Video leaving me blue... :-)

[David Guntner-3]

Hello, all,

Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).

Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.

Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?

                  --Dave

[Anssi Hannula-3]

David Guntner wrote:

> Hello, all,
>
> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>
> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>
> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?

Reset Xvideo settings. Many programs handle resetting badly, you can do
it manually with xvattr:
xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
(this results in a BadMatch error, as xvattr tries to read
XV_SET_DEFAULTS after setting it, and XV_SET_DEFAULTS is write-only;
this is expected)

--
Anssi Hannula

[David Guntner-3]

Anssi Hannula wrote:

> David Guntner wrote:
>> Hello, all,
>>
>> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
>> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
>> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>>
>> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
>> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
>> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
>> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>>
>> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>
> Reset Xvideo settings. Many programs handle resetting badly, you can do
> it manually with xvattr:
> xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
> (this results in a BadMatch error, as xvattr tries to read
> XV_SET_DEFAULTS after setting it, and XV_SET_DEFAULTS is write-only;
> this is expected)

Had to install the package to do that. :-)  But once done and run:

$ xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
Found Xv 2.2
X Error of failed request:  BadMatch (invalid parameter attributes)
  Major opcode of failed request:  142 (XVideo)
  Minor opcode of failed request:  14 ()
  Serial number of failed request:  12
  Current serial number in output stream:  12


Ok, so there's the BadMatch error you mentioned.  However, upon running
that, no change.  Looking at video still has everything blue-tinted.

                  --Dave

[Anssi Hannula-3]

David Guntner wrote:

> Anssi Hannula wrote:
>> David Guntner wrote:
>>> Hello, all,
>>>
>>> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
>>> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
>>> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>>>
>>> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
>>> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
>>> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
>>> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>>>
>>> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>> Reset Xvideo settings. Many programs handle resetting badly, you can do
>> it manually with xvattr:
>> xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
>> (this results in a BadMatch error, as xvattr tries to read
>> XV_SET_DEFAULTS after setting it, and XV_SET_DEFAULTS is write-only;
>> this is expected)
>
> Had to install the package to do that. :-)  But once done and run:
>
> $ xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
> Found Xv 2.2
> X Error of failed request:  BadMatch (invalid parameter attributes)
>   Major opcode of failed request:  142 (XVideo)
>   Minor opcode of failed request:  14 ()
>   Serial number of failed request:  12
>   Current serial number in output stream:  12
>
>
> Ok, so there's the BadMatch error you mentioned.  However, upon running
> that, no change.  Looking at video still has everything blue-tinted.

Which video card, which driver?
Did you run the above while watching video? If not, try it like that.

Also, provide the output of xvinfo command (you'll probably need to
install that one as well).

--
Anssi Hannula

[Len Lawrence]

David Guntner wrote:

> Hello, all,
>
> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>
> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>
> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>
>                   --Dave
>

I remember several months ago I had a similar problem on 2008.1 and I
fixed it by adjusting the hue in totem.  In video preferences it had to
be set to the extreme right but the strange thing is on testing it on a
WMV file just now I find all the sliders at the centre position and
colour is fine.  vlc plays OK as well.  I did tinker with the video
output format, Xv and all that without success, but the default seems to
work fine now.  The hue slider did the trick but the defaults for colour
balance also now work fine.  Sorry I cannot be of more help.  Stick with
the experts.

Len

[Anssi Hannula-3]

Len Lawrence wrote:

> David Guntner wrote:
>> Hello, all,
>>
>> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
>> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
>> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>>
>> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
>> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
>> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
>> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>>
>> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>>
>>                   --Dave
>>
> I remember several months ago I had a similar problem on 2008.1 and I
> fixed it by adjusting the hue in totem.  In video preferences it had to
> be set to the extreme right but the strange thing is on testing it on a
> WMV file just now I find all the sliders at the centre position and
> colour is fine.  vlc plays OK as well.  I did tinker with the video
> output format, Xv and all that without success, but the default seems to
> work fine now.  The hue slider did the trick but the defaults for colour
> balance also now work fine.  Sorry I cannot be of more help.  Stick with
> the experts.

At least NVIDIA recently changed their driver behaviour with some cards,
so that the center is correct instead of extreme right/left. The problem
here is that the "default value" is not defined in the Xv API, and some
programs assume that center is the default, which is not always true.

--
Anssi Hannula

[David Guntner-3]

Anssi Hannula wrote:

> David Guntner wrote:
>> Had to install the package to do that. :-)  But once done and run:
>>
>> $ xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
>> Found Xv 2.2
>> X Error of failed request:  BadMatch (invalid parameter attributes)
>>   Major opcode of failed request:  142 (XVideo)
>>   Minor opcode of failed request:  14 ()
>>   Serial number of failed request:  12
>>   Current serial number in output stream:  12
>>
>>
>> Ok, so there's the BadMatch error you mentioned.  However, upon running
>> that, no change.  Looking at video still has everything blue-tinted.
>
> Which video card, which driver?

Nvidia, using the Mandriva-supplied packages.

$ rpm -qa|egrep -i nvidia
dkms-nvidia-current-169.12-4mdv2008.1
nvidia-current-kernel-desktop-latest-169.12-1.20081031.4mdv2008.1
nvidia-current-doc-html-169.12-4mdv2008.1
x11-driver-video-nvidia-current-169.12-4mdv2008.1
nvidia-current-kernel-2.6.24.7-desktop-2mnb-169.12-4mdv2008.1


Just a reminder:  Everything else on my screen looks just fine - desktop
wallpaper, displaying pictures, etc.

> Did you run the above while watching video? If not, try it like that.

Interestingly enough, when I ran that command during video playback in
totem, it did correct the hue.  Unfortunately, it didn't "stick."  When
I exited the video player and then restarted it, things were back to
blue again.

> Also, provide the output of xvinfo command (you'll probably need to
> install that one as well).

Nope, didn't need to install that.  Looks like it got installed as part
of the urpmi install of the other package. :-)

$ xvinfo
X-Video Extension version 2.2
screen #0
  Adaptor #0: "NV17 Video Texture"
    number of ports: 32
    port base: 280
    operations supported: PutImage
    supported visuals:
      depth 24, visualID 0x21
      depth 24, visualID 0x24
      depth 24, visualID 0x25
      depth 24, visualID 0x26
      depth 24, visualID 0x27
      depth 24, visualID 0x28
      depth 24, visualID 0x29
      depth 24, visualID 0x2a
      depth 24, visualID 0x2b
      depth 24, visualID 0x2c
      depth 24, visualID 0x2d
      depth 24, visualID 0x2e
      depth 24, visualID 0x2f
      depth 24, visualID 0x30
      depth 24, visualID 0x31
      depth 24, visualID 0x32
      depth 24, visualID 0x33
      depth 24, visualID 0x34
      depth 24, visualID 0x35
      depth 24, visualID 0x36
      depth 24, visualID 0x37
      depth 24, visualID 0x38
      depth 24, visualID 0x39
      depth 24, visualID 0x3a
      depth 24, visualID 0x3b
      depth 24, visualID 0x3c
      depth 24, visualID 0x3d
      depth 24, visualID 0x3e
      depth 24, visualID 0x22
      depth 24, visualID 0x3f
      depth 24, visualID 0x40
      depth 24, visualID 0x41
      depth 24, visualID 0x42
      depth 24, visualID 0x43
      depth 24, visualID 0x44
      depth 24, visualID 0x45
      depth 24, visualID 0x46
      depth 24, visualID 0x47
      depth 24, visualID 0x48
      depth 24, visualID 0x49
      depth 24, visualID 0x4a
      depth 24, visualID 0x4b
      depth 24, visualID 0x4c
      depth 24, visualID 0x4d
      depth 24, visualID 0x4e
      depth 24, visualID 0x4f
      depth 24, visualID 0x50
      depth 24, visualID 0x51
      depth 24, visualID 0x52
      depth 24, visualID 0x53
      depth 24, visualID 0x54
      depth 24, visualID 0x55
      depth 24, visualID 0x56
      depth 24, visualID 0x57
      depth 24, visualID 0x58
      depth 24, visualID 0x59
    number of attributes: 7
      "XV_SET_DEFAULTS" (range 0 to 0)
              client settable attribute
      "XV_ITURBT_709" (range 0 to 1)
              client settable attribute
              client gettable attribute (current value is 0)
      "XV_SYNC_TO_VBLANK" (range 0 to 1)
              client settable attribute
              client gettable attribute (current value is 1)
      "XV_BRIGHTNESS" (range -512 to 511)
              client settable attribute
              client gettable attribute (current value is -1)
      "XV_CONTRAST" (range 0 to 8191)
              client settable attribute
              client gettable attribute (current value is 4091)
      "XV_SATURATION" (range 0 to 8191)
              client settable attribute
              client gettable attribute (current value is 4091)
      "XV_HUE" (range 0 to 360)
              client settable attribute
              client gettable attribute (current value is 177)
    maximum XvImage size: 2046 x 2046
    Number of image formats: 4
      id: 0x32595559 (YUY2)
        guid: 59555932-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
        bits per pixel: 16
        number of planes: 1
        type: YUV (packed)
      id: 0x32315659 (YV12)
        guid: 59563132-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
        bits per pixel: 12
        number of planes: 3
        type: YUV (planar)
      id: 0x59565955 (UYVY)
        guid: 55595659-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
        bits per pixel: 16
        number of planes: 1
        type: YUV (packed)
      id: 0x30323449 (I420)
        guid: 49343230-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
        bits per pixel: 12
        number of planes: 3
        type: YUV (planar)


                   --Dave

[David Guntner-3]

Len Lawrence wrote:

> David Guntner wrote:
>> Hello, all,
>>
>> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
>> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
>> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>>
>> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
>> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
>> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
>> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>>
>> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>
> I remember several months ago I had a similar problem on 2008.1 and I
> fixed it by adjusting the hue in totem.  In video preferences it had to
> be set to the extreme right but the strange thing is on testing it on a
> WMV file just now I find all the sliders at the centre position and
> colour is fine.  vlc plays OK as well.  I did tinker with the video
> output format, Xv and all that without success, but the default seems to
> work fine now.  The hue slider did the trick but the defaults for colour
> balance also now work fine.  Sorry I cannot be of more help.  Stick with
> the experts.

I gave that a try and it worked!  Oddly enough, it didn't matter if I
went extreme right *or* left - moving the slider to either side
corrected the hue.

What's even *more* odd?  That after adjusting that slider in totem, all
the other video players that I've tried (mplayer, vlc) display video
with the correct hue as well!  Go figure!  If I readjust the totem hue
slider back to center, it shows blue, and so do the other players.  Why
on Earth that the slider setting for one program would influence the
display of other unrelated programs (other than they're related by
virtue of all being video players...) is beyond me....

                --Dave

[David Guntner-3]

Anssi Hannula wrote:

> Len Lawrence wrote:
>> David Guntner wrote:
>>> Hello, all,
>>>
>>> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
>>> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
>>> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>>>
>>> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
>>> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
>>> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
>>> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>>>
>>> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>>
>> I remember several months ago I had a similar problem on 2008.1 and I
>> fixed it by adjusting the hue in totem.  In video preferences it had to
>> be set to the extreme right but the strange thing is on testing it on a
>> WMV file just now I find all the sliders at the centre position and
>> colour is fine.  vlc plays OK as well.  I did tinker with the video
>> output format, Xv and all that without success, but the default seems to
>> work fine now.  The hue slider did the trick but the defaults for colour
>> balance also now work fine.  Sorry I cannot be of more help.  Stick with
>> the experts.
>
> At least NVIDIA recently changed their driver behaviour with some cards,
> so that the center is correct instead of extreme right/left. The problem
> here is that the "default value" is not defined in the Xv API, and some
> programs assume that center is the default, which is not always true.

I just wish I knew why moving the totem hue slider fixes all the other
video display programs on my system as well.... :-)

               --Dave

[Anssi Hannula-3]

David Guntner wrote:

> Anssi Hannula wrote:
>> David Guntner wrote:
>>> Had to install the package to do that. :-)  But once done and run:
>>>
>>> $ xvattr -a XV_SET_DEFAULTS -v 0
>>> Found Xv 2.2
>>> X Error of failed request:  BadMatch (invalid parameter attributes)
>>>   Major opcode of failed request:  142 (XVideo)
>>>   Minor opcode of failed request:  14 ()
>>>   Serial number of failed request:  12
>>>   Current serial number in output stream:  12
>>>
>>>
>>> Ok, so there's the BadMatch error you mentioned.  However, upon running
>>> that, no change.  Looking at video still has everything blue-tinted.
>> Did you run the above while watching video? If not, try it like that.
>
> Interestingly enough, when I ran that command during video playback in
> totem, it did correct the hue.  Unfortunately, it didn't "stick."  When
> I exited the video player and then restarted it, things were back to
> blue again.

That would be totem reseting stuff to the stored settings. As other
posts indicated, you need to modify totem settings.

--
Anssi Hannula

[Len Lawrence]

David Guntner wrote:

> Anssi Hannula wrote:
>  
>> Len Lawrence wrote:
>>    
>>> David Guntner wrote:
>>>      
>>>> Hello, all,
>>>>
>>>> Running 2008.1 here.  I've been trying to figure out why video playback
>>>> has been acting odd, and I'm now at wit's end (but not stuck in a cave
>>>> with a copy of Spelunker Today <grin>).
>>>>
>>>> Everything on my screen looks fine, so I know it's not the monitor.  But
>>>> no matter what kind of video playback I try, be it totem or mplayer or
>>>> firefox's built-in .wmv handler, the video comes out blue.  Skin tones
>>>> are blue.  Other colors come out with too much blue in them.
>>>>
>>>> Any ideas what could be causing this, and how to fix it?
>>>>        
>>> I remember several months ago I had a similar problem on 2008.1 and I
>>> fixed it by adjusting the hue in totem.  In video preferences it had to
>>> be set to the extreme right but the strange thing is on testing it on a
>>> WMV file just now I find all the sliders at the centre position and
>>> colour is fine.  vlc plays OK as well.  I did tinker with the video
>>> output format, Xv and all that without success, but the default seems to
>>> work fine now.  The hue slider did the trick but the defaults for colour
>>> balance also now work fine.  Sorry I cannot be of more help.  Stick with
>>> the experts.
>>>      
>> At least NVIDIA recently changed their driver behaviour with some cards,
>> so that the center is correct instead of extreme right/left. The problem
>> here is that the "default value" is not defined in the Xv API, and some
>> programs assume that center is the default, which is not always true.
>>    
>
> I just wish I knew why moving the totem hue slider fixes all the other
> video display programs on my system as well.... :-)
>
>                --Dave
>
>  

It probably means that they all use the same underlying mechanism.  
Several players use gstreamer, totem certainly, so adjusting totem means
adjusting gstreamer properties.

[Anssi Hannula-3]

Len Lawrence wrote:

> David Guntner wrote:
>> Anssi Hannula wrote:
>>> At least NVIDIA recently changed their driver behaviour with some cards,
>>> so that the center is correct instead of extreme right/left. The problem
>>> here is that the "default value" is not defined in the Xv API, and some
>>> programs assume that center is the default, which is not always true.
>>>    
>>
>> I just wish I knew why moving the totem hue slider fixes all the other
>> video display programs on my system as well.... :-)
>>
>>                --Dave
>>
>>  
> It probably means that they all use the same underlying mechanism.
> Several players use gstreamer, totem certainly, so adjusting totem means
> adjusting gstreamer properties.

Nope, the reason is they all use the Xvideo extension for playing videos
by default.

--
Anssi Hannula

[David Guntner-3]

Anssi Hannula wrote:

> Len Lawrence wrote:
>> David Guntner wrote:
>>> Anssi Hannula wrote:
>>>> At least NVIDIA recently changed their driver behaviour with some cards,
>>>> so that the center is correct instead of extreme right/left. The problem
>>>> here is that the "default value" is not defined in the Xv API, and some
>>>> programs assume that center is the default, which is not always true.
>>>>    
>>> I just wish I knew why moving the totem hue slider fixes all the other
>>> video display programs on my system as well.... :-)
>>>
>>>                --Dave
>>>
>>>  
>> It probably means that they all use the same underlying mechanism.
>> Several players use gstreamer, totem certainly, so adjusting totem means
>> adjusting gstreamer properties.
>
> Nope, the reason is they all use the Xvideo extension for playing videos
> by default.

Well, I guess that sort-of solves the mystery, then. :-)

Thanks all for the help!

             --Dave