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The Canon 5DII shoots great MOV clips, but does anyone know how to make thumbnails for them in Explorer? I tried installing QuickThumb.dll in Windows/System32 folder as suggested by various websites, but it didn't work for me. Of course I can view the files in Quicktime or VLC media player, but thumbs in Explorer would be nice.

Hi Strabo,

Though your question was prompted by your Canon I've moved the thread across to the "Computer hardware and operating systems" section as the answer isn't camera manufacturer specific.

I use Vista x64 here so my answer is specific to that OS. It may be applicable to XP, with a bit of tweaking, but I have no way of checking.

The thumbnails for a particular folder are contained in file called ehthumbs_vista.db within that folder. The trouble is that the file is actually marked by Vista as a "protected operating system file". This file is generated by Vista automatically by scanning those video files it understands.

Your first step is to defeat this is to create a JPEG (file extension "jpg") holding the desired thumbnail image for each of your videos. I use an image size of 320x240 pixels but I don't believe the size is too critical. What is critical is that the name of the JPEG must match the name of the video exactly. So if your video is called "mymovie.mov" then its associated JPEG must be called "mymovie.jpg".

So far so good but Vista still persists in using the "ehthumbs_vista.db" data so the next step is to delete the file, forcing Vista to recreate it. It may be that the "Disk Cleanup" app that ships with Windows can be used to delete this file but if so it would delete all such files which may not be where you want to go. The alternative is to open the folder in question in Windows Explorer and then from the "View" tab of the "Folder Options" dialog (accessed from the Tools menu) deselect the "Hide protected operating system files" checkbox. Accept the warning and click OK. You should now be able to see and delete "ehthumbs_vista.db". You should then go back into the Folder Options dialog and hide the OS protected files again.

The next time you open that folder Vista should create an "ehthumbs_vista.db" using your JPEGs. You can probably move those JPEGs elsewhere after that but I've never needed to as I access those video folders from Media Center.

The only other "gotcha" would be remembering to add an approriate JPEG thumbnail to your folder before you add a new movie so that Vusta can add what you want to "ehthumbs_vista.db". Microsoft's failure to provide a thumbnail "selector" in Vista is pretty dumb, IMHO. Or am I the dumb one and they provided one I never found?

Bob.

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OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

Many thanks, Bob, but it seems complicated. I use XP and would welcome a simple way of doing it. I wonder whether there are file managers apart from Explorer that would do it?

Strabo,

I have the G10 and MOV thumbnails in Vista Ultimate after installing the latest klite codec pack (full).

http://www.codecguide.com/download_kl.htm

Perhaps this might help solve your problem?

I think XP only does previews for files that Windows Media Player can play natively, e.g. MPEG and AVI - I think thats it, mp4, m4v, mov, mkv, flv etc arnt supported natively by windows media player, although are by plugins, they still wont show in explorer.

As for other file browsers, not sure mate =/

Vista and Windows 7 use a very different build of Explorer.exe and all the underlying tech for rendering thumbnails/previews is totally different and uses DX9 (9.0L i think) to accelerate this.

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Canon EOS 5DmkII + BG-E6 + Canon EOS 40D + BG-E2N + Canon EOS 33
Canon 17-40 F/4L USM + Canon 24-70 F/2.8L USM + Canon 28mm F/1.8 USM + Canon 70-200 F/2.8L USM IS + Canon 85mm F/1.8 USM
Canon Speedlite 580EX II + Canon Speedlite 540EZ + 2 x Nikon SB-80DX
Cactus V2s Wireless Trigger - 5 x Cactus V2s Wireless Reciever

MY FLICKR!

I realized that there is a simple solution - the THM files are actually just jpegs, so change the file extension from THM to jpg! But keep the file name the same.