
META tags is valid.

SEO in general is a valid way to try to get the SEs
to notice a site. I think that actually a lot of the dishonesty
is on the part of SEO sellers. They make it sound like
your business depends on their secret formulae. But
they're just not that powerful.

I find the whole thing seems to be spotty. On my own
site Google lists some things with a high rating and doesn't
notice others. Also, it's not very intelligent. Someone
who searches for "tea pot" may never find "tea kettle",
and vice versa. That kind of thing is harder to deal with
these days as a web designer or SEO seller because the
search terms are only sent to the landing page in rare
circumstances. I generally no longer know how people
arrived.

And Google values a number of factors that don't always
apply. For example, frequent updates and incoming links
are both valued highly. That means Home Depot gets a
high rating while a chemist, working alone, giving away a
formula to live for 200 years, will never be discovered.
No one is linking to him and he doesn't rewrite his page
daily, so google judges him to be irrelevant. It's heavily
skewed commercially. That in itself is a distortion, arguably
cheating. Would Google only value commercial sites if they
didn't make all their money on targetted ads?

Finally, Google have shown themselves to be thoroughly
dishonest any number of times. One glaring example was
that they lied "through their teeth" about collecting data
from unprotected wifi with their streetview vehicles, claiming
it was an accident -- until the actual software to do the
job turned up.

And if you search for "google settles with EU" you'll
find an almost yearly case of Google being fined and/or
settling in some way with charges of cheating. Just last
week Google announced changes to comply with the
EU, after being charged a $2.8 billion fine. The fact
they're paying fines like that seems to show that
Google make *a lot* of money by cheating. I guess
they're hungry. They made billions back when they just
had pplain text ads on the right with no spyware or
data collection. They demonstrated that the privacy
intrusion of targetted ads is not necessary. But billions
wasn't enough for them.

It's become like a shopping guide in a shopping mall.
They might refer you to a store outside the mall, but
that's really not the purpose of the guide. I doubt the
Googlites even see themselves as a search engine at
this point. They're just the grease of online commerce.

Mayayana wrote:

Procter and Gamble recently decided to cut back on
online ads in general after finding they seem to have
no effect!

https://www.wsj.com/articles/p-g-cut...ads-1501191104

It's amazing how much coverage there is of that.

http://adage.com/article/cmo-strateg...slashe/309936/

"Procter & Gamble's concerns about where its ads were
showing up online contributed to a $140 million cutback

P&G didn't call out YouTube, the subject of many marketers'
ire earlier this year, in its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings
release, but did say digital ad spending fell because of
choices to "temporarily restrict spending in digital forums
where our ads were not being placed according to our
standards and specifications."
"

Rather than being largely ineffective, they were worried
about some questionable Youtube video content, have
their advert for "Flounce" show up in the middle of it.
I guess the two effects cancel out.

The reason I was looking for additional articles, was to
see whether they used lab rats to measure their advert
effectiveness. It doesn't look like that kind of decision.

Paul