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I have embedded a video (.mp4, ~1mb) in my presentation using media9 as followed:

\documentclass[]{beamer}
\usepackage{media9}

\begin{document}
\begin{frame}
    \includemedia[
      width=0.4\linewidth,
      height=0.45\linewidth,
      activate=pageopen,

      addresource=Video.mp4,
      flashvars={
          source=Video.mp4}
    ]{}{VPlayer.swf}
\end{frame}


\end{document}

The positioning and the rest seem to be fine on Overleaf, but whenever I try playing it back on my PC using Adobe Acrobat Reader DC I only get a black video. Weird enough, I had no issues opening videos before and I have not updated any of the pdf tools on my pc or another device where the behaviour is indeed the same.

  1. Any idea of what might be causing this error?
  2. Is there another way of playing back videos embedded in pdfs?

enter image description here

Pablo Jeken Rico
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    Works for me with example-movie.mp4 (from pkg mwe). But note that on Windows, the video can be played only once by click, unless you tweak the Windows registry somewhat. See: https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/516102 – AlexG Sep 06 '21 at 10:48
  • Thank you for looking into it @AlexG . Unfortunately, I cannot display that video either. Could it be the compiler that I am using? (pdfLatex) Or adobe acrobat (latest release, 32-bit for some reason...) – Pablo Jeken Rico Sep 06 '21 at 12:04
  • It should work with any compiler. I tested with pdflatex and AR-DC-2021.005.20060. – AlexG Sep 06 '21 at 12:12
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    I guess you know already that much of the media playback functionality in PDF and Acrobat Reader is gone since FlashPlayer was retired by Adobe. – AlexG Sep 06 '21 at 12:15
  • @AlexG That is likely making things worse. I downloaded Adobe Reader XI and it does now work. It seems the main issue was the reader. Any other pdf reader that you might recommend? – Pablo Jeken Rico Sep 07 '21 at 08:49
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    Not really. All user interaction with video was programmed into VPlayer.swf using Flash elements and ActionScript (the scripting language of FlashPlayer) and thus depends on FlashPlayer, which is no more. And for the same reason, other PDF viewers cannot really do a better job here. – AlexG Sep 07 '21 at 09:30

1 Answers1

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The problem, in this case, is not Latex, but the pdf reader that has been used to visualize the presentation. As pointed out in the comments, Flash player is no longer supported (ended 2020) and thus many new pdf readers do not work with the playback of embedded swf files.

The solution in my case was installing Adobe Reader XI.

Pablo Jeken Rico
  • 111