A/V out of sync after trying to re-encode...

[Lathe]

Sigh... and I thought it was getting so much easier...

I have this print, and this time it really is a very good looking print of an older film. It appears to be already encoded in x264. VLC tells me (since MediaInfo didn't) that it is at a frame rate of (30000, 1001) if I have that right, and it is progressive (no blurred frames when stepping through motion.

BUT... for some odd reason this MKV is not playing on my OPPO, so time to re-encode... However, when I try to do a simple re-encode using the same CMD line I always do, the resulting encode when muxed back in with the audio is HUGELY way off sync. When I went to load the demuxed .h264 stream into DGIndex, it came back with a prompt saying 'no video sequence header found' So, I went back to my usual DirectshowSource open of the MKV like I've done many times before. Here is a snippet with motion:

http://lathe-of-heaven.com/TM.mkv

It is a beautiful print, but I sure don't know why my audio is coming out so far off after re-encoding it. This is the very simple code that I used:

DirectshowSource("C:\x\00000.mkv")
ConvertToYV12()
AssumeFPS(30000,1001)

And then I ran my usual x264 CMD line that I always do. I have NO idea why the sync is all messed up. I appreciate any suggestions, thanks!

[manono]

DirectshowSource("C:\x\00000.mkv")
ConvertToYV12()
AssumeFPS(30000,1001)

There's your problem as it's really 23.976fps. Movies just aren't 29.97fps. By changing the length to have it play too fast, you made movement too fast and the audio out of synch. Try this:

FFVideoSource("TM.mkv")

When I went to load the demuxed .h264 stream into DGIndex, it came back with a prompt saying 'no video sequence header found'

DGIndex is for MPEG sources.

[Lathe]

DirectshowSource("C:\x\00000.mkv")
ConvertToYV12()
AssumeFPS(30000,1001)

There's your problem as it's really 23.976fps. Movies just aren't 29.97fps. By changing the length to have it play too fast, you made movement too fast and the audio out of synch. Try this:

FFVideoSource("TM.mkv")

When I went to load the demuxed .h264 stream into DGIndex, it came back with a prompt saying 'no video sequence header found'

DGIndex is for MPEG sources.

Ah, I will do that. That is exactly what was happening; the video was playing way too fast for the audio, thus the frame rate was wrong. MediaInfo just showed it as 'variable', but VLC showed it as 29.xxx. Interesting. I will try to get the FFVideoSource command going. But, if I can't, do you think that simply putting AssumeFPS(24000, 1001) instead will do it? I wonder why I couldn't get an accurate read of the actual frame rate? How did you know...? I THINK, although I may be mistaken, that I do have some movies that in MediaInfo show as 29.xxx and are progressive. Is that simply not possible?

BTW... I REALLY should have guessed that about the frame rate and just tried 23.xxx...

[Lathe]

Geez, yes... of COURSE that fixed it. I honestly really should have thought of that. What a total numbnut... Sorry about that.

[manono]

But, if I can't, do you think that simply putting AssumeFPS(24000, 1001) instead will do it?

Probably, but I never - EVER - use DirectShowSource, so I don't know for sure.

I THINK, although I may be mistaken, that I do have some movies that in MediaInfo show as 29.xxx and are progressive. Is that simply not possible?

Film, almost by definition, is 24fps (or 23.976fps for DVD). There were some very few movies shot at 30fps. If you have some movies at 29.97fps then they are direct from hard telecined NTSC DVDs, or from frame blended NTSC DVDs, or were hard telecined and deinterlaced for NTSC DVD or after some idiot got the DVD and decided simply deinterlacing it was the right thing to do to get it progressive.

[Lathe]

I see... Yes, I think the few I have are directly from hard telecined NTSC DVDs. Does that mean then that they somehow ripped the file to MKV leaving the frame rate at 29.xxx and in some way made it progressive?

Also, I tried the command 'FFVideoSource' instead of DirectshowSource, but VD said that there was no such function. Do I need to load or enable something in order to use that?

[manono]

Unlike AviSource, FFVideoSource isn't built into AviSynth. Among other things you need the ffms2.dll:

https://github.com/FFMS/ffms2/releases

Does that mean then that they somehow ripped the file to MKV leaving the frame rate at 29.xxx and in some way made it progressive?

It could mean all kinds of things. If you download crap from the internet, you often get what you pay for. There are a lot of people out there that don't know what the f**k they're doing. In my experience, the ones with the good stuff know the least about how to handle it. But even having a retail DVD is no guarantee of quality. So, we just have to suck it up and do the best we can with what we're given.

[Lathe]

Unlike AviSource, FFVideoSource isn't built into AviSynth. Among other things you need the ffms2.dll:

https://github.com/FFMS/ffms2/releases

Does that mean then that they somehow ripped the file to MKV leaving the frame rate at 29.xxx and in some way made it progressive?

It could mean all kinds of things. If you download crap from the internet, you often get what you pay for. There are a lot of people out there that don't know what the f**k they're doing. In my experience, the ones with the good stuff know the least about how to handle it. But even having a retail DVD is no guarantee of quality. So, we just have to suck it up and do the best we can with what we're given.

Yep... Sometimes you just have to deal with stuff like that with films that are not commercially available. Thanks for the link too mate.