Mini Guide: Normalizing Audio for Multiple AVI files

[Miotto]

Hi Miotto, thanks for your kind words. I have a newer beta version

http://drop.io/xrbfrk8/media/other

Soopa, do u hv some knowledge about do the same thing using Mp4 files?
i got Mp4box to remove/insert sound in mp4 video and aacgain for normalizing, but im failing to create a batch file for this programs. Can u help me again plz?

Ty.

[Soopafresh]

Newer version released - V08. See first post.

Changes:

The biggest change is that it uses Mencoder rather than Divxmux to re-mux the new audio to the video. This seems to work a bit more reliably.

[Miotto]

well, ty for the new version.

About the mp4, i dont know why, but this movies i got in mp4 format use a strange encoding, cause i tried many programs to re-encode MP4 to avi-Xvid, and all programs failed, even nero, corel video converter, and many others. my total files is about 39 episodes. none of the programs made a 100% sucesfull conversion of all files. the program that was better is xilisoft video converter, but he failed in about 10 files.

This is only to be able to use your great tool for normalize avi sounds.
BUT... a few hours ago i found a great conversion tool, a very clean program, and worked GREAT. He made 100% sucessfull conversion to all my mp4 videos to avi-xvid. and now im using your avi normalize tool.
Maybe u guys know about the program, but i tell his name and adress any for check.
Recomended.
http://www.pazera-software.com/download/
and the name is Pazera Free MP4 to AVI Converter 1.3

[Nologic]

Okay I've put together an unofficial Alpha build of AVI Gain which is basically just moving from Batch Scripts to AutoIt Scripts...this allows for a future version to actually have some sort of GUI.

Its currently doesn't have feature parity with the Batch Scripts..but will in time...and hopefully a lot more features.

Source and compiled scripts are available in the link above.

Okay now I am a newbie at the whole video thing...so I seek enlightenment.

Okay I parsed my AVI files and came up with the following video stream encoders:
-DIV3
DIVX
DX50
-H264
MP42
MP43
+XVID

So far Xvid is the only one I know for certain is fine to apply AVI Gain to...and H.264 and DivX3 are suppose to not work.

My questions are...what others are safe...beyond what I have listed...and the ones that don't work is there some other tool or command line required...as I can on the fly change how things are processed.

Same thing far as Audio:
AC3
DTS
+MP3
+PCM
Vorbis

Get me the lowdown and command lines and I'll start stitching things together.

I have tried PMing Soopafresh but so far no responce.

Anyways any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Soopafresh]

DX50 and DivX, plus Xvid will usually work. None of the h264 or the older pre 5 Divx will work (although there are always exceptions). Try out your test files and see which ones normalize and which ones are rejected.

I like the idea of a gui, I'll check it out

[Nologic]

Okay small update...but no new release yet.

Actually all the video streams are fine Divx 3 and H264 included. This issue appears to be with FFmpeg extracting the video stream...I've updated to a newer build of FFmpeg and it doesn't solve the issue...however the new version fixes an issue with extracting a DTS audio stream; so in my internal builds DTS is working...well I convert it over to WAV then to MP3.

Vorbis shouldn't be an issue...main thing right now is that AC3 audio streams are getting me jacked up right now....but should be solved in short order.

Actually the question thats bugging me is should be try and preserve the multiple audio channels in AC3 & DTS? and if so how?

Toss working programs at me and I'll make it work...may not be visual pretty during processing...but I can make what ever work...just need apps..and ideally a tutorial.

[Nologic]

Okay here is the updated version:

Here is the deal...I've stripped it down to just MEncoder & MP3Gain thats it...I've updated the version of MEncoder as well.

I still haven't tossed in a GUI yet but its next on the todo list.

This processes all AVI files I have except one which is a H264 & Vorbis combination...general H264 files are fine...its just this one is giving me grief for some reason or another. Its also the only AVI I have that uses Vorbis for the audio stream...so I've written the script to currently bypass processing any Vorbis encoded files.

My best guess at this point with the Vorbis AVI is that its actually a miss labeled container...so instead of AVI its actually MKV...but as of yet I have no way for testing this.

I certainly welcome others banging on this...mainly on the Vorbis issue.

At present it converts all audio streams to Stereo MP3, future versions will allow you to not convert or process certain audio streams.

This is still Alpha but works with:
DIV3 +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM
DIVX +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM
DX50 +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM
H264 +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM
MP42 +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM
MP43 +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM
XVID +AC3, DTS, MP3, PCM

Doesn't work with:
Vorbis +DIV3, DIVX, DX50, H264, MP42, MP43, XVID

[Nologic]

Okay GUI time...very simple but it works for now.

Volume must be between 50-100

BitRate value only applies when converting audio streams to MP3. Only values allowed are those supplied in the combo drop down.

Vorbis is still a no go.

If you don't like the limitations I've used...well edit the source code.

[Nologic]

hmm no at-a-boy's, bug reports, feature requests...guess my work here is done then.

[Soopafresh]

Ataboy! I like it.

[Nologic]

heh good deal...I was getting generally concerned that all I was doing was making a mess in your thread.

Next version out the door will probably only offer a few features...like don't parse folder paths that have the string "completed" in them. Also direct file replacement...for those brave out there.

Really need to get that vorbis issue resolved as well.

[Anonymous5394]

Nologic could you elaborate on functions of this alpha tool with GUI -shown above- of avi gain? Why does it have mp3 volume default set to 90%, if you are converting from AC3 to mp3 etc wouldn't you get a considerable drop in decibels and therefore shouldn't you set it to at least 100% plus assuming an automatic gain(if needed) would come from the parameters of AVI gain when data highs and lows are worked out in normalisation process.? What is this folder "recursion" option too?

The thread is confused a little now with this tool GUI addition, but despite that it potentially looks a very promising piece of work. Good work! Thankyou.

Getting back to AVI gain 0.8 which I have used I have tried all options and they work excellently. 8) Many mp3 movie tracks in my AVI files have had some clipping, but I either use MP3 Gain to get rid of it using -1.5 or -3db it, then use regular bat. Occasionally the clipping has returned using this regular bat method, but if so I would use soopa loud and then finally MP3 gain to normalize the excess soopa loud gain on the resultant mp3 track(normalising it to default 89db or whatever suitable to ears) to totally eradicate the clipping everytime.

[Nologic]

It defaults to 90db...guess I should probably make that more clear. For reference MP3Gain it's self defaults to 89.9db I just kicked it up to make it look pretty.

It actually doesn't perform any normalization...only volume gain.

Folder recursion basically means do you want the application to process folders below the current one.

Say you have a drive that looks like so:
Z:\TV\24\
Z:\TV\Alias\
Z:\TV\Babylon 5\
Z:\TV\Band Of Brothers\
Z:\TV\Battlestar Galactica\
Z:\TV\Bones\
Z:\TV\Breaking Bad\
Z:\TV\Chuck\
Z:\TV\Cold Case\
Z:\TV\Criminal Minds\
Z:\TV\Damages\
Z:\TV\Dark Angel\
Z:\TV\Dexter\
Z:\TV\Farscape\
Z:\TV\Fringe\
Z:\TV\Heroes\
...

If you set the application to Z:\TV\ in all likely hood it wouldn't process any files since everything appears to be in sub folders. However if you enable recursion...its going to go through all sub folder under Z:\TV\ which can be a good thing...or a bad thing depending on the amount of free space you have on that drive...since at present it duplicates any file that's changed.

Personally I'd enable recursion but only use it at a fairly low level...like Z:\TV\24\ to run through all the different season sub folders...then spot check all the files...and if happy over write the originals...and then move on to another folder.

For now just don't set it to the root of a drive and enable recursion...while its expected to do the right thing...it's only been downloaded 14 times thus far...so not a lot of use to expose possible bugs.

[Anonymous5394]

No confusion at all now-for me anyway- I initially confused the GUI index with 0 to 100% but in fact as you say it is 90db default. Clear as a bell! Thankyou Nologic for taking the time to explain your work and best wishes for future improvements of it.

[kmruss]

Soopa - thank you very much for releasing your batch file/util set. It's came in very handy for converting files on movies I've converted for the kids on Handbrake (which I LOVE the speed of) - but Handbrake's major lacking feature of course is a good AMPLIFY or boost feature for audio (dynamic range of even 4 only goes so far when you trying to entertain the kids in a restaurant where you can barely hear yourself talk). I'm willing to stick with Handbrake though since I can convert a whole DVD (1 1/2 hrs average) in about 7-8 minutes on my new computer I finally built (after having an old one for 5 years) with Intel Core i7 2.8ghz in 64-bit safely overclocked to 3.6ghz. Same conversion other utils takes over 30 mins even on the new computer!

Any rate, your util set fills the gap and easily boosted the audio to where I needed it for our little cheapie $50 Ematic video player that I bought through Wal-mart online which plays XVID and has 4GB memory and a Micro-SD card slot and small built-in speaker (and headphone jack) if you can believe it! (and even FM radio, camera, video capture, ebook, and more - pretty wild for $50).

In my use of your util, I found a way to improve it a bit (and let us be a little more lazy). I've been using computers since I was 5 (no joke) and am 32 now - and am very familiar with batch coding from when I was younger and in my day-to-day job as an IT Admin. I modified your script to allow for multiple-file drag-and-drop capability - as I saw where you posted a note to 'not drop files onto the batch shortcut'. Took a lot of tinkering around since I'd never done this - but had seen it done on several utils I had used in the past. I finally got this working beautifully and have tested it with multiple files.

So basically, it lets you CTRL-CLICK, SHIFT-CLICK, or drag and select (or etc.) two, three or MANY files - and drag-and-drop those onto a shortcut to your script on the desktop and converts - making it fairly close to a GUI experience (but without input capability). It took some major re-working of the variables in there to get it to work - plus I cleaned up a little of the code and made it not so 'redundant' (by making the 'for' statement one nested set instead of repeating it on each line). I left most of your regular items in-tact including your 'soopa' and 'v1deo' 'catch-phrases' if you will.

I've posted a screenshot so you can see how it works.

Let me know if you're interested and I'll upload it for you to include with your set. All I would ask is for maybe a small shameless mention of credit - as I appreciate your script which has made my job of converting videos for the kiddos MUCH easier and straight-forward now.

Thanks!

Kevin

[sincostan45]

Soopa, I just want to say thanks for creating this awesome little utility, since I've been using it (and the updated versions) since December 2006, so I think showing my appreciation a just a little overdue! I am currently in an ongoing video project where I create larger videos out of many smaller clips and the audio levels on the clips were always dramatically different. My project would have basically been impossible without this utility.

(Or I would just have to live with the volume levels changing every time a new clip would show, or I would have to painstakingly demux the audio and video and normalize all of the audio and then remux...)

As far as feedback goes, having support for normalizing just the .wav format within the video files is VERY helpful, I must say. Before, I had to always compress all the audio to .mp3, then always get .mp3 back in the normalized videos. This wasn't a problem in of itself, but joining clips together with .mp3 audio was causing some trouble for me. Seems to be much better with .wav. So, thanks for adding support for the .wav format!

Nologic, I did try the GUI, but I could never really get it to work. I always get this error, no matter what settings I choose:



My files are always in Xvid/X264 + Wav/MP3.

Right now, I don't see it as a big deal, because the running the batch file still works perfectly fine for me. But I figured I'd give some feedback about the GUI to help out on it's development. You can look at my computer specs if you need any information about those. I'm also willing to answer any questions if you're wanting more information.

Anyway, thanks again for making this awesome utility guys!

EDIT: On a side note, this thread really should be stickied. It would help out many people, I think...

[Nologic]

I'll look into it and see if I can spot the issue...course if you are feeling adventurous, certainly welcome to hack on it.

[DarrellS]

Nologic's GUI does nothing for me. I click the run button and a fraction of a second later, it says it's done. I check the completed folder and nothing is there.

What am I doing wrong?

[Nologic]

DarrellS -

I really have no idea why its not processing files for you...some of them are AVI containers correct?

I'm starting a major rewrite of the application...which isn't so bad given how small it actually is. This new version will ideally fix the Array issue experienced by sincostan45, but also add support for MKV & MP4 containers...and with luck finally resolve the issue with Vorbis audio files.

Anyways with some minor luck I'll have a new version up for everyone to toy with in a few days.

[DarrellS]

All of them are avi.

There aren't any instructions to tell you what to do so I tried putting the gui in Soopafresh's program and vise-versa but still no luck.

Soopafresh's program works fine.

[Nologic]

Well my app is independent of SoopaFresh's work, granted its fully based off what he has done...so he deserves full credit there.

Instructions:
Download archive & extract it anywhere...your desktop is just fine.
Double Click the executable.
Decide if you wish to convert certain audio type's (I'd actually advise against it at this point) to MP3.
If converting to MP3 set the desired BitRate.
In all instances set the desired Db gain level (marked as volume).
Decide if you wish to process sub folders...if so Check "Folder Recursion".
Then Click the "..." button and browse to the folder you wish to process...or you can type it into the edit field.
Then Click Run...and go find something to do for a while.

Things should be more clear in the next version.

[DarrellS]

That's exactly what I'm doing and nothing works. It tells me it's done after a second of doing nothing and the folder is empty

If I try using any other file type besides avi then I get error messages. Line 1 - Variable used without being declared.

[localdog]

Hi, new member here. I googled "normalize audio in many videos" and ended up here, and am currently running the avi_gain_v08_BETA program on a dozen or so tv episodes. I just want to make sure I'm on the right track because I'm clueless when it comes to all the jargon I've read in this forum...

I have a few seasons of a particular television program that I like to watch. I set a playlist in wmp to play the vids at night when I go to bed. Problem is, one video might be at volume 3 while the next one is at 10 and the next is at 5... in other words, the volume level differs per episode and its really annoying having to adjust the volume on the player or pc all the time.

If I'm understanding this correctly, I can run all my videos through this program and it will normalize all the volume levels so they are the same? Will it only raise the level on videos with a volume at 30% (for example) to 80% while ignoring those over 80%, or will it also reduce the level of videos at 120% down to 80%??? It would be awesome if all the videos played at the same volume level.

So far the program is working great, its already processed 6 of 40 episodes in the last 15 minutes.

Hope my question/comment makes sense.

[Nologic]

@ localdog -

Hi localdog,

Yes these will increase or in some cases decrease the volume gain to were they are all roughly the same...provided there are no odd quirks in the audio.


@ Everyone -

Okay I've updated my app...not the big rewrite I had planned...been a little bit more busy than expected.

The Array Error that sincostan45 and others have ran into "should" be resolved.
It now process not only AVI containers but also FLV, F4V, MP4, MKV.
Audio Conversion is now from AC3, DTS, PCM to AAC rather than to MP3...in a future version I'll likely make it selectable between MP3 & AAC...once the Vorbis issue figured out I'll add that as an option as well.
Volume Gain is now hard limited to 89.0db this will stay the default...you can of course edit the source.
Updated some of the tools & added a few new ones.

Known Bugs:
Fails to work with Vorbis Audio
AAC conversion fails with Mono Audio
- AAC conversion fails with AC-3
Doesn't support multiple audio streams
Doesn't support Meta Data
Doesn't Support Subtitles
- FLV Error (unknown cause)
- MP4 Pause (unknown cause)
- MKV Pause (unknown cause)

Please submit bug reports.

[localdog]

@ Nologic,

Thanks for the reply. So far so good, 30 out of the 40 videos I've ran through "AVI_GAIN_Regular" have come out perfect (or as close enough to perfect to satisfy my needs).

I don't know how you guys do it, but keep on doing it! The great work, that is.

Thanks.

[Nologic]

@ localdog -

Well its good to hear that Soopafresh's handy work is doing the trick for you.

Well all I did is follow Soopafresh's example...course I've been a bit hit & miss...but hopefully I'll get all my issues resolved soon.

[DarrellS]

The new version works for me with avi files but none of the other file types mentioned work.

FLVs give error message and MP4 and MKV say that the script is paused.

[ConverterCrazy]

@Nologic

I'm trying to convert AVI video for NORMALizing volume [decrease].

=======
KM Player Media Info:

D:\Videos\desh.avi
General
Complete name : D:\Videos\desh.avi
Format : AVI
Format/Info : Audio Video Interleave
File size : 1.36 GiB
Duration : 2h 52mn
Overall bit rate : 1130 Kbps
Writing application : VirtualDubMod 1.5.10.2 (build 2540/release)
Writing library : VirtualDubMod build 2540/release
Video #0
ID : 0
Format : MPEG-4 Visual
Format profile : AdvancedSimple@L5
Format settings, BVOP : Yes
Format settings, QPel : No
Format settings, GMC : No warppoints
Format settings, Matrix : Default (H.263)
Muxing mode : Packed bitstream
Codec ID : XVID
Codec ID/Hint : XviD
Duration : 2h 52mn
Bit rate : 926 Kbps
Width : 640 pixels
Height : 480 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate : 29.970 fps
Resolution : 24 bits
Colorimetry : 4:2:0
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.101
Stream size : 1.11 GiB (82%)
Writing library : XviD 1.1.2 (UTC 2006-11-01)
Audio #1
ID : 1
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Codec ID : 2000
Duration : 2h 52mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 192 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Stream size : 237 MiB (17%)
Alignment : Split accross interleaves
Interleave, duration : 33 ms (1.00 video frame)
Interleave, preload duration : 500 ms
===

When I try to use your application, I get "Script Paused".

Any suggestions, pl?

[Nologic]

@ DarrellS -

Thanks for confirming the Array Error has been fixed for you...and thanks for the heads up about the Container issues. I'll try to get an update out ASAP that attempts to correct the issues.

@ ConverterCrazy -

I'm guessing that things are going a wrong with the AC-3 conversion to AAC, I'll look into this with the samples I have here again. Thanks for the bug report.

Keep in mind my app doesn't do normalizing...it only applies Replay Gain to certain audio stream encodes. Which in your case means converting from AC-3 to AAC...which is fine since AAC supports up to 92 channels...provided you use a reasonable bitrate (320 - musicals, 240 - typical movie, 192 - lectures). Course I have some hearing loss...so you may want to use higher bitrates...plus in all likely hood you have a better sound system than I do.

[DarrellS]

Thanks for the work you put into this. I like the fact that your GUI keeps everything about the same volume. All of mine are coming out around 88.5dB whereas Soopafresh's are all over the place. Regular.bat is to low (between 73dB and 83.dB) and Soopaloud is just a little higher than normal at 93dB.

Might be nice to have the option to change dB like your first version since my friend likes to make all his files super loud (98dB to 105dB). He has a couple of Altec Lansing studio monitors and a couple of huge woofers hooked to an amp so he can let his neighbors a couple of blocks away listen to his entertainment system