Videos from the Legacy store are no longer available for download.

However, if you would like to view or re-download videos from a previous purchase, this can be arranged. Please contact Lu-La Customer Service by email with details of your purchase and we will send you a coupon for viewing.

Please note: this FAQ refers to the older Legacy Store videos

Which Media Player should I use?

QuickTime for Windows is available as a free download here and for Mac here.

* Windows Media Player 12 under Windows 7 appears to work well with our .mov files.

VLC Player is available free for all platforms here.

Install GoodReader to download and view directly on iPad! Streaming to iPad.

Playback Problems on monitors & laptops

Q:   My video is faulty: there is no audio!

A: Make sure you do a fresh install of the latest VLC Player (v. 2.05) or QuickTime Player.
Note that some video files may have the volume control set to zero; try turning up the media player’s volume control!

A: Installations or upgrades of Windows Media Player may have corrupted QuickTime Player. You may have to re-install QuickTime Player.

A: Unclick or deselect the Direct X option (see other Windows problems below).

Q: My computer does not recognise the file and it will not play! What do I do?

A: Check the size of the file you are attempting to play – it should be large. Avoid frustration and don’t try to play the 1k file that is sometimes left after the unzipping/decompression process of the original downloaded files. This tiny 1k file is a vestige left over from compression on a Mac and subsequent decompression on Windows. Annoyingly, it will have the same name as the real video file!

Q: The video and audio stutter or are out of synch. What’s wrong ?

A: Try reducing the size of the playback window. You are likely playing the High Definiton version of the files on an older or low-powered computer that cannot handle that sized file.

iPad, iPhone, High Definition,  AppleTV, AVI, DivX Questions

Q:  How can I view the videos on my iPad, iPhone, iTouch, Apple TV or in .avi or DivX?

A : Videos released from mid-2010 forward will import directly into the iPad without re-encoding. The files can be moved using the standard iPad Sync procedure or with apps such as ‘FileBrowser’ or ‘GoodReader’. Use the Videos app for playback on the iPad if you import them via iTunes. If you use a regular browser for download, you will need to open the zip file in GoodReader.

You may download directly to an iPad and iOS 5 if you have GoodReader installed.
The zip file downloads, you are prompted to open in GoodReader.  Tap the file again in GoodReader,  it unzips and all the .mov files appear.  The movies are listed in the GoodReader app but do not appear in the Videos app.  You just tap them to play within GoodReader.

Android Tablets will work with the free MX Video Player.

For older videos, iTunes users can import (Open…) the files into their iTunes Library. Select each video and then from the Advanced menu, choose Convert Selection for iPad, Apple TV / iPod / iPhone.

If the video is incompatible with your choice, you will need to export the the appropriate video format using QuickTime Pro or other encoder. 
If you are converting from High Definition, do not use QuickTime Pro which takes a long time. We suggest you use MPEG StreamClip or RoadMovie for Mac – a simple, fast & efficient encoder that costs $19.95.

An encoder for our older DVD-Video products is the free Handbrake. The latest version of Handbrake can also be used for encoding in a similar way to MPEG StreamClip or Road Movie.

Q:  What is the difference between the older files (that were named Hi-Res) and the newer High Definition files?

A : The newer High Definition files are considerably larger: 1280 x 720 or 960 x 540 pixels vs. 640 x 360 pixels.
These High Definition videos use the H264 codec that will scale up to 1920 x 1080 very well.
The frame rate is 29.97 or 24 fps and they are progressive (de-interlaced).

From mid-2010 forward, all videos released will be at 720P, 24fps.

Q:  Where can I get QuickTime Pro or one of the other media converters?

A : QuickTime Pro is available for either Windows or Mac OS here. 
MPEG StreamClip is available free for either platform here.
Handbrake is available free here.
Road Movie is available for $19.95 here.

More Questions

Q:   Are the Tutorials available as a DVD ?

A: No, we abandoned the physical shipment of DVDs in 2008/9. Distribution costs are far too high to be supported by our pricing. Download video gives far greater flexibility and faster turn-around.

QuickTime for Windows Player Problems

Please use VLC Player – it often works better than QuickTime!

Windows Media Player under Windows 7 appears to work well with our .mov videos

If you use QuickTime…please download the most recent version!

Read Apple’s QuickTime: Windows Troubleshooting tips

Q: There is no sound on your video files!! ??

A:  Please download the most recent version of QuickTime Player! … and turn up the volume control?
Unclick or deselect the Direct X option (see below).

Q: When I open a video, I get a black screen and the video does not play.  

A: Tap the spacebar to initiate Play  . (QuickTime v.10)
A playback control bar appears when your mouse rolls over the window.

Q: When I try to open a video I get an Error 2048 message saying that QuickTime does not recognise the file.  

A: To date, the quickest workaround is to use VLC Media Player.

Q: When I try to open a video I get an Error -2096 message saying that QuickTime failed to initialize. 

A: Please read Apple’s page on Compatibility Mode.

Q: When I try to play a video the sound is absolutely fine, but the screen just shows green/black fuzziness  

A: Open QuickTime
Click on Edit tab and go to Preference,
Then click on QuickTime Preference.
Once that opens, click on Advanced tab
You will see a selection for video or Direct X : unclick the Direct X radio button
Click on Safe mode (GDI only)
Then click on Apply, then OK.
Restart QuickTime and play a movie to test.

 

Q: I try to open the .mov files and nothing happens!

A:  Check the size of the file you are trying to play, each should be between 500KB and 500 MB. Some Windows users may see very small duplicate-named .mov file in the unzipped directories/folders, each about 1k in size.  These small files were created by compressing the originals on a Mac computer. They can safely be deleted – just make sure it’s the small one you delete.

Q: I cannot get QuickTime to work properly on my computer.  What do I do?

A:  QuickTime & Windows troubleshooting tips are available here. Make certain you have installed a recent version of DirectX.

The codec that is used in our download videos (H.264) requires the use of QuickTime 7.2 or higher. Attempting to play the .mov files in another player may cause poor quality, severe artifacting or broken video. See alternative player below.

Should you have recently installed other player software, ‘permissions’ may have been altered. Amongst the many posts on Apple’s QuickTime for Windows discussion forum, you may find some help.

An interesting ‘kludge’ can be used on our newer videos: if the file extension is .mp4, make a duplicate of the file and change the extension to .f4v
The video should then open in Adobe’s Media Player, Flash Player and other Flash supporting media players.

Q: Is there an alternative to QuickTime?

A:  These files are playable with VLC Media Player
( http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ ). It’s free and is available for a variety of operating systems including OS X, Windows, Linux and BSD. VLC Media Player does not support drop-down menu navigation.

Windows Media Player may be able to play the files. This from a customer using WMP on Windows XP sp2: “Right click on the video file and select “Open With” from the menu. The flyout menu will show QuickTime but at the bottom you can select “Other Program” which opens a selection window. Scroll down to Windows Media Player and select it. It will show a message saying it doesn’t recognize the .mov extension and ask if you want it to try and play the file anyway. Click on “Yes” and the video will play.”  (Thanks Earle!)

Some users have also reported success using a media player for windows calledQuicktimeAlternative.

Others have reported success with the free Media Player Classic from codecs.com.

Q: I am using ‘Vista’, is there a QuickTime version for that?  

A: Yes, v. 7.5 or greater seems generally problem-free for XP & Vista users

Miscellaneous

Q: Why do you use .zip compressed files when it saves so little space?  

A: .zip files are a requirement of the download function of our shopping cart.

Q: How do I open the .zip files?  

A:  Mac: ‘Archive Utility’, ‘Unzip’ or ‘Stuffit Expander’
Windows & others: ‘Unzip’, available for all platforms here or ‘Zipeg’ available free here.

Q: The .zip files will not decompress! Is the original file corrupted ?  

A: No, the original file on our server is fine; the corruption likely occurred during the download process – especially if it took longer than usual. Disable any Download Manager, try One-File-At-A-Time, *Re-boot your browser* and please try again.

Q: I cannot see the drop-down navigation menu, why not?  

A: Access to the navigation menu is at the bottom right corner of the QuickTime Player window.

The only versions of our files that support drop down-menu navigation are the .mov Hi-Res files played in QuickTime Player.
Neither .mp4 nor .m4v videos support menus.

Q: Why do you watermark the video? 

A: The QuickTime videos have no copy protection and can be distributed in contravention of our copyright. We would like to maintain the non-protected state of the videos but realise that some will copy them and pass them on. If we have a watermark embedded in the video, we hope that non-paying viewers will at least know where the video originated and perhaps come and visit us! We try hard to keep the watermark as unintrusive as possibe with a 50% opacity and a position over non-critical content.

Q: Can I watch the files on my TV ?

A: Yes. While primarily designed to be watched on a computer monitor, there are various ways of viewing the download video on a television.

The best and easiest is to use a set-top box with HDMI or component output, this means using our original files with no quality loss. Set-top boxes now come in many flavours:  Apple TV, X-Box, Western Digital Media Player… there are many devices to which digital video files can be copied and which export the video as a component video signal to your TV or HDTV via HDMI, component or composite cables (See above).

The files can be transferred to a DVD-Video, but there is a major disadvantage. You have to re-encode the video with the appropriate software that will create the special files for a DVD-Video. Re-encoding and transferring our files to DVD-Video will cause visible quality loss. DVD-Video is now a rather old low-quality video format.

Some DVD-authoring programs are:

Mac: iDVD, Roxio Toast

Windows: Roxio MyDVD, DVDirector

Please remember that when making a DVD-Video,  the quality will not be as good as a regular DVD-Video, since these files are already compressed for optimized download.