Is it possible to edit out commercial segments while ripping?

[doctorm]

I've downloaded a stream now two different ways, and the commercials are maintained. The thing is, if I rip the stream in 1080p, the resolution drops to 720p for the commercials and then comes back to 1080p during the show.

Is it possible while downloading to get yt-dlp, ffmpeg or something else to skip segments of a different resolution to edit them out?

Dunno what other details you might need to know.

[kajer]

If you are downloading from a VOD service, there are usually XML files "somewhere" that define when ad breaks can be inserted, and sometimes the XMLs have links to which ads as well. But this is usually an integrated player thing. Are you ripping the video stream via the browser, or are you connecting to the backend CDN to rip the "source" file?

I have not heard of hard-embedded ads in a while.

[doctorm]

I'm playing the program in my browser, grabbing the .m3u8 file and dropping it into the program to download it.
It's a basic cable channel with no encryption.
The XMLs seem to be image files.

[ElCap]

does that mean its a live stream? ie. the m3u8 doesnt have the full list of files - it keeps adding as time goes by
a less elegant way would be to download each fragment without combining it, deleting the commercial fragments (based on res) and then combining the remaining together.

[doctorm]

No, it isn't live. It's a previously broadcast program. That's a LOT of frags though.

[ElCap]

looks like theres a feature in N_m3u8DL-RE to specify an ad keyword which should exclude any ad fragment.
this feature was added to the code in July 2023, but the latest release is June 2023 so its not released yet
https://github.com/nilaoda/N_m3u8DL-RE/issues/221

you should be able to sort the fragments in windows explorer by "frame height" so you can delete all the ads in one go
https://superuser.com/questions/1187306/finding-videos-by-resolution-in-windows

[LZAA]

Nov 13, 2023
https://files.videohelp.com/u/274438/N_m3u8DL-RE.exe

[stabbedbybrick]

Before you start trying to edit anything, I'd poke around the API responses with web developer tool to see if there's a clean m3u8 or mpd in there. It's really rare for ads to be a part of the main stream, and there's almost always a way to remove the ads before downloading anything. Either by finding a clean version, or by modifying the manifest URL and/or segments.

And to use the latest builds of N_m3u8DL-RE, you can scroll down to the bottom HERE and download the appropriate version. The latest version includes "--ad-keyword <REG>" that lets you skip segments based on keyword.

[doctorm]

Just to provide more information, this is regarding Comedy Central. So I'm not surprised the ads are part of the stream like that. I suppose if I had Paramount+ there would be an ad-free version.

I'll play around with some of these suggestions and see what I can find. It's not critical in any way, I'm just looking to learn how to deal with this if it comes up again.

[ElCap]

Before you start trying to edit anything, I'd poke around the API responses with web developer tool to see if there's a clean m3u8 or mpd in there. It's really rare for ads to be a part of the main stream, and there's almost always a way to remove the ads before downloading anything. Either by finding a clean version, or by modifying the manifest URL and/or segments.

And to use the latest builds of N_m3u8DL-RE, you can scroll down to the bottom HERE and download the appropriate version. The latest version includes "--ad-keyword <REG>" that lets you skip segments based on keyword.

Nice - i didnt know that was there!!

[doctorm]

Thanks. This was my first experience with N_m3u8DL-RE. Took a few tries. Using in a Win7 command line was probably the worst way to go since it was giving me an error that I needed to manually select the streams:

N_m3u8DL-RE.exe "http://...master.m3u8?..." -sv avc1.640028 -sa en -ss en-US --ad-keyword ads

(Couldn't get mkvmerge to work, so I manually muxed them.)

And now I have a rip of Jeff Dunham: I'm With Cupid that is pretty much identical to the scene release.
Yeah, the ads got removed with just the keyword of 'ads'.
Sweet. Thanks all. I learned something today.

[doctorm]

(nm)