In Beamer, how to prevent \includemovie from restarting swf animations?

Question

On this frame, there are 3 swf animations starting once the slide opens. I would like to prevent them from automatically looping. I tried a few options without any success, such as endat=frame:10 or repeat=0.

This behaviour seems to be specific to swf files. I was using mp4 before, which didn't restart automatically. Unfortunately, having three animations on that page caused Adobe Reader to be extremely unstable, which is why I converted the file to swf.

Here is the code:

\frame{
\frametitle{Example 2}
Double cantilever beam
\vfill
\begin{columns}[l]
   \column{0.33\textwidth}
     \includemovie[autoplay,mouse]{1.\textwidth}{5em}{Pics/Cubic_D_Struct_AnisoShear.swf}
     \small{discrete pre-crack}\\
     \small{cubic function} 
   \column{0.33\textwidth}
     \includemovie[autoplay,mouse]{1.\textwidth}{5em}{Pics/Quad_D_Struct_AnisoShear.swf}
     \small{discrete precrack} \\
     \small{quadratic function} 
   \column{0.33\textwidth}
     \includemovie[autoplay,mouse]{1.\textwidth}{5em}{Pics/Cubic_Struct_AnisoShear.swf}
     \small{modelled pre-crack} \\
     \small{cubic function} 
\end{columns}
\vfill
} %%%

Answer 1

This can be achieved using the original MP4/h264 files and the media9 package.

By default, the video player component VPlayer.swf of the media9 package doesn't loop MP4 video, but rather keeps the last frame after reaching the end.

In the example below, three videos are started right after opening the document/page (thanks to the Flash variable setting autoPlay=true). The example uses the files cube.mp4 and cubeposter.png from the media9 CTAN package.

\documentclass{beamer}
\usepackage{media9}

\begin{document}
\begin{frame}{Three Video Example}

\includemedia[
  label=vid1,
  width=0.33\linewidth,
  addresource=cube.mp4,
  activate=pageopen,
  flashvars={
     source=cube.mp4
    &autoPlay=true
  }
]{\includegraphics{cubeposter}}{VPlayer.swf}\hfill%
\includemedia[
  label=vid2,
  width=0.33\linewidth,
  addresource=cube.mp4,
  activate=pageopen,
  flashvars={
     source=cube.mp4
    &autoPlay=true
  }
]{\includegraphics{cubeposter}}{VPlayer.swf}\hfill%
\includemedia[
  label=vid3,
  width=0.33\linewidth,
  addresource=cube.mp4,
  activate=pageopen,
  flashvars={
     source=cube.mp4
    &autoPlay=true
  }
]{\includegraphics{cubeposter}}{VPlayer.swf}

\centerline{\mediabutton[
  mediacommand=vid1:play,
  mediacommand=vid2:play,
  mediacommand=vid3:play
]{\fbox{Play all at once}}}
\end{frame}
\end{document}