Are mp4 bit rates the same as Flash bytes per frame? I'm converting Flash movies to Mp4 (and webm) and having to learn lots about web video.

The process starts with MOVs exported from Flash. For example, I have a MOV of 640px x 290px, 1m 58s, 2843 frames, 24fps, 171 MB, 11 Mbps.

Converting that to H.264 with Handbrake, with constant quality of 20 RF, I get a file of 3.45MB with - according to MediaInfo - "overall bitrate mode: variable", and an "overall bitrate" of 240 kbps (video 79, audio 144 with max 170). Bitrate Viewer tells me the average bit rate (this might be video only) is 92 kbps, with a 1-second peak of 1019.

Then I tried Handbrake's variable bit rate, because (if I've understood its advantages correctly) there are 20 seconds with lots of motion, in the middle of the video, which might look better with a higher bit rate. With VBR 300, I get a 6.3 MB file with (MediaInfo) an overall bit rate of 440 kbps, video 300, audio 144. Bitrate Viewer has average 293 kbps, with that peak now at 3467. For about 65% of the video it is below 130 kbps. I've placed the Bitrate Viewer profiles here: http://www.casedasole.it/bitrates.html

With Flash, bytes per frame were important because, when streaming, you needed to have the browser download as much as possible in advance, so that particularly big chunks of bytes (like a big JPEG) were already loaded before the Flash player reached them.

My question is: Is that the same principle with video bit rates? Looking at that peak bitrate of 3467 (converts to 433 kB), I think: "That's OK, by then, the whole video will be loaded".  Or am I missing something?

Comparable yes but unlike Flash you have a very consistent average size over the timeline of your content. So you don't need to download as much to show content but can actually just start right away to play the video if your bandwidth is equal to (in practice it should be a bit higher of course) the average bitrate of your video. You only need to pre-load a tiny bit to account for inconsistency in the download rate.

Edit: What you have to consider when using looking at the graph you posted, you have quite a bit of very low bitrate frames, so the peak is not really that important, they somewhat cancel each other out. Whats important when streaming is the average bitrate as this is the bitrate that is needed to stream the video consistently without stopping to fill the buffer a bit more.
In reality you usually need a little more than the average to cope with very "noisy" bitrates that go up and down for long periods, your video is already a rather extreme example, usually you have a much smoother graph. It always depends on the complexity of your video to how well you can compress a frame.


What player do you use? After my experience with FFmpeg created content: different player, different results.

So what player do you use to look at you footage?

Does someone know a player where you can check current frame meta information (PTS, frame number, pict type)?

manu

I was a rusted on MPC (and more recently its derivatives MPC-HC and MPC-BE) fan until recently when the MPC devs flagged that it would not be continued. So I started looking to see what else was out there.

While the MPCs are still very capable players I've increasingly been using MPV, another mplayer-derived open-source project.

It has a fairly minimal UI (which IMHO is a good thing),
it is GPU-rendered and seems to be pretty resource light–on my machine we've been watching 6K camera footage in ProRes without problems.
It's easily configureable, has useful features such as colour management and HDR,
plays most codecs and formats that I throw at it without problems
It's cross platform, so if you swap between PC, OSX and Linux you can use it on all of them.

Another player that is useful to know is djv-view. This comes with some very useful tools such as histograms, RAM-caching for smooth playback and jog-shuttling and so on. It doesn't have audio so it's nto a general purpose media player, but it's a real winner for playing image sequences that would struggle to play smoothly otherwise–as long as you have the RAM for it. This is also cross-platform, available for PC, OSX and a linux package manager near you.


ffmpeg rtmp server connection issues I am trying to stream using ffmpeg rtmp using,
ffmpeg -i out2.mp4 -c:v copy -c:a aac -listen 1 -ar 44100 -ab 64000 -f flv rtmp://localhost/live

The process starts but nothing is happening after handler_name

When I use the command, ffmpeg -f flv -i out2.mp4 -c copy -f flv -listen 1 rtmp://localhost:1935/live/app.

I get---> Cannot open connection tcp://localhost:1935?listen&listen_timeout=-1000
rtmp://localhost/live: Immediate exit requested

I followed your instructions. I changed localhost to 127.0.0.1:10000, and I was using input from an rtsp.
Here is my command. It worked for me. I was able to get the stream in VLC player.
ffmpeg -i "rtsp://someurl/" -c:v copy -c:a aac -listen 1 -ar 44100 -ab 64000 \
       -f flv rtmp://127.0.0.1:10000/live


How to replace clip preserving trimming in Final Cut Pro X? How can I replace an already trimmed clip with a new one so that the trim start and end positions are preserved?

Open the existing clip.
Replace the inner clip (the start of it will be in a gray area which represents the trimming).

Warning: Audio properties such as Pan are lost during the process.


How do you bring up the effects settings window? Rank beginner with fcpx here. I keep having trouble using the effects. Sometimes I move my cursor into the little window for a given effect, and I can scrub back and forth, and sometimes I can edit the parameters of the effect, but it seems I can never do both.

As a concrete example, in this screenshot, I've moved my cursor into the "censor" effect which pixelates a circle in the center of the picture.

When I did this previously, the circle of pixelation had handles on it so I could drag it and resize it, and the inspector had a number of settings I could change.

Now I'm in a state where I can't preview the effect, the inspector isn't showing the settings, and more often than not, double-clicking the effect has no effect.

Is there some sort of mode switch or setting I'm missing?

By scrubbing the thumbnail you're only previewing the effect. To add it to the clip, drag the thumbnail to the clip on the timeline in your project. The effect is then added to the effects in the thumbnail (at the top of your screenshot) and controls are available in the inspector and the viewer for manipulating the effect.


360-degree cameras and the sun I think the risks of aiming a digital camera at the sun are pretty self-explanatory.   Sensors can quickly get damaged.

With lots of 360-degree VR-style video cameras available now, you cannot really avoid capturing the sun.

If you set a stationary 360-degree camera up for a lengthy outdoor video, I assume you're not actually going to damage the camera's sensor, but why not?

Your initial assumption about damage risk is a little too general.

I have taken thousands of photos, and a lot of video, having the sun within the sensor's image. No damage, and for good reason. There could have been under some conditions, so don't take that as a fully general statement. I'll explain below.

I have also driven thousands of miles with a (smart phone) digital camera sensor aimed directly at the sun (not actively taking a picture yet still aimed there!) No damage. The whole phone got hot and I had to aim car A/C at it, but that's a different issue :)

So what's going on? First, when IS it a problem?

The primary risk is to the human eye. You don't want to keep your eye looking at an optical viewfinder for long, with the sun in place.

The big photography risk is with a long telephoto lens. Use a 500mm to take a stitchable series for 360VR, and you'll be in trouble when it aims at the sun. Even 200mm requires care (I've done this.) But a normal 360VR setup? Nope.

What's the difference? Two:

First, our eyes, especially combined with big optical telephoto lenses, are analog and continuous: the sun's heat, focused to a spot on the retina, definitely causes damage very soon. Magnify that with a telescope or 500mm lens, and you've got tremendous heat. A DSLR only opens its shutter for brief moments under normal conditions. I'll discuss digicams/smartphones next.

Second, consider the light gathered and focused on the sensor.

In the case of a DSLR with a wide angle lens, it's not a big deal. The sun is only a tiny portion of the view. Very little heat gathered.

In the case of a non-SLR digicam, smart phone or 360VR, the lens surface is not that much larger than the sensor, and again the sun isn't the only thing in view. Hence, much less heat.

So, the sun IS a problem when a significant amount of its heat is gathered and focused on a point. True with our eyes, true with telephoto lenses. Not true with wide angle let alone 360VR. Not true with small lenses matched to small sensors (phones.)

Hope that helps!


I'm totally new to AE. What are some things typically done to clean up video and make it look nice? I shot some wedding footage for a friend when her video guy was unable to make it at the last minute. I use LR and PS all the time but I have no experience with video at all beyond some basic time lapse stuff. I have AE and PP but know next to nothing about the latter and not much more about the former. What kinds of things are typically done to a video to make it look nice? I shot the ceremony on a handy cam on a tripod while I roamed hand-holding a 7D. I shot the reception with the 7D on a tripod; collapsed, monopod style.

Thanks!

Common postproduction work:

Color Correction
Reframing (crop out unwanted stuff from images, especially viable if shot in a higher resolution then distribution format)
Stabilization
Speed Changes and Speed Ramps

Personally i doubt that you need to use After Effects for this though, as all of that can also be done in Premiere. If you want to learn After Effects in the process, i'd look into making some nice typography animations which you later import into the final video. There are tons of tutorials on that on the interwebs and / or you can download some After Effects templates to get you started.


Should I do color grading in FCPX or round trip do DaVinci Resolve? I'm an amateur learning to edit videos from my GoPro, DSLR, and quadcopter. I've tried various NLE's for cutting and liked FCPX workflow much more then Premiere Pro and similar editors with tracks. But for color grading looks like most editors use DaVinci. How it is different from FCPX? Does it have any advantages in case of simple grading for amateur projects?

Use Resolve, it is far superior to FCPX for grading.

This is my workflow, since I always shoot in RAW with the Blackmagic Cinema Camera.  I know there are ways to do this using XML, but I've run into issues with that when I segment a larger clip in FCPX and then bring it back to resolve it will then have each of those clips as individuals, instead of the one larger clip.

Import the RAW DNG files to Resolve
Add all clips to my timeline (their order doesn't matter)
Apply a Blackmagic film to rec709 LUT and perform some basic grades
Export as individual clips. The format and codec you use are up to you, but for editing I use 422 proxy

Ensure that you export your clips using the source filename and save to a folder titled something like "Edit Media" or whatever you'd like

Import those clips from the "Edit Media" folder into FCPX and perform your edits.  Once you're satisfied with your edits,  go back into Resolve and perform the final color grades of the clips you wound up actually using in your video.  Render them at a higher quality (how high is up to you) and overwrite the clips in "Edit Media"
Open the project again in FCPX and render your video.  The clips should automatically be overwritten with the new ones you just exported from Resolve, as long as you keep using Source Filenames


Batch compress a folder of videos using handbrake (or other) - Without manually loading each video into the queue Ive got c.50 videos in QuickTime movie format. These video sit all in one folder on my computer. In the past when Ive had 5 or so files, ive imported them each into Handbrake, then saved them to the queue and run the queue.

But this is quite a tedious process as each one takes c. 1 min to import and save to que.

Is there a way to be able to point Handbrake (or any other video compression software) to a folder and tell it to compress all videos in that folder.

Im only tying to compress the videos, dont need to run any other processes on them.

Im doing this on a 2.7gz, 16gb ram macbook pro, but i also have Bootcamp so if the solution is only available on Windows i could run it there.

I use HandBrakeBatch for doing the same thing on Tv series or shows that have been downloaded, quite easy to use and can point it to a folder which has folder inside and it will batch them all choosing a preset of your choice

http://www.osomac.com/apps/osx/handbrake-batch/


How can I convert large jpgs (15000 x 10840px) to video? Whenever I try the command

ffmpeg -y -r 1 -i File01.jpg -c:v libx264 -tune stillimage -pix_fmt yuv420p out.mp4

I get the failing result:

[swcaler @ 000000000347fe0] deprecated pixel format used, make sure you did set range correctly
[libx264 @ 0000000002da3c0] using SAR=1/1
[libx264 @ 0000000002da3c0] frame MP size (938x678) > level limit (36864)

and a corrupt file which cant be read.
Is there a maximum size of the resolution that can be created?

That's way more than h.264 can handle. The maximum resolution for h.264 is 4096×2304 with Level 5.1 or 5.2.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264#Levels

There are lossless codecs who can theoretically handle this video resolution but it would make no sense to do this. There is no hardware capable of playing videos in this resolution at any acceptable frame rate.
Atleast none that is in any way affordable by a normal human being.


With an SVideo Y splitter 1M 2F, does the video input need to go in to the male end? With a Y splitter Svideo cable

Example

   ---F
M--
   ---F

Would plugging the input in to the F side allow the output to come out of both the M and other F side?

End setup would be

Camera       M - F---
                    --- M - F Monitor
Capture F - MM - F---

I basically want to make sure the M side doesn't need to be the Input, couldn't seem to find an answer, sorry if it's a simple question.

Analog cables are thin bits of metal with connectors at each end. The signal that comes out of the source is present instantly* at all of the other connectors whether they are male or female.

However, connecting two outputs does change the impedance that the signal is seeing. Since you're dealing with an analogue signal, where the amplitude of the signal directly relates to the brightness of the image this could cause problems. To oversimplify it, it's like you had a battery and two light bulbs connected in parallel: they're each going to be less bright than a battery connected to only one light bulb.

So where possible you're better off connecting one source to one input. To split the signal use the output from the equipment, as it will be buffered by an internal amplifier.

*ignoring the time it takes for the signal to propogate which will be based on the electomechanical properties of the wire, but will probably be better than 0.5c (where c is the speed of light), or in other words for a 1 metre cable the signal reaches the end ~ 6.7 nanoseconds after it appears at the other.


Batch-importing images in sync with audio/markers I am trying to create a sequence that displays hundreds of images in succession. I want the images to change according to the speed/mood/beat of the music that plays at that moment. For example, changing to the next image every time the kickdrum is heard. I am talking about a rapid succession of images, many of them will only show for a couple of frames. So basically I am looking for a way to accomplish this as fast as possible.

This is what I've come up with.

First, I'll listen to the song and edit my preferences so that in the "General" tab, the "Still Image Default Duration" is set to the number of frames that would best sync up with the tempo/beat of the song.
Next I'll listen to the song again in the "Source" panel and whilst playing it I'll set markers using the m keyboard shortuct where I'll want the images to change. If necessary, I'll listen to it again at half-speed or zooming in a lot and fine-tune the position of the markers until I am happy.
Then I'll import the song to my timeline, along with all of my images, which of course will not be in sync with the markers. So I'll basically use the "Ripple Edit Tool" with all of my images, and individually set the in and out points of every single image so that they 'snap' to the markers.
Finally I'll fine-tune again the in and out points of the images, performing ripple deletes and doing minor adjustments.

Is there a way to speed up this workflow? Maybe a way so that when I import all of the images to the timeline, they'll sync automatically their in and out points with the position of the markers?

Thanks. I'm using Adobe Premiere Pro CS6.

You are going along the right track, but the first step is not necessary.  You want to use the "automate to sequence" functionality, found under the Project menu, to set the images to the markers.  There are a variety of orders that you can have it insert the images in and you may need to do some adjustments to how you bring in the images to make them go in the correct order, but it will handle setting the start and end points at the markers and can even automate transitions if you so desire.


Can duplicate frames from an h264 stream be dropped without encoding? I have a file which from progressive 24fps was rendered into a h264 high profile 60fps file by mistake. This can be clearly seen advancing frame by frame because every other frame is duplicated except sometimes there are four equal frames. Is there any software able to drop those duplicates frames producing a 24fps stream without encoding again? Is this possible at all or would those frames depend on previous ones, making it impossible?

Almost all encoded frames depend on the surrounding frames, so it's virtually impossible to delete anything from the encoded output without negatively affecting the video. Short answer: no, you can't do that.

One consolation is that true duplicate frames cost almost nothing in terms of file size. They can effectively be represented by a short sequence that means "repeat previous".


Camcorder for use as a webcam I've been looking into a camcorder for use as a webcam, since all the webcams I have found don't seem to be up to the task I have in mind.

My biggest issue is finding camcorders can can even be used as a webcam, either natively or through a 3rd party software such as DVDriver. DVDriver requires that the camera have an IEEE 1394 port, but it seems that this is not a common thing on camcorders now like it was years ago.

Capability to record in 1080p and a wide angle lens would also be useful.

Does anyone know of any camcorders that are capable of this, or a resource where I can find more information on camcorders?  My searches of the Sony, Canon and other manufactures websites has turned up very little in the way of useful information.

I know one solution, but it's not cheap as webcams. Same time full hd quality is something that webcams usually doesn't deliver.
Device especially interesting for live shows recording and streaming.

http://zoom.co.jp/products/q2hd

Webcam driver is provider by Zoom, so you still can use it as regular webcam delivering high quality video and audio to Skype for instance.

PS: there are plenty of reviews on youtube.


Any way to batch stabilize video files? I have a lot of videos that need stabilization... is there any way to batch stabilize them?

edit: I'm on Windows 7 64-bit. I don't think that what kind of software and footage do I have... I'm just looking for a program that can take a folder full of videos and batch stabilize them. VReveal kinda can do it, but I have to manually add each file to the queue, which is a chore

I think the quick answer is no, not that there is not software to do it, but every clip is different and will need to be stabilized using different paramaters.

If you take the easy way you may realize that after the fact it took way longer in that it could be a step backwards rather than actually helping.

I would recommend editing the clips as is, then stabilize when you are finished, that way it is only stabilizing what is used which is a) faster, and b) more efficient as you may cut around large camera moves that could cause un needed blown up footage.  At this point you could do each clip using software like premiere, which has a 30 day free trial.  And at worst you would just need to apply it individually to each clip, and unless this is a feature, it cant take that much time.


Fast pans and motion seem to strobe or stutter, why? I have some high frame rate video from a video camera. It is shot at 50 frames per second. But my editing project is set at 25 frames per second. When I render the timeline out every movement seems to strobe or stutter across the screen.

What can be done to fix it?

If the original High Frame Rate (HFR) source was recorded with a (non DSLR) video camera there is a good chance that each frame has been created interlaced. This means that when a shot is not moving you have full resolution, but when you pan or the subject moves it will be separated across the frame in alternating lines.

If you remove half of those alternating lines by using "De-interlace" technique you only see half the resolution. If you blur the lines vertically a bit (like 2 pixels) you will get soft pictures that smear during movement.

The reason that the original looks good is because it is played back at full speed interlaced. But that is really 50fps! That is why it looks so smooth.

Its like a ladder has every second rung removed, making you jump each step. It looks weird. This applies to high frame rate footage that is recorded progressively (not mixed as alternating lines), where there are more whole frames. Progressive recording is better vertical resolution because movement doesn't smear across the frame in the same way.

One potential solution would be to try Optical Flow retiming. Some applications like FCPX or Premier Pro use this for slow motion but you can also use it to try and fix interlace to progressive. By adding a 0.5 or 1% speed change, the optical flow effect will try to make new better frames using all of the interlace information.

Alternatively you can get the NLE software to "interpret" the footage when imported so that the interlacing or alternate frame is merged 50% with the first frame in the sequence.

So in future, if you want to make a 24fps or 25fps project from HFR footage, I suggest shooting at a wider shutter angle to make the motion blur more pronounced or avoid fast pans.


Black and white moving character in a color video This question is a consequence of :

How to make a film in black and white and add color to some objects?
How to show a character in black and white mode with colorful background?

This is just for my personal culture. Using gimp + path + transform, I can do it in one 2D image, but I was trying to understand how you guys would make a character in black and white in a colored scene, if the movie is already done.

From the previous answers, I understand that the key word is this case is rotoscoping.
But, I don't understand the principle !

Is it some kind of dynamic path with the time ?
What software would you use to do it ?
Have you got a link to explain that to a guy without video processing culture like me ?

Thanks for reading,

You'd achieve the effect by masking one part of the image and applying a desaturation effect to it. The hard part is masking off one part of the image.

In software such as After Effects and Nuke you can mask off an area of the image with bezier splines, and the shape of the masks can be animated. Tracing and animating these masks is what is called rotoscoping (it was invented by animator Max Fleischer in 1915, where he hand traced frames of film projected onto paper).

After Effects does come with an automatic rotoscoping tool called "Roto Brush" that works a bit like the magic wand in Photoshop, except that it changes shape over time. This can take a lot of the work out of rotoscoping, but it is far from infallible.


How do I create a solid black background in Premiere? I want to create a solid color "video" segment in my overall video. In iMovie I can add it by importing a background. I don't see any such feature in Premiere Pro.

How do I add a black (or other color) solid color background to my timeline?

In the workspaces panel, right-click the background and choose New Item > Color Matte...
You can then select any color you want.

See Easily Create a Solid Color Background in Premier Pro 2019 for more details.


Smoothcam filter vs Warp Stabilizer To smooth out shaky footage I want to know which of the following apps is the best:

Final cut Pro X
Adobe Premiere Pro CS6
Adobe After Effects CS6

After Effects, especially with Mocha, has the most advanced motion tracking and stabilization capabilities of these 3 options, but they are also the most complicated to use if you want the best possible results.  (Note that AE also does offer simple options like Warp Stabilizer if you don't need super advanced stabilization.)

The options in Final Cut Pro X and Premiere CS6 are far more limited, but both are still reasonably powerful.  I will deffer to Guus' answer for that comparison though since I don't have experience working with Final Cut's stabilization.


Encoding Video For Archiving Using Premiere Pro CS6 I have a set of videos created in Premiere Pro C6 and currently I am encoding them in h264 for YT upload. The raws were taken using a Canon 700D @ 720p60.

I was wondering what is the best encoding settings that is available in Premiere Pro that I can use to encode them that is suitable for archive. I would like them to be somewhere along the same size as if it was taken by the 700D. I tried doing a lossless format and my 5min video balloon to 70GB. That's way over the size of the raw file.

I appreciate the help so that I can just store the archive copy in my glacier and delete the rest of the footage in my hard drive rather than uploading every footage I have in the cloud.

Here is what VLC sees on my RAW file if it helps. http://prntscr.com/72kvgb

The thing is, whatever you do you will still have to re-render your files, they have to be re-encoded. Some small amount of quality degradation/compression, however miniscule, is inevitable. My best advice would simply be to try and match you sequence and render settings as close to the original files as possible, find a file size–quality ratio you feel comfortable with and just go with that.

To give a more practical answer for you specifically: I'd choose "Quicktime" under "Format", "MPEG-4 Video" under "Video" > "Video Codec", click "Match Source" and also drag the "Quality" slider to a 100%. Don't forget to uncheck "Limit data rate..." under "Bitrate settings". Audio settings should be pretty straight-forward.

Remember, these settings are mostly a guess based on the information you've given and some tests I ran on my Mac using Premiere Pro CC 2014 with the codecs I have installed on it. Hopefully someone with more knowledge of codecs/video encoding will pop in and give a more fleshed out answer eventually; but for now I think this is your best bet.


How to fix this screwed part of Audio i am new to video production , and i know that audio is a big part of the production process and cannot be messed up .
here is a audio that i recorded and then reduced the noise from audacity and exported
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1a5ZelYB6noyZhrVenkins0wZI62GC4Yj/view?usp=sharing
how can i further improve this audio

Audio is not my expertise, i try my best.
The problems of your source are

volume is low
speech is fast
sound is dull
bass is insufficient
treble is high

Therefore,

I use the command to find the max volume
ffmpeg -i source.wav -af "volumedetect" -vn -sn -dn -f null /dev/null
, which is -6.4dB, then i transform the max volume to 0dB by using audio filter volume=6.4dB

I slow down the speech by using audio filter atempo=0.8

I make it lively by using audio filter aecho=0.06:0.9:50:0.7

I boost the bass by using audio filter firequalizer=gain_entry='entry(0,24);entry(250,12);entry(500,4);entry(1000,2);

I decrease the treble by using audio filter firequalizer=gain_entry='entry(4000,-4);entry(16000,-20)'

In conclusion, the command is
ffmpeg -y -i source.wav -af "\
volume=6.4dB,\
atempo=0.8,\
aecho=0.06:0.9:50:0.7,\
firequalizer=gain_entry='\
entry(0,24);entry(250,12);entry(500,4);entry(1000,2);\
entry(4000,-4);entry(16000,-20)'" \
output.wav

Hope you like it, good luck.


How to enable multi-camera in Premiere *after* I've already made tons of cuts I started with an hour-long video interview and cut it down into a 4-minute sequence of clips using Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2017.

Then I remembered that I had a 2nd camera's video file.

How can I convert my sequence to a "multicam" sequence even though I've already cut it up a bunch?

I want to sync up that 2nd video file so that all of the cuts are the same and that I'm then able to simply bounce between 2 camera angles throughout my 4 minutes of cuts.

Ryan, sorry, but I think it's basically too late. You can certainly turn on multicam editing mode now but Premiere is not going to recognize your existing edits. If you have more footage to edit you could use multicam mode for the remaining portion.


Making video content for 30' x 10' 3:1 Widescreen Looking for some help on how content should be created for an upcoming show with super widescreen blend on it.

The show consists of a 30' x 10' front projection screen with unblended resolution of 3840 x 1080. Video content is currently being created, as the projectors are being blended there is a 600px overlap, the resulting width is 3240px.

Should I get the content made in 3240px or 3840px?

Any help appreciated.

Since the resulting projected image is 3240 px wide, that's the size you should create. Then output two "halves" -- the leftmost 1920 px, then the rightmost 1920 px. There will be 600 px that appear in both parts. That's the overlap.


Can Sony Vegas Pro be used or compared to the output produced by Final Cut Pro for professional use? I am a PC user and use Sony Vegas Pro. I really like it for editing purposes. I do not like Adobe Premier or Avid which work on Windows and believe that the top 3 tools are AVID, Sony Vegas, and Premier. Can Vegas be used for professional productions today or semi pro; is the quality and tools up to notch? Can it compare to Final Cut Pro which I see professionals use?

The criteria can vary but in general if it is feasible.

Vegas is a mature, full-featured NLE. I use it regularly for professional work from spots, to corporate video to feature films. I've also used it for semi-professional things like editing a video of my stepdaughter's choir concert for a Christmas DVD.

Here's where I run into problems. My producing partner is all about FCP. There's no clean way to export an EDL between our two systems so that we can BOTH edit. We work around it. If there's something with Sony's proprietary HD format that's somewhere between HDV and XDCAM, or DSLR footage from a Nikon, I edit because Vegas imports those clips easily. When FCP imports those formats, it ranges from not recognizing the file to displaying interlace artifacts. On the other hand, my Vegas setup chokes on Canon HDV, so that gets edited on FCP.

Whether using FCP or Vegas, the output is comparable, I'm not saying identical because of inherent differences in how MacOS/FCP and Windows/Vegas implement the various output codecs. Needless to say, though, our material from FCP and Vegas has been used in every media from Broadcast to family videos.

The tool, in and of itself, it not the issue. Professionalism comes from a.) the footage and b.) the skill of the editor. Shoot a corporate video with the onboard mic, no tripod and no lights and Eisenstein himself couldn't make that a professional looking edit. Conversely, light and mic a two year old's dance recital, shoot it with three Steadicams for proper coverage, and you'll get something worthy of a broadcast dance show.

It's just that for some projects, I need a phillips head and for some I need a flathead. It doesn't matter if Vegas in the flathead or the phillips and FCP the other. Which one is the best for the job? No one's comparing MSPaint to Vegas...it's just a tool, and if you use it right, you'll be very pleased wit the results.


Batch converting files to monochrome I am looking for a free software that lets me convert a batch of video files to monochrome.
The closest I've found so far is Any Video Converter free but this does neither allow for easy application of a setting to all files within the queue, nor does it allow to keep the original file format (e.g you can't convert from webm to webm and just apply a filter).
I do, however, want to keep all properties except for color.

Okay I just did with a ffmpeg batch
In PowerShell:
ls | Where { $_.Extension -eq ".webm" } | ForEach { ffmpeg -i "$i" -vf "hue=s=0" -crf 20 -codec:a libvorbis -c:v libvpx -b:v 500k "${name}.webm" }


Headphone for recording voice for YouTube I want to record my voice for YouTube videos. So should I get a headphone with mic like Senheiser GSP 300 or a microphone separately and a monitor headphone..?

The quality of the headphones will only affect how the audio sounds to you, so you don't necessarily need to spend your money on that to improve the audio for a youtube video. I would suggest focussing your money on the mic itself.
This is a great roundup of relatively inexpensive mics, with audio clips so you can hear how they sound.
Gaming headsets tend to have relatively cheap mics in them, and you need to be really careful about the mic's position.  Too close and you get breath noise and popping sounds. Too far away and you get room noise and hissing on the audio.


My video is blurry after dragging it to composition I matched the dimensions and it is still blurry and ive tried it with multiple videos and it is still blurry. please help.

Your viewport preview is set to Quarter resolution (see just below the preview video). Set it to full. Depending on your machine, preview may not be fluid.

This setting only affects the preview.


Why does moving objects in some videos flicker or distort horizontally I am not asking the common question of horizontal dark stripes on some of the videos. I know this is a known topic and lots of resources are already available on the internet on this. But I am talking about a strange phenomena of some of the videos here, specifically appears around moving objects. Please see the screenshot below.

This is snapshot of a Youtube video (a cricket match). The player in the video is running. Hence you can clearly see the horizontal distortion of the player's image. But notice carefully, the entire video screen is not distorted. You can see the score board and logo which are added on post processing of the camera footage during telecast. Those static parts are not distorted.
I do notice this problem, when I record my own videos with my Sony Handycam and try to play the recorded clips (MTS Files) with VLC Media player. If I play the same clip with Windows Media Player these stripes disappear. When I shoot using my OnePlus 5 Mobile, it doesn't appear at all in any player. So, there is indeed a contribution of the camera we are shooting and the player which is playing the video. And this happens specifically when the objects in the video (or the camera) moves. If I take video of a static content, the stripes do not show up. I am pretty sure, many of you have noticed this too.
Anyone has any idea what causes this horizontal distortion to appear? Is there any resource available which explains the cause and ways to fix it?
If you want to see the sample Youtube video which I am referring here, the video id is nclPaVQmCHc

This is called interlacing. It's a video artefact left over from the days when video signals for television (and domestic systems) sent every other horizontal line, then filled in the missing gaps, every half a frame of video that was sent.
You need to deinterlace the footage before you edit it.
If someone else has already uploaded the footage incorrectly to youtube, you may be unable to deinterlace their footage, depending on whether the scale and frame rate of the video has been altered when they edited it.


After Effects: Shortcut for showing all transforming properties of a layer just wondering if there is a shortcut in after effects to reveal all transforming properties (scale, position, opacity, etc.) of a selected layer at once?

There's 3 options:

Ctrl+` for Toggle expansion of selected layers to show all properties

UU for Show only modified properties

U for Show only properties with keyframes or expressions


Largest input image size when encoding a video? I got a bunch of really large 16 bit videos, approaching 65535×65535 pixels in size. These are essentially high quality timelapse panoramas. I want to convert them to a 7680×4320 movie (8K UHD, 8 bit). I'm not too concerned about the format, but I want some kind of compression.

I think I can resize the images using Python to get them down to HEVC (8192×4320)...

Is there anything that will playback (with VLC?) that can do a larger number of pixels than 8192×4320? What are my options?

When I try to use FFmpeg I get errors like:

[mjpeg @ 000000000062eae0] [IMGUTILS @ 000000000023ed40] Picture size 20000x19824 is invalidN/A
Error while decoding stream #0:0: Invalid data found when processing input

FFmpeg is tripping up at this statement in Imgutils.c in function av_image_check_size()

if ((int)w>0 && (int)h>0 && (w+128)*(uint64_t)(h+128) < INT_MAX/8) return;  [ else error() ]

where INT_MAX is defined in limits.h as at least 32767 (2^15-1), or greater depending upon your compiler.

Compiling with a 64-bit compiler will permit larger images.


What applications can I film in and integrate photos, and narrating on iMac/iPhone/Maybe iPad What applications can I film in and integrate photos, and narrating?

I've played with iMovie and don't get it (ADHD), and video apps on my iPhone seem puny for a series of youTube like documentary chapters. There is the iMac remote control, and I have Apple TV for Screening.

I know this sounds obvious but I want the final cut to be a little slick, as a tool to sell the idea of not quitting after 21 years, or to use in the slightly landmark divorce, (hope not).

iMovie is extremely easy to use - maybe you just need to find some local classes or a friend who can walk you through the process?

Alternately, try writing up the screenplay version of your story so you can shop it around to local producers. If you can write out a compelling story, you will have an easier to finding people to collaborate with you. And the written document may help you structure your recording and editing process.


Can a low-bitrate BluRay video be written to DVD-R to be played by BD-players? Assume a BD-Video directory structure with a 1080p video. It is so boring, that its max datarate is below 10MBit/s, and the entire directory structure takes less than 4.7GB.

Instead of writing this to a BD-R, could it also be written to a DVD-R, and would BD-players run it?

On the one side, the data rate is lower than the max DVD-Video data rate, so the "DVD-part" of the drive is fast enough, and I'd imagine the player just looks at the directory structure to determine if it's DVD-Video, BD-Video or anything else.
On the other side, I read everywhere that the BD-Video standard specifies UDF v2.5 as file system. Many players don't care, but for example the Play Station 3 does. Of course, UDF v2.5 could be used for DVDs, too, but if a player checks this, it could also check the media type and refuse to play the movie.

Almost all Bluray players will play a UDF v2.5 with a movie on it, even if the physical media is a DVD.
Another twist is to encode the movie as AVCHD, which was originally meant for HD camcorders recording to DVDs. Many DVD (!) players and all Bluray players are compatible with this format, so if you encode your movie in this format, you have the unexpected benefit that it will work not only in Bluray players but in many DVD players, too.


How to record screen with zoom in high quality? Is there some way to record Windows screen with zoom in high quality? Like in this video:

You have 3 options:

find a software that supports recording with a zoom-in
on Windows there is the screen magifier (I hope there is something similar on Mac?) which can be used to magnify the relevant screen part
you record the video normally and then edit in post

If you go for the first option, it's easy to find several screen recording applications with Google, I tried the terms "screen recorder" "zoom-in" (just usign "zoom" spoils the search results with many hits for the Zoom meeting app. So use "zoom-in" with quotes). I can't recommend any software in particular.
My preferred method would be to do it in post, but that's a personal preference and of course your video editor has to support it. The feature, which you need, may be called a "crop" effect, whereas the zoom effect will animate the process of zooming in or out. Anyway, when you want to do it in post, make sure you can record a higher resolution than the output resolution, e.g. record in 4k and output to HD. However editing 4k video requires either fast hardware or a good video editor that can work with proxy files or similar resource saving alternatives.
That said, the edit-in-post option takes some effort. Option 1 or 2 may be the more economic way for you.


How do they create that kind of "twisting zoom"? I'm new to video production and editing. I'm wondering how I should use my camera (maybe with some other tools) to create a kind of twisting zoom, where the camera moves towards the front of the subject at the same time to the subject moves, without shaking the camera. I'd like to do something similar to what is in the video below:

This is not an editing technique and it is not a zoom. There is no change in focal length. The subject is on a product or photography turntable. You can even make your own. The camera is kept fixed on a tripod with no zooming. Just position the camera and the subject to capture the motion you want and rotate the turntable.


Question about using the DeShaker plug-in for VirtualDub I've been using my Canon 7D primarily for photography and am starting to get into the video realm with it.

I tried using the Deshaker plug-in for VirtualDub on some of my shaky/not usable footage. I like the program but want to have as little quality loss as possible. Does anyone have suggested settings to use?

Also has anyone tried "streaming" the output of Deshaker into something like Sony Vegas?

Edit:

Although, I am still curious about this question I have since moved on to Sony Vegas 11. Wow this version is vastly superior to 9, especially for those using HD content... It also does include a built-in stabilizer. I am much happier with it and can work with files from a Canon 7D as well as an HD Sony Camcorder natively instead of having to pre-render everything.

The built-in stabilizer in Vegas Pro is very convenient, but some may still want to use Deshaker because it is more flexible.

It is available as an FX plug-in for Vegas Pro:

http://www.vegasvideo.de/plugins/104-deshaker-interface-for-sony-vegas-pro.html

Some people report having problems getting the plug-in to work, and continue to use the very handy script that calls out to VirtualDub:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.edmiston/deshaker.htm

Some settings that are useful to fiddle with:

Remove pan/crop prior to rendering - unclick this if there are a lot of index marks in pan/crop and you want to smooth them out
Block size and scale - needs to be finer if there is a lot of black or walls or lack of things for Deshaker to lock onto.
Ignore pixels inside/outside - allows you to eliminate the moving things so that the whole smoothed video doesn't bounce up and down with the moving things.
Edge compensation: None
Yes to Use prev and future frames to fill borders
Yes to soft borders
Yes to Extrapolate colors into borders
Motion smoothness - all appropriate ones at 3000. Include Zoom only when appropriate (1500). Zero for Rotation if using a tripod.
Correction limits - all appropriate ones at 99. Zoom at 50 only when using.


Software to "control" a video show I'm working on a magicians show.
They need some videos to be played during it, but the timings of their work could vary.
So I was wondering if I could find some kind of software that could be used to control how videos do play, and that they could control with a keyboard.
It would be quite simple, they idea is to have some videos that would loop, waiting for a "user" action.
Eg.

video A >>>
video B - video loop - when key is pressed, plays until its end then goes to...
video C>>>
video B - video loop - when key is pressed, plays until its end then goes to...
video D
etc.

I used to do this with Flash back in the days.
Maybe is there a better tool to achieve this now, and which would handle videos in a better way (Flash was bad for videos !)
Thanks !

For live event video display, I would search for "VJ software."  Because (a) I'm a video editor who uses DaVinci Resolve in his daily life and (b) I sometimes make typos when performing internet searches, I've stumbled across a piece of software called "Resolume," which appears to be highly regarded in this space, although I cannot comment on its quality or efficacy.  https://resolume.com


How to create a animated intro video in Adobe After-Effects? ( With particular animation, not in general) Background

I want to create a animated Intro video for my YT channel.

What I need!

I want the image to show from small size to normal size with constant rotation. Then some images appear with spiral type spin/rotation with size change from small to normal.
Then the those images shift to left side and the channel name appears on right of image with smoke type or crackling type animation.

Question

I want the names of animations and effects I should use?

  I searched on internet for each effects and animation explanations but
  it got tedious and complicated and then I found this stack site. So I
  am asking here. I hope it's the right place to ask.

.

If anyone can also explain a little bit about how to use them then it would be really helpful too!

There are not that many options. "In general" (Sorry) you have

Position
Rotation
Scale
Change the origin point
Opacity

So you simply combine them.

  Then some images appear with spiral type spin/rotation

Change the origin point so it is not a rotation but a spiral

  size change from small to normal

Scale

  from small size to normal size with constant rotation

Scale + rotation

  Then the those images shift to left side

Position

  the channel name appears on right of image

Opacity

  with smoke type or crackling type animation.

For this, you either create your own smoke or get a clip from an image bank.


iMovie 4K resolution to Keynote – apparent loss of resolution I exported a 4k resolution video from iMovie on my MacBook Pro. I imported it into Keynote in order to crop it. I noticed that upon exporting from Keynote, the resolution of the video was markedly reduced.

In Keynote, I had exported the cropped video using File → Export To → Movie. Upon export, the resolution field only gave me 720p, 1080p, and Custom. I clicked on Custom. This gave me three compression types: H.264, Apple ProRes 422, and Apple ProRes 4444. I tried saving the cropped video using each of these three options. However, in each case, the video appeared to be reduced in quality (presumably resolution).

My question is: How can I crop a 4K video in Keynote and export it without reducing quality/resolution?

I had the same problem. I changed the dimensions to 2160×3840 and exported and the quality was excellent. Hope this helps.


Blur effects on a transparent background leaves a black ghosting effect If I add a simple UV sphere that emits white light, and in the compositor add a Fast Gaussian blur effect, then when viewing on a transparent background there is a noticeable black halo around the glow.

Any ideas what the correct way to do this is?

Update: It seems to have something to do with the horizon colour being picked up by the blur effect.  How do you prevent that from happening?  As a work around I can set the horizon colour to white, but I don't think that's the correct way to do it...

Here you can see with a red horizon colour, and changing the colour of the emitter to blue the effect is quite pronounced:

To ensure you get 'pure' transparency, you'll have to ensure the transparent world is used, instead of your (coloured) sky.

When using Blender Internal, make sure you have in the Render settings, under Shading panel Alpha set to Transparent

When using Cycles renderer, make sure you have in the Render settings, under Film panel the Transparency box checked.

Without these settings your alpha will be pre-multiplied with the sky color, which will look like your example.


Final Cut X Events missing Added a new external drive. Moved Final Cut X Folders to new drive. Now Events and Projects missing. I know files need to be relinked, but I'm not even seeing the Event folders. I relocated the FCP folders back to original drive, but Events/Projects still missing. What do I need to do to regain original configuration?

This is just a guess, but when the projects and events folders are on an external drive, they need to be at the drive's root level for FCPX to see them.  So, when you had them on your external drive, the file path would need to be: External_Drive/Final Cut Events/YourEvent and External_Drive/Final Cut Projects/YourProject.  They will not show up any other way.

When they're on your system drive, they need to be at ~/Movies.  When you move projects and events, it's better to do it from within Final Cut (instead of Finder) because Final Cut keeps track of all of the symbolic links.  To do this, choose File->Move Project (or duplicate project, duplicate event, move event, duplicate event).


FFmpeg graph2dot tool In FFmpeg Filters Documentation is the section 3 graph2dot is this about graph2dot program:

  The graph2dot program included in the FFmpeg tools directory can be used to parse a filtergraph description and issue a corresponding textual representation in the dot language.

I have FFmpeg from Zeranoe's build (Windows, 64-bit, static) and I have no tools directory.

So I tried find this program by Google for downloading it but without success.

Is this part of the documentation obsolete or is it possible to obtain this program?

I don't use Windows, but in Linux you can download the FFmpeg source, then:

cd ffmpeg
./configure
make
make tools/graph2dot

Then you can use it:

echo "nullsrc,scale=640:360,nullsink" | tools/graph2dot -o graph.tmp
dot -Tpng graph.tmp -o graph.png

Resulting in:

Not Windows specific, but maybe helpful for any Linux user who also wants to use this tool.


Why do background generators restart in a glitchy way, and how can I avoid it? I'm seeing this issue frequently: if I'm using one of the built-in moving background generators such as Flow or Glimmer, the generated output sometimes glitches on boundaries of other visual elements, e.g. when a text/title clip ends its fade-out in the row above. It's as though thresholds of other clips/elements force the generator to restart or glitch in some other way. Why would other elements affect the generator's output?
In the image shown below, the generator will glitch on the playhead's current frame, as soon as the fade has finished.

It might be a side effect of that FCPX has a top down approach. Elements and timelines on top can have effects of elements and timelines underneath.
Change the order and move the generator on to of everything, this should help the glitching.


What are some software to create animated videos? I am looking for software to create an animated video like this:

or an even better: http://vimeo.com/63457188.
It would be great if you could share more than one tips. Are there any such free apps out there?

The animation that you refer to was probably made with Adobe After Effects. You can animate this kind of thing for 'free', if you don't value your time, using PhotoShop CS2 (free from Adobe) and the Quicktime player which will import image sequences and save them as movies.

But your hope for free software misses the point that the costly parts of animation are time and skill. More expensive tools frequently have built-in time savers. After Effects is certainly one of those. It won't save you, however, from having to get skill.


(Efficiently) Extract multiple clips from a long video, possibly with ffmpeg I've got a long video (2 hours at high resolution). We might as well assume it's in mp4 format, because it's in an AVCHD, and I'll have to extract and convert it to mp4 anyhow.

I'd like to extract from it about 40 clips, of varying lengths. I know the "start" and "stop" time for each. It might look like this:

0:00:15 to 0:01:30 -> clip1.mp4
0:01:55 to 0:03:10 -> clip2.mp4
0:03:45 to 0:05:12 -> clip2.mp4
 ... (many more lines)
1:55:45 to 1:57:11 -> clip41.mp4

I can certainly write a script to extract each of these individually (via something like what's described here), but that requires "reading through" the source forty times, which can be slow. Is there a way to get ffmpeg to do this in some sort of sequential fashion in a single pass? Or do I just resign myself to an overnight background process?

According to @Gyan, the referenced command does an efficient job, and won't read through MP4s but use an index to jump to the inpoint. So there's no real need to optimize.


Creating menu for a video file (not for DVD) I need to create a menu for a video, which will be written onto a disk not in a DVD format, but as a single file (f.e. mp4). The problem is that programs such as Adobe Encore are not able (as far as I'm concerned) to create a 'standalone' menus (executable-like). What is the recommended way to do such a thing?

Looking at what Mr Henderson was saying, it appears you will need to have some basic programming skills to do what you want.  The system he provided a link to appears to be based off of a markup language (similar to HTML if you've used that).  If you aren't afraid to get your hands dirty with some basic programming that would be the way to go.
(details here: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=66583)

Alternatively you could use Encore and create an image (ISO) of the DVD, but I'm not sure if it's possible to run a disk image independently of a disk.

I will play around with Adobe Encore tomorrow and see if there is a way to export a standalone menu.


Recommendation for a flying camera device Does anyone have any experience using flying devices that you can mount a camera to? I would like to try this just as a side hobby and there are a lot of links and information that come up once you do a search on the Internet.
As I'm really beginner in the area, the concerns that I have right now are battery life and amount of time that it could spend in the air. The other interesting question is whether it would be better to buy a full equipped devices that comes with a camera or just a flying widget that you can use with your own camera. However, any information on the matter would be useful at this point.
Price range - as I said, hobby and I don't want to spend a lot of money on it but I don't want to make a compromise with quality either so just looking for the best available offer.

The on board cameras you ask about I have found to be sub-par in resolution, so I would focus on models you can attach a camera to.

One of mine - the Parrot AR Drone 2 - I simply gaffer tape a gopro to - the obvious problem is any movement of the drone to cope with flight results in a camera shift - the onboard cameras have this issue too of course.  This can be stabilized out with good post-processing tools, but it's worth, budget allowing, to have a Gimbal for the camera.

Having used a Phantom 2 Vision system with a remote control for the Gimbal with video feedback, this was absolutely a winner for a film production, as the director I could watch each run, in high winds which occupied the pilot.  This requires quite a bit of gear - the camera signal broadcast to a monitor (for us over wifi), the control of the gimbal, and the control of the drone.  The positive of this system was the Gimbal and Drone control was centralised, so each didn't need their own battery, broadcast, and control systems.

So if you want smooth shots that don't "give away" it's taken by a flying machine and have a smooth flight quality, it really is worth having the camera separate on a Gimbal of some sort.  The advantage of the prebuilt systems for this (We take XYZ camera) is they've 1. worked in the weight of the camera for that drone, and 2. figured out it's best positioning in terms of a balanced flight and drag, and tested it for that.  Eg. If I gaffer tape my gopro in the wrong place, the drone stabilisation software fights it and the footage ends up shakey.

Good luck, it's all very very fun!


How to do a better and easier roll transition in Kdenlive I've been using Kdenlive for a month or so. One of my favorite transitions is a roll transition, where the old clip slides out (e.g. from the center to the left) while at the same time the new clip slides in (e.g. from the right to the center) creating the effect of the old clip being pushed out by the new clip. To do this in Kdenlive, I slightly overlap the two clips in different tracks then apply two Slide transform, one to the old clip (a slide out) and one to the new clip (a slide in).
However:

this is time consuming;
the movement is linear, there isn't a way to a dynamism or speed changes in the movement.

Any ideas on how to do a better and easier roll transition in Kdenlive?

I think you should try the other transitions again
Please do not be absolutist
I also enjoy the transition roll
But
Do a quick Google search for smooth transitions. Maybe it's right for you
Good luck


Tool to make a short youtube video I'm a total newbie into developing videos..:) But I would like to create an animated video which is about 5-7 minutes long. The kind of ones we find on youtube.

I did some research to find a tool. I came across online tools like moovly and Animaker. They're easy to use..but their free version has limited features and with the free version you can only have a video length of 2 minutes.

I also stumbled upon the free tool called Blender. But unlike Moovly or Animaker, it seems it requires quite some knowledge in animation to make animation videos in Blender(don't know if I'm right. Just that I feel so..)

Is there a free online tool like Moovly or a software to download like Blender that will help me to easily make an animated video of about 5-7 minutes length which will also allow me to include voiceover and also facilitate adding of some of my custom images (from my desktop) into that animated video..?

The kind of ones we find on youtube

Well, youtube is a pretty big place, so you can find a lot of different animations, with different levels of complexity... really different levels in complexity.

Even the two online tools you posted are quite different. One is for 2d animations, and the other is more like a video editor. But the most important thing is that those tools have assets, one has animated toons, the other has a library of video clips.

This means that if you use another tool, which I will put a link to, you need to either create your own assets or get them from somewhere else. Video Clips, Music, still photos, cartoons, or even animated cartoons.

Sayed that, two great and free tools are:

HitFilm Express which is a video editor and a compositor (the compositor is the tool to make basic animations)

And NHC Express animate.

Here is a link to the graphic design forum post I made some days ago, explaining a bit more about them:

https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/136912/free-and-easy-to-use-tool-for-easy-2d-animations/136917#136917

But you can not go as blindly as I feel you are going. You need to define what you really need. Video editing, 2D animation, a slideshow converted into a video...


Finding the place where a video loops I got a video of a fireplace, the video is 3 hours long.

I can see that it is looping as the logs keep burning forever. My guess is that it is looping in the region of 5-15minutes.

Is there some software available that can find where the video loops?

So far my best idea is using ffmpeg to output all the frames in raw bmp and search for duplicate files.

Try

ffmpeg -i video.mp4 -filter_complex
"[0]trim=start_frame=0:end_frame=1[c];[c][0]blend=all_mode=difference,blackframe" -f null -

As long as the very first frame of the video is not something like a static logo screen or similar, this should help you locate the loop joint. If it is, change the start frame value to a higher number. The end_frame should be 1 greater.  Basically, one instance of the video is trimmed to just one frame, then it's composited with the full video frame-by-frame, in difference mode. When the blend filter encounters an identical frame i.e. the point of loop, the result will be a black frame. The blackframe filter should then identify that frame (and all others at each loop turnover), with a readout looking like this:

[Parsed_blackframe_2 @ 0000000003607d20] frame:325 pblack:100 pts:13837 t:13.837000 type:I last_keyframe:325

That t value represents the duration of a single loop.


How do you get the highest quality type in After Effects? I'm a complete beginner to After Effects and Premier Pro. When I typed directly into After Effects and then did a "Best Settings" render my text looks a bit pixelated. Is this the best quality AE can do or would it be better to import the text in another format for high quality? Transparent TIF for example? Is there another thing I should look at in the render settings to ensure the type renders crisp?

It depends on how bad the aliasing is, but a very slight fast blur can sometimes smooth a layer that looks too digital. I most often use this on thin linework, but sometimes type as well.


How can I achieve the Ken Burn Effect with greater control or in other software? I am using the Ken Burns effect in Final Cut Pro X, however it does not allow me enough control over how it behaves.  I end up having to cut the video in to multiple clips in order to get the effect to work the way I want.

How can I achieve multiple different Ken Burns like zooms without having to cut my video in to multiple pieces to make the adjustments.  What about other software when Ken Burns isn't an effect that it has?

What you like to accomplish is a zoom?
In that case you can just add keyframes on the position of the video within your canvas/composition.

Find the moment where you want to zoom.
Add keyframe on the scale / position
Add keyframe on end of the zoom
Set preferred value
Add keyframe one frame before zooming out
Add keyframe on that next frame.
Add keyframe at the end of the zoom
Set the value of that keyframe back to 100% (original value)

That's it!


Question about text graphics and audio clips. How do i input text from the audio filename? Sorry if the title is confusing, but I have around 500 audio clips with 500 text/titles or whatever it's called. As you can see in the image, there are multiple audio files with text graphics overlapping them. Since I have so many, I want to be able to automatically take the filename for the audio  (such as “and” as shown in the image) and display it as text.

Premiere would be a pain in the rear for doing this. You should opt for after effects, create a text and set the text content as the filename using an expression. Then you can just copy+paste this for every file and the name will be applied automatically.
Open your text-layer, alt+click on the "source-text"-stopwatch to create an expression. In this, type

thisComp.layer(2).name

IMPORTANT: For the expression to work, the audio-file must be placed so that it's layer 2, i.e. under the text-layer. If you want to change the position of the layer, just put the place of it in the expression, replacing the "(2)".

Now all you have to do is copy and paste that text-layer containing the expression, and (if the sound-files are all in the same position in each comp) the text-layer will automatically change to the name of your file.


Can I zoom in, manual focus, then zoom out? I'm recording a top view of a drum machine with this camera: Panasonic HDC-TM40. I need to use manual focus to fix the focus.

Using manual is the only way to lock the focus, right?
I can barely see the manual focus with the little screen (and even with an external screen). May I zoom in, focus, then zoom out (optical zoom only)?

To answer your second question:

You can only use the zoom in, focus, zoom out if the lens is parfocal. Normally a parfocal zoom lens starts at 3000-4000 USD, thus I highly doubt the lens in this camera is parfocal.

Then again, how much of an issue this will be depends entirely on the lens, perhaps it won't loose a lot of focus or it will loose a lot of focus when you zoom out.

I'm not familiar enough with the camera to really answer your first question, but in general terms manual focus is the only way to lock focus. However, modern auto focus in certain cameras keep focus very well, but it isn't locked as such.


Netflix encoding system - MAPLE I understand that Netflix does all their encoding in AWS using EC2.  They have a custom encoding software called MAPLE that chunks all source video into 2-3 second chunks and encodes in multiple codec and formats across many EC2 instances in parallel.

Netflix is known to open source their software, however I am not finding that MAPLE has.  Does anyone know if an alternative / similar encoding/packaging scheme is available in open source?

Thanks for your attention.

MediaEncodingCluster is an Enterprise Class, Video Cluster Environment with a Plattform Independent Client - Server Architecture for distributed video/audio converting/encoding tool over a grid Computing Network Design. more on http://docs.codergrid.de

Note: I haven't personally tried this yet. I'll update with some benchmarks when I do.

Sources:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/bripper/

http://codergrid.de/trac/


FFMPEG Batch Processing I have a ffmpeg command that will happily process all video files in a folder one by one, but how can i make it process them simultaneously?

here's my current command:

for i in *.mov; do name=``echo $i | cut -d'.' -f1``; echo $name; TIMECODE=$(ffprobe "$i" -v error -show_entries stream_tags=timecode -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 | awk -F: '{ print $1 "\\:" $2 "\\:" $3 "\\:" $4 }') ; ffmpeg -i "$i" -vf "trim=start_frame=192,setpts=PTS-STARTPTS,scale=1280:-1:force_original_aspect_ratio=decrease,drawtext=fontfile=/usr/share/fonts/truetype/droid/DroidSansMono.ttf: fontsize=28: timecode='00\:00\:00\:00': r=24: x=(w-tw)/2: y=25: fontcolor=white: box=1: boxcolor=0x00000099" -threads 4 -c:v mpeg1video -b:v 5000k -af "atrim=start=8,asetpts=PTS-STARTPTS" -c:a libmp3lame -b:a 192k "${name}_mpeg1.mpeg"

All that you need is to put an & at the end of the ffmpeg command line. This will make the ffmpeg process to run in background, allowing it to be executed simultaneously with other processes.

#!/bin bash
# add this code to a file called encode or whatever you want
# make it executable: chmod ugo+x encode
# and you are ready to run: ./encode

for i in *.mov; do
    name=``echo $i | cut -d'.' -f1``;
    echo $name;
    TIMECODE=$(ffprobe "$i" -v error -show_entries stream_tags=timecode -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 | awk -F: '{ print $1 "\\:" $2 "\\:" $3 "\\:" $4 }') ;
    ffmpeg -i "$i" -vf "trim=start_frame=192,setpts=PTS-STARTPTS,scale=1280:-1:force_original_aspect_ratio=decrease,drawtext=fontfile=/usr/share/fonts/truetype/droid/DroidSansMono.ttf: fontsize=28: timecode='00\:00\:00\:00': r=24: x=(w-tw)/2: y=25: fontcolor=white: box=1: boxcolor=0x00000099" -threads 4 -c:v mpeg1video -b:v 5000k -af "atrim=start=8,asetpts=PTS-STARTPTS" -c:a libmp3lame -b:a 192k "${name}_mpeg1.mpeg" &;

    # limit ffmpeg processes to 5
    while [$(ps | grep ffmpeg | wc -l) -eq 5]; do
        echo "ffmpeg queue is full, waiting...";
        # amount of seconds to wait till we check again
        sleep 10;
    done
done;


How do I create this slide/bouncy effect in After Effects? The news channel in my country is using a nice bouncy/slide effect. Now I'm trying to recreate that in After Effects. I tried many effects and expressions, Googled a lot and watched many tutorials. But none fit to my expecting result.

Does someone know how to recreate those effects? With expressions or maybe a nice plugin?

Look very close to the end of the bar. Its bouncing a little bit.

Key is creating 2 additional keyframes after the last one (one copy of the last one 5-10 frames ahead and another one in between). The keyframe in between is for shifting the position slightly into the opposite direction. In order to get a non linear animation ease all the keyframes at the end.

Instructions

Create a new composition and a new solid layer with the dimensions of the gauge
Click the solid layer and create a mask (double click the rectangular mask path icon to create new mask with the dimensions of the solid layer)
Open up the mask properties of the solid / gauge layer MM
Go to the end of the composition and add a keyframe by clicking on the stop watch of the mask path property
Go to the first frame of the composition and drag both right mask bezier points to the left (this will automatically insert a new keyframe)
Copy the last keyframe 5-10 frames ahead and another one in between
With the cursor on the keyframe in between, drag both bezier points on the right side of the rectangle slightly to the left
Select the last 3 keyframes
Right Click > Keyframe Assistant > Easy Ease or simply hit F9

Examples

Bounce to the right

Bounce to the left

Project File Download


Multi-source, picture-in-picture live stream So I have some experience with live production, but I want to do something a bit more complex and need some things cleared.

This project would use multiple cameras (lets say 5), some non-camera
sources (live PC display screengrab) and tons of graphics.
There would probably be some 4-5 layouts, some of them would need to
display multiple sources added to some graphical overlay. Some would
be one camera at a time (with some live cut between cameras) and
maybe some lower third or something over that.
Entire thing would be live streamed online.
Entire thing would be handled in HD (I imagine 1080p is no problem, am I wrong?)

I have used BMD ATEM plenty of times, but this seems to be over ATEMs capabilities (or am I wrong?).

I imagine there is some sort of switcher like ATEM, but with the ability to prepare layouts composed of multiple sources and graphics via some companion PC/mac software. To this switcher, camera sources would be connected via HDMI or SDI, and screengrab sources via some sort of HDMI splitter (between PC and it's display). This switcher would allow for switching between layouts and inside those layouts. It would also allow for switching between different graphics. Imagine there is small space for a sponsor banner and it would switch between three banners of different sponsors. Or there is point counter displaying one of multiple PNGs with a number.

Entire thing would then go from switcher to some encoder/streamer (like wirecast?) that would stream it to let's say YouTube.

To lower number of inputs needed on the main "super switcher", it would be possible to route 3 cameras to secondary switcher like simple ATEM and route that as single source to the main switcher, since signal from those cameras would be used only in one layout and only linear edited (no PIP).

My main questions:

Is there such "super switcher" that would handle PIP and multiple graphics?
Is there reliable streaming device, or do I need PC with BMD Intensity Shuttle (or similar) and some streaming software?
And are there any contraptions I am not thinking about? Am I maybe thinking about this all wrong? Is there some "best" way to solve this scenario?

Thank you very much!

Investigate some of the software switcher products such as "V-Mix". Or some of the computer-based integrated products like NewTek "TriCaster". They will handle many more inputs than even the large (and expensive) hardware switchers like BMD ATEM, etc.  The more expensive models likely handle quite a large number of PIP images to be combined. Of course, you must have enough compatible video input ports on the computer to capture all those cameras (or whatever). But they can typically handle live inputs from many computers directly over the LAN, so that would be a big advantage for your requirement.

And many (most?) of those products also handle concurrent recording and streaming all in one solution.

Ref:

http://www.newtek.com/
http://www.vmix.com/
http://livestream.com/producer


Transition / Cut Advice for Video Idea I have an idea for a film project that I would like some advice on.
I want to use my GoPro with the handgrip attachment to "interview myself" on a ski chair lift.
Here is what I mean by that: I want to ride a two person chair lift and on the first ride, with the camera pointed at me, I am going to record myself asking all the questions. On the next ride I am going to wear a different outfit and sit on the other side of the chair and record all the answers. Then I want to edit the clips together to make it seem to the best of my ability that they both occurred on the same chair ride.
I could just standard cut / jump cut the clips, but it will be pretty obvious to the viewers what I did and seem discontinuous. I would like to somehow edit the transitions to create the effect that there are really two of me on the same chair (it will be obvious to my viewers that it is the same person, because they all know me, but it will be funny because I am wearing different outfits and I will talk / behave differently for the two different characters).
What I am not trying to achieve is some sort of photo shopping technique to get two of me in the same frame at a given time, but somehow pan back and forth in a smooth way to make it seem as close to being one continuous clip as possible.
Imagine that two people were actually on the lift, and I pointed the camera at myself to ask the question, then turned it to aim at the other person for the answer, then back to me for the next question. This is what I want, but I have to edit it since there is (obviously) only one of me.
Just to help people who aren't familiar with what a ski lift might look like, here are three screen shots from a video of a friend and I essentially doing what I described above (but with two people instead of ong)

Camera being aimed at me for a question, camera was being held by my friend sitting next to me

Halfway between panning from me back to my friend holding the camera

Camera fully panned back to my friend holding the camera
Obviously picture two is unachievable since it has both people in one shot, but I am thinking I might be able to take advantage of the black pole that is in the middle of the chair?
I hope my question is clear, please let me know if I can improve it in any way. Let me know what creative ideas you might have to achieve this goal!
I typically use adobe rush or adobe premier pro for editing.
There is a park near my house that has two swings with a similar pole in between them, and I was thinking I could practice on that before filming on the ski lift.

You could use black screens as section dividers, e.g. one screen could feature a large question mark and the other one an exclamation mark as text.
The idea is to drag the black screens across the video frame from side to side at the same speed you're panning. Make the animation so that it looks like the black screen is attached to the middle pole.
Step by Step:

show the black question screen for a second or two
cross dissolve to you asking the question, the camera being fixed on you
begin panning
as soon as the pole comes into view, move the black answer screen from off-the frame into view, at the same speed as the panning, so it looks like the pole drags the screen with it.
this screen will cover the empty lift seat while you pan
the black answer screen comes fully into view
in the background cut to the other video track
Cross dissolve again and show you sitting in the other seat and answering the question.
start panning again
and so on

You could start the speech tracks just before the dissolve effects start, this is a common technique that simulates typical human dialogue where we perceive someone started speaking first and only then turn our eyes on that person. Research J and L cuts if you want to know more about this.
Also record some ambient sound from the lift ride and environment, that can be played continuously on loop in the background.


Storyboarding for beginners I wanna get more professional with videography and I'm looking for a structured way to make a concept before I start shooting. I'd like to be able to split a clip into scenes and determine how to film it with the equipment I have, e.g. how many cameras, what angles etc.

I read an article about storyboarding software/apps for beginners a couple days ago, but I can't find it anymore. Do you have any recommendations on how to start with this?

Thanks in advance :)

I've always just envisioned the film in my mind and sketched out (on actual paper) the shot angles.

Another option is to get miniatures of your locations, props and performers (dolls, action figures, etc.), position them as they'll be in the scene, and take photos of each of the angles you want in your storyboard. Then you have actual photos of the angles you want.

A third option is similar to the second:  Use miniatures, and then use a video camera to do the actual movements you want.  Someone could be reading lines of dialog aloud while you are shooting.  I saw a documentary showing that this was done during preproduction of Return of the Jedi for the speeder bike sequence on the forest moon of Endor.

With the first two options, I would have the storyboard on set with me, and put a mark next to each shot I'd gotten. That way I knew what I had left to shoot.


ffmpeg concatenation of MP3 files to single M4A file fails Instructions from this site, Can ffmpeg input mp4 and convert it to m4b or m4a?  fail to concatenate and convert multiple MP3 files into one M4A file.
I downloaded the ffmpeg static build for Windows 10 git-2020-06-26-7447045 from http://ffmpeg.zeranoe.com/builds/
I generated a file list.txt containing the files to concatenate, numbered from 01.mp3 to 51.mp3 .
When I try to combine those MP3 files into 1 M4A file, the error happened as below. How do I resolve this?
I ran:
ffmpeg -f concat -safe 0 -i list.txt -vn -y -b:a 64k -acodec aac -ac 2 result.m4a

and got
[concat @ 000002652204c840] Line 1: unknown keyword '01.mp3'
list.txt: Invalid data found when processing input

Here's the content of list.txt:
01.mp3
02.mp3
03.mp3
04.mp3
05.mp3
06.mp3
07.mp3
08.mp3
09.mp3
10.mp3
11.mp3
12.mp3
13.mp3
14.mp3
15.mp3
16.mp3
17.mp3
18.mp3
19.mp3
20.mp3
21.mp3
22.mp3
23.mp3
24.mp3
25.mp3
26.mp3
27.mp3
28.mp3
29.mp3
30.mp3
31.mp3
32.mp3
33.mp3
34.mp3
35.mp3
36.mp3
37.mp3
38.mp3
39.mp3
40.mp3
41.mp3
42.mp3
43.mp3
44.mp3
45.mp3
46.mp3
47.mp3
48.mp3
49.mp3
50.mp3
51.mp3

Each line in the concat list must be either a comment (start line with #) or a keyword. To specify an input, start with file,
so 01.mp3 becomes file 01.mp3.


Video File Navigation Is there any way to provide navigation in a video file like a DVD or Blu-Ray?

I know that QuickTime supports Chapter Markers, but the codecs you can use with QuickTime result in very large files. As far as I know, you can't use H.264 with QuickTime (for example).

I create a lot of training videos and I need a way to provide a way to navigate though complex material.

So I am looking for 2 things:

Reasonable file size (like H.264).
Content navigation.

MKV/MP4 container support chapters too, it also supports h264 and almost any other codec. MP4 container based on MOV container, so you can try to include h264 in MOV too.


Licence for including (with HTML embed tag) others YouTube videos Do I need any Licence for including (with HTML embed tag) others YouTube videos in my website?
I just want to show some cool YouTube videos in my website, but those videos aren't neither created by me nor by my friends. I don't want to add any download link; just to include the videos

If you use the YouTube embed feature then it is allowed according to the YouTube terms of service. If the uploader doesn't want their video to be embedded they can simply turn it off in the video manager.

What is not allowed, whether the embed feature is enabled or not, is that you rip the video from YouTube and then distribute it from your own servers. The only exception is that the video author gave you permission to do this.

Also, you may get a cease and desist letter if you have a habit of just putting a ton of YouTube videos on your webpages and some ads and no original content of your own.


Preventing letters from going to next line as title expands in iMovie I have a title at the end of the movie with my website's URL.  I was using the expand Title effect on this title. As of the most recent update, when the text expands too much, the last letters go to the next line, e.g. video.stackexchange.com: as it grew a little, the m would go to next line, then the 'o', then the 'c', etc.

How do I disable that? I actually want the bounds of the text to go out of the screen. I had no problem doing that before this update.

the easiest thing to do is to manually adjust the font size, use spaces to break up the text into several lines so that it starts out small enough and finishes expanding without jumping to other lines. Took me forever to figure out. Apple really needs to do an update that prevents this.


Wavy screen and lines showing now and again in live streaming cam I have setup a trial live streaming cam in my chicken coop to test this little camera. I am seeing some waves and lines in the feed now and again.

Does anyone know why this happens and what the fix is? I am using the RCA / BNC connector to connect to my video in and this is a 12v system running through 100' of wire.

Here is an example video (around :10 shows the most...):

I have this connected to my gamer PC which is more than powerful enough to process all this video if that could be an issue. Might it be the video capture mechanism? If so, anyone have a good card in mind?

That appears to be analog signal degradation resulting in a loss of frame syncronization.  You may need to add a video amplifier on the end near the camera to boost the signal enough to get it to your computer or possibly use a device that can convert it to digital and stream it over a network connection directly.


Why is the EOS M6 Video Bitrate lower than the EOS 1200D/T5? I was looking to upgrade to the EOS M6 from the EOS 1200D/T5, but one thing that confused me was that the M6 has a listed video bitrate (at DPreview.com) at 1080p60 of 35 Mbps, and for lower framerates at 24 Mbps. Meanwhile, while I can't seem to find any actual bitrate specs for the 1200D, opening up a 1080p24 video file in Windows Explorer and switching to the Details tab  under the Video section lists Data rate as 46541 kbps, with Total Bitrate just below as 48077 kbps, which if I'm not mistaken, is equal to 48.07 Mbps (division by 1000 to get Mega-bits from Kilo-bits). So how is it that the newer Canon APS-C camera has a lower bitrate with a higher framerate? Or am I just reading it wrong?

That would be a great question for Canon, because only the manufacturer can provide the reasons considered when producing a new model. I only can venture a guess that the M6 is a smaller camera that presumably is a lower-level compared to full-body T5. Maybe higher bitrate results in more heat, and the smaller body may have issues with dissipating it. Your guess is as good as anyone else's. It seems that the M6 uses the same H.264 as the prior models instead of the more efficient H.265, so seems that this is not the reason for decreasing the bitrate.


CPU vs. GPU in a MacPro I'm thinking of purchasing a MacPro and I'm wondering what the performance differences would be (in a Pr/Ae workflow) between one with the 3.0GHz 8-Core processor and Dual D500 graphics cards vs. one with the 3.5 6-Core and Dual D700. I'm only editing HD footage from my DSLRs, so no RAW or 4K.

I'm wondering if one would be better for editing and the other for rendering, or one is better for both. I appreciate any advice!

8 cores is nice but unnecessary. Adobe products rarely utilize all the cores unless you have multiprocessing enabling, which if you don't know: multiple frames are being rendered at the same time using different cores for each frame. But even at that I doubt you could get all 8 cores on board to do that because you need more ram dedicated to each cores processes.

An addition of .5Ghz for a sacrifice of 2 cores sounds like a deal to me! Plus if you choose to multiprocess you can utilize almost all of your cores, given you get the 16gb upgrade.

Now the video card is simply an upgrade according to benchmarks. With the +.5ghz on the CPU and an upgrade to the D700 it basically makes it render at an equivalent speed of a 8core 3.0ghz & D500

I know you didn't ask this but I think it changes everything: get an SSD (Solid State Drive). I have one in my PC and the boot up time is 5 seconds, I can only imagine the boot time with a light weight operating system like OSX. Applications open just as fast and finding files in your project/loading your project in a second. Not going to ramble on because I don't actually know too much about SSD's other than first hand experience. I do however recommend you go to this article, it has great visuals and explanations on SSD vs HDD!

In conclusion: I would get the 3.5ghz w/ Dual D700 and if possible, a solid state drive (ssd).


Why won't After Effects import an uncompressed avi file? I just recorded a demo from cod4 with 2000FPS.

I used Vdub to make an uncompressed video from the Screenshots.
After saving as an avi, the file looks good. (Apart from the lack while playing in windows media player which is probably caused by the large Framerate)

When I try to import to after effects or encoder, I get the error that it can't be imported.

But why?

After effects should take in the image sequence just fine. No reason to run it through Vdub first. Let me know how it works out for you, it sounds like a very interesting project.


Vhs capture: 720x576 or less? On many forum and sites people say that you can capture with resolution of 720x576. But many other replies is too high resolution and is better to capture at 512x384 or similar. Someone know what is the max original resolution of a vhs?

I think you want to capture at 640x480. VHS uses interlaced video, so the recorded content provides half the lines every 1/30th of a second. The effective resolution is horribly low, 352x240.

Have a look at VHS capture DIVX information, which seems to discuss all the issues.

Regardless of the workflow you use, be sure your de-interlacer is high-quality or the output will suffer greatly.


How can I remove a crowd of people from a scene while keeping one person in the shot I'm trying to film in a city with one person being the focus point, and the goal is to make the city look deserted.  If the city is always busy and full of people, is there a way for me to remove the people in After Effects or Premiere Pro?  I would think that one could just make a composite shot of only the parts of the image that stay constant, but I have no idea how to even approach that.  How can I do this?

Is the camera moving? If it's a still shot you could make a clean plate of the empty city in Photoshop and use a green screen for the actor. If you don't want the shot locked-off you can cheat add some movement to the frame in post, but big changes in perspective would require recreating the city in 3D.

Interestingly one of the earliest photographs of a human being was by accident — owing to the extremely long exposures required by the early emulsions, anything moving would blur out. In a photo by Louis Daguerre there was a guy standing having his shoes shined and he appears to be the only person in Paris. You could use the long exposure technique to get your background.


MPEGTS & HLS: Only second segment onwards is valid When i use hexadecagonal audio channel layout in an mpegts container, I can receive and play back the stream fine only if I configure the hls server to allow serving the very first segment, and then concatenating subsequent segments.

I.e. If I probe segment 1414:

[mpegts @ 0x7faf58001200] Could not find codec parameters for stream 1 (Audio: aac (LC) ([15][0][0][0] / 0x000F), 0 channels, fltp, 1464 kb/s): unspecified sample rate
Consider increasing the value for the 'analyzeduration' and 'probesize' options

Input #0, mpegts, from '1414.ts':
  Duration: 00:00:02.07, start: 2834.393367, bitrate: 9079 kb/s
  Program 1
    Stream #0:0[0x100]: Audio: aac (LC) ([15][0][0][0] / 0x000F), 0 channels, fltp, 1430 kb/s
    Stream #0:1[0x101]: Audio: aac (LC) ([15][0][0][0] / 0x000F), 0 channels, fltp, 1464 kb/s
    Stream #0:2[0x102]: Video: h264 (High) ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), yuv420p(progressive), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 59.94 fps, 59.94 tbr, 90k tbn, 119.88 tbc
    Stream #0:3[0x103]: Video: h264 (High) ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), yuv420p(progressive), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 60 fps, 60 tbr, 90k tbn, 120 tbc

However if I probe the first segment:

Input #0, mpegts, from '0.ts':
  Duration: 00:00:02.02, start: 1.412033, bitrate: 11598 kb/s
  Program 1
    Stream #0:0[0x100]: Audio: aac (LC) ([15][0][0][0] / 0x000F), 48000 Hz, 16 channels, fltp, 1353 kb/s
    Stream #0:1[0x101]: Audio: aac (LC) ([15][0][0][0] / 0x000F), 48000 Hz, 16 channels, fltp, 744 kb/s
    Stream #0:2[0x102]: Video: h264 (High) ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), yuv420p(progressive), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 59.94 fps, 59.94 tbr, 90k tbn, 119.88 tbc
    Stream #0:3[0x103]: Video: h264 (High) ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), yuv420p(progressive), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 60 fps, 60 tbr, 90k tbn, 120 tbc

The playlist file is very simple and looks like this:

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-VERSION:3
#EXT-X-MEDIA-SEQUENCE:0
#EXT-X-TARGETDURATION:4

#EXTINF:2.000,
0.ts
#EXTINF:2.000,
1.ts
#EXTINF:2.000,
2.ts
#EXTINF:2.000,
3.ts
#EXTINF:2.000,

etc ...

With say an 8 channel layout, this does not happen.. every segment contains the correct headers.  But my preference is to keep 16 channels because my application at the receiving end uses 16 channel files, and this avoids the need to transcode when downloading.

I am using FFmpeg to upload the mpegts stream.

Any insight to the mechanics behind what's going on here, and what I can do to achieve the desired independence of segments ?

For non-conventional layouts, the native AAC encoder writes a PCE section in the bitstream header as part of the AudioSpecificConfig. However, it does so only at the beginning, therefore subsequent files have AAC streams with this missing.

Workaround is to change to a different packetization scheme for AAC in MPEG-TS.

Add -hls_ts_options mpegts_flags=latm when generating the HLS package.


custom DaVinci Resolve key mapping does not work I've changed the key binding for the edit page, such as by hitting backspace (the default) or by hitting x then the selected clips are deleted. I made sure that DaVinci Resolve is using my custom saved profile and yet it is still not working.

The solution turned out that if a key is already mapped to something else then it won't work. Davinci usually points out errors if something is already mapped however as seen from the attached image, no warnings are triggered so I assumed it should work.


How to get a TV channel to stream as IP camera My apartment building is broadcasting security cameras via a TV channel. I want to watch this broadcast on an IP camera viewer software (and there combine it with IP cameras that I am using). Is that possible?

I have been looking into TV cards/sticks for PCs but I would not know how to convert the incoming video signal into something an IP viewer software can accept.

I know I could buy a PC, hook in a TV card, output via HDMI to a TV signal encoder box and use that signal on the network but this solution seems overkill to me. I am looking for something compact & simple.

Ae this is a multi-layered question and every option in one layer changes the solutions / problems for the next later, I don't know where to start. So here is the list of questions I have:

how to best get the TV signal into a computer?

I could go with a TV tuner USB stick, but if the output for those then specific to the app that is shipped with it or rather a universal standard that can be used by other software such as VLC? Since I will need to tune to a specific channel where the cam feed is broadcasted, I am not sure if VLC (or other "generic" software) can tune into that.

what computer to use to get the signal to the network?

Do I need a full PC with relevant computing power? Could it be an Arduino? Can Arduinos connect to TV sticks at all?

What processing power do I need? The video stream is likely only 640x480.

Sorry if this is too vague or off-topic.

I think I can see what you are asking, and Ken seems to have missed a big part of the question.

So assuming you are saying that the camera you want to watch is being broadcast as a TV channel that is connected to via an aerial (or equiv).  Then as you have said, you will need something to capture that with. That's going to depend a little on the hardware you are using with the capture device. But I am capturing local TV channels on a xbox usb tuner through a Ubuntu box.  But there are loads of low cost devices out there.

I am then using a bit of software called TVHeadEnd to grab that and spit it out as an IP stream. That can be watched on loads of devices. Of course if you want to watch this outside you home network, you are going to have to open ports on your router, and likely use something like DDNS (no-ip is a good provider for this) to find your router.  Just make sure what ever device you get to capture the broadcast and stream it, is compatible with the software you use to broadcast the stream.  Research before you purchase is recommended.

Lastly I think you will probably get away with running all this on something like a rasberry pi, depending on if you have to transcode the stream (which you would use FFMPEG to do, over an above most internal transcoders, but that's a whole different story).

There may be much simpler solutions out there, with everything just built in, perhaps a HDHomeRun, but I have not used one, worth a looks to see if it fits your need, it may remove the need for a PC all together.

Without more details this is all the info I can offer at the mo. I hope it's enough to get you started.


Quality of VHS converted to DVD I work for a small library. We have a collection of VHS tapes that we have recorded to DVD using a Magnavox VHS HQ DVD recorder. They came in as .ogg, They came in a a set of files including some .VOB which I can play by changing the file extension to .mp4. How much quality have I lost in this conversion? Is there a way to convert VHS to digital with higher fidelity?

The collection has historical value, so there is some debate on whether we need to save the original VHS tapes as opposed to just keeping the videos in electronic format (on a server that is backed up nightly).

Edit:
A bit of new information:

I used GSpot to determine the codec (I don't have admin/install rights on my computer, so that is the only program I could use), and it says mpeg2. Does any of this information help with the original question?

Edit2:
I'm such a dumb dumb. I had all these people trying to figure out why my files were .OGG. They weren't. They were .VOB. What was on the DVDs is exactly what Perter Cordes described below. Now that I've sent people on a wild goose chase...

One big loss in converting VHS to DVD arises from going through the composite domain. Both VHS and MPEG2 use a separated chroma paradigm -- on the VHS tape are two signals, essentially luma and bandwidth-limited chroma. MPEG2 (the standard for DVD) also uses separate luma and chroma. But the standard output from a VHS player combines the signals in a way that means the MPEG2 encoder must do a rather imperfect job of unmixing them again.

One solution, such as it is, would be to use a VHS player that has separate luma and chroma outputs, called S-Video, and an encoder that can work directly with S-Video components.

I'm not saying you'll get beautiful results, because nothing about VHS is beautiful to begin with. But you would be sure of getting a conversion that doesn't suffer unnecessary losses.