New (advanced) FFmpeg GUI for Windows OS builds.

[ChrissyBoy]

Intresting... NUL is the symbolic link to the null device. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_sink). I never knew that nul.txt etc did the same thing.

[wiseant]

I wrote:

Hi Folks - I just renamed my folder from AviSynth 2.5 to AviSynth 2.5.7 and that seemed to fix the issue, now I get:

11:12:53 - Valid FFmpeg/Avisynth combi found (Avisynth AUTO options enabled).


When the folder was renamed back to AviSynth 2.5, I got this message:

11:15:08 - This FFmpeg version doesn't support Avisynth (AVS options disabled).


and back to AviSynth 2.5.7

11:16:27 - Valid FFmpeg/Avisynth combi found (Avisynth AUTO options enabled).


Still working fine for me on XP SP2 - I also installed it on another machine AMD 3500 with Vista Home Basic - works OK - but the top Menu (shortcuts etc) does not appear - can't load templates - and if I load a template by changing the .ini file - there are no "Templates comments" or User Video Options, etc.

Is there something that can be changed in the .ini file(s)? so that the 8 Icons on top show up in Vista?

Thanks

[Chris K]

Still working fine for me on XP SP2 - I also installed it on another machine AMD 3500 with Vista Home Basic - works OK - but the top Menu (shortcuts etc) does not appear - can't load templates - and if I load a template by changing the .ini file - there are no "Templates comments" or User Video Options, etc.

Is there something that can be changed in the .ini file(s)? so that the 8 Icons on top show up in Vista?

Thanks

Nice to hear it still works on XP. Thank's for your concern.

About Vista: I just this afternoon asked the author of Gui4Cli (the language Avanti is written in) if he knew somthing about Vista. He didn't but expected that it would run without problems, now we know it doesn't. I will inform him about your experience with Vista but for now we have to wait for a new Gui4Cli version that is adapted for it.

About changing the template in the ini file. This is right because templates are not reloaded at startup.
The philosophy behind this is that if you run Avanti, you're always back at where you left.
My experience is that I often load a template and make a few adaptions to it. If Avanti should reload the template, this would ovewrite my adaptions, setting them back to the basic template settings.
The template path in the ini file is only a reference to the last loaded template in case you want to save the actual (modified) environment back to the template.

[Chris K]

Is there something that can be changed in the .ini file(s)? so that the 8 Icons on top show up in Vista?

Perhaps the next will work as a temporary work-around for Vista.
I attached a zip with a small file that is in the avsystem directory "avDBm.gc". You can overwrite the existing with this.
Now if the popup menu on the "Start process" button works in Vista (which I hope), choose "Open Advanced Database Manager".
If the window that opens has the toolbar icons on it (a few of them), then I can also apply this to the main program.

EDIT: Removed download link because this isn't applicable anymore (hope it frees some valuable space).

[voodle]

/dev/null is somthing that only works in Linux afaik.

/dev/null is generic UNIX and something old UNIX hands use as shorthand to describe any bit-sink. So "nul.<something>" is Windows version of "/dev/null".

I have some doubts about this because Windows occasionally came up with something like "File path doesn't exists". I first want to know where (or how) nul is exactly stored.

It's not stored, Chris. It's a bit-sink. It's an implementation of the Windows NUL: device, which you can find in the Device Manager under non-Plug-and-Play devices. If nul.avi seems to be failing it may be because this device is not activated.

the only thing nul.avi does is suppress the writing to disk.

Yup, it's the only thing, but it's a big thing. The first pass output can be large because it's not optimised. On several occasions I've had a first pass overflow available disk space and bring an encoding session to an ugly end.

I will consider to add a automatic 2-pass option to the program in a future version.

It's a no-brainer, IMHO. A "profile" should always include provision for describing a second pass, in which case the first pass should be sunk to /dev/nul, and skip audio encoding.

[voodle]

/dev/null is somthing that only works in Linux afaik.

Yes but you do this in windows:

ffmpeg.exe -i TEST.avs -pass 1 -passlogfile TEST.log NUL

Yes this should work too but the only difference with the batch example is that the nul filename now is given without a extension.
You can use nul for anything nul, nul.avi. nul.txt, nul.exe it will all disappear in the nothing (at least that's how it looks like).

Yup. I used nul.avi because my version of ffmpeg seemed to barf without the extension.

[Chris K]

the only thing nul.avi does is suppress the writing to disk.

Yup, it's the only thing, but it's a big thing. The first pass output can be large because it's not optimised. On several occasions I've had a first pass overflow available disk space and bring an encoding session to an ugly end.

Where it concerns DVD mpeg-2 encoding, I always have enough diskspace (120Gb HD) to encode several versions while there's already a captured 90 minutes MJPEG (approx 40Gb) file on disk. Perhaps that's the reason why I do not worry to much about this.

I will consider to add a automatic 2-pass option to the program in a future version.

It's a no-brainer, IMHO. A "profile" should always include provision for describing a second pass, in which case the first pass should be sunk to /dev/nul, and skip audio encoding.

Well, you can call it what you like. The readme of my program says "Avanti doens't offer single-click solutions".
Perhaps my program shouldn't be your choice.

Besides, I'm already investigating the possibility to add (automatic) 2-pass encoding, including your nul device suggestion. As I earlier mentioned, you can do 2-pass encoding with the current version of the program but have to manage it yourself. You can even use the nul device and disable audio at the first pass.

[Chris K]

Yup. I used nul.avi because my version of ffmpeg seemed to barf without the extension.

That is because FFmpeg is very strict where it concerns the output extension.
If in your example you would encode to mpeg2video, you must give the mpg, m2v or vob extension depending on the desired destination container. So it then must be:

nul.mpg, nul.m2v or nul.vob

It seems (fortunately) that the Windows OS doesn't mind what you append to the nul.
This is my experience. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[wiseant]

Hi Chris K

I did what you mentioned re "avDBm.gc" and then I chose Open Advanced Database Manager which did display five rows:
Add All New, Update All Changed, Add/Change Selected, Remove Selected, and Sort Database

As well, Get User Video Options does work but not Template Comments

Thanks for the heads up

[Chris K]

Hi Chris K

I did what you mentioned re "avDBm.gc" and then I chose Open Advanced Database Manager which did display five rows:
Add All New, Update All Changed, Add/Change Selected, Remove Selected, and Sort Database

As well, Get User Video Options does work but not Template Comments

Thanks for the heads up

Yes, what you descibe are the buttons on that window but were there no icons like you get on top of the main window when you run it in WXP? There must be one on the left with a menu just like on the main window and a few others including the blue round arrow to the left.

[bidmead]

I will consider to add a automatic 2-pass option to the program in a future version.

It's a no-brainer, IMHO. A "profile" should always include provision for describing a second pass, in which case the first pass should be sunk to /dev/nul, and skip audio encoding.

Good news about the upcoming 2-pass option, Chris.

As far as profiles "including provison for a second pass" goes, it seems to me that profiles don't need to do this, as long as the app using them is 2-pass aware. All you need is a profile describing a single pass, including audio, video and output. Then the app can derive (if the user sets a 2-pass flag) an efficient first pass from this by negating or removing (marginally better) the audio codec instructions and directing the output to a NUL pseudo-file.

--
Chris

[Chris K]

As far as profiles "including provison for a second pass" goes, it seems to me that profiles don't need to do this, as long as the app using them is 2-pass aware. All you need is a profile describing a single pass, including audio, video and output. Then the app can derive (if the user sets a 2-pass flag) an efficient first pass from this by negating or removing (marginally better) the audio codec instructions and directing the output to a NUL pseudo-file.

I understand what you mean and already working on something close to that. At the moment I'm saving the 2-pass flag in the template (I started to call it a template but this expression seems to be a bit out-dated).
It is indeed not necessary to do this and makes the template more universal. It would be then... after the user loads a template, he decides to do a 1 or 2-pass encode.

About the difference between negating/removing the audio commands:

I think FFmpeg simply scans the command line from start to end and taking the last encoutered command into account e.g.

-vcodec mpeg4 -vcodec mpeg2video -vcodec libx264

In this case it will use the last one. For that reason I think that if you append -an to the audio commands, it wouldn't make a difference with using only -an, except for the scan time of the command line, but that can be neglected.
I know you do serious tests on this subject and can probably explain the difference. I can implement both approaches and if it matters will certainly chose the best.

[45tripp]

Are you planning to fix the avisynth detection problem?

[Chris K]

Are you planning to fix the avisynth detection problem?

Avisynth is called up by FFmpeg using its build-in Avisynth redirect interface. Avisynth itself is by the Windows OS looked at as a codec. Avanti doesn't in any way refer somewhere to the Avisynth install directory. It only directs a AVS script to FFmpeg. I understand that most people don't have the problem. It seems that FFmpeg has the problem (on some machines). It is inexplicable why it helps to rename the Avisynth install directory.

I don't have the problem on my machine so I can't do a test but if someone who has, could run FFmpeg with a AVS script on the command line and this would run ok, perhaps then it has something to do with the way Avanti calls FFmpeg (which is the normal C++ procedure to run any program).

At the moment I don't have any idea where to start. Sorry!

[45tripp]

It is inexplicable why it helps to rename the Avisynth install directory.

I know.
and i have reasons not to.

I don't have the problem on my machine so I can't do a test but if someone who has, could run FFmpeg with a AVS script on the command line and this would run ok, perhaps then it has something to do with the way Avanti calls FFmpeg (which is the normal C++ procedure to run any program).

Of course it does.

>ffmpeg -i raw.avs o.avi
FFmpeg version SVN-r10141, Copyright (c) 2000-2007 Fabrice Bellard, et al.
  configuration: --enable-gpl --enable-pp --enable-swscaler --enable-pthreads --
enable-liba52 --enable-avisynth --enable-libamr-nb --enable-libamr-wb --enable-l
ibfaac --enable-libfaad --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libnut --en
able-libogg --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libx264 --enable-libx
vid --cpu=i686 --enable-memalign-hack --extra-ldflags=-static
  libavutil version: 49.5.0
  libavcodec version: 51.41.0
  libavformat version: 51.12.2
  built on Aug 19 2007 19:58:01, gcc: 4.2.1
Input #0, avs, from 'raw.avs':
  Duration: 00:00:10.0, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 0 kb/s
  Stream #0.0: Video: rawvideo, yuv420p, 1280x720, 552960 kb/s, 50.00 fps(r)
Output #0, avi, to 'o.avi':
  Stream #0.0: Video: mpeg4, yuv420p, 1280x720, q=2-31, 200 kb/s, 50.00 fps(c)
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0.0 -> #0.0
Press [q] to stop encoding
frame=  184 fps=  7 q=31.0 Lsize=    3061kB time=3.7 bitrate=6815.0kbits/s
video:3051kB audio:0kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead 0.325759%
Received signal 2: terminating.

[Chris K]

It is inexplicable why it helps to rename the Avisynth install directory.

I know.
and i have reasons not to.

Just to get closer to the problem.
Can you please run Avanti and leave the red Avisynth message for what it is.
Then load a AVS script on "source 1" and see if FFmpeg accepts it.
It should come up with source properties on the report window.

Thanks,
Chris.

[45tripp]

no
and i tried 10141 too

19:53:51 - Source properties:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Input #0,, from 'C:/Documents and Settings/Administrator/Desktop/flv/raw.avs':
  
FFmpeg version SVN-r9767, Copyright (c) 2000-2007 Fabrice Bellard, et al.
  configuration: --enable-gpl --enable-pp --enable-swscaler --enable-pthreads --enable-liba52 --enable-avisynth --enable-libamr-nb --enable-libamr-wb --enable-libfaac --enable-libfaad --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libnut --enable-libogg --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --cpu=i686 --enable-memalign-hack --extra-ldflags=-static
  libavutil version: 49.4.1
  libavcodec version: 51.40.4
  libavformat version: 51.12.1
  built on Jul 20 2007 18:03:34, gcc: 4.2.0

19:53:51 - Avisynth error (use "Preview (debug) Avisynth script" to check).

[Chris K]

no
and i tried 10141 too

19:53:51 - Avisynth error (use "Preview (debug) Avisynth script" to check).

Dramatic... and the last line will not work because this is disabled.

I'll keep on searching!

Thanks.

[Chris K]

I am curious as to why there are no options for x264 or XviD in an .mp4 container? All the current ffmpeg builds natively support x264. I think adding x264 and Flash support would open up this application to a much larger audience, that's just an opinion so take it as you will.

I'm working on the release of Avanti 0.1.8 and want to expand the default options
with the most common used codecs and their related container types. Also options like
bitrates, sample frequencies, FourCC's for AVI etc.

Me myself use only a limited number of "very common" formats like mpeg4 and mpeg2video
but recently helped someone with a h263 in 3gp container problem with success.
If some of you that use formats like flv and flash etc. could give me the container
types used for these codecs, this would be very helpful.

It can be all added by the user itself but the current number of offered defaults
is rather limited.

The new version will be simplified and improved on adding codec specs to the database.
It also is very likely that it will have support for 2-pass encoding.

Thanks in advance,
Chris.

[Chris K]

New version AVANTI 0.1.8 - FFmpeg/Avisynth GUI.

Now with 2-pass encode support and several bug fixes.

I updated the download link at the first post of this thread to version 0.1.8 and hope it still may be available for a while.

AVANTI 0.1.8 -- FFmpeg/Avisynth GUI -- Change log 13-09-2007.
==========================================

1. Added system controlled support for 2-pass encoding.

2. Changes the purpose of the "Codecs" database priority field.
(Read help appendix on 2-pass encoding.)

3. Improved and simplified user registration of codecs.

4. Added "Load Avisynth plug-in" to Avisynth editor.

5. Fixed bugs in codecs database search.

6. Fixed bug in load template option (removed user options).

7. Fixed bug in delete of user additions to basic options.

System controlled 2-pass encoding thanks to the insistance and useful suggestions of bidmead .

No good news for Vista users and for those who had problems with Avisynth support in WXP. Did set a SHOW flag for the icon toolbar but haven't much hope (for now).
Installed Avisynth 2.5.8 in WXP on different drives with the most weird and deep paths, but they all worked on my system...?.

Chris.

[wiseant]

Hey Chris

Can't wait to try it out - let me know if you want any feedback

Thanks
wiseant

[Chris K]

Hey Chris

Can't wait to try it out - let me know if you want any feedback

Thanks
wiseant

Sure... Only user feedback can help to fix bugs, change things and add useful new feutures (if possible).

Happy to hear you're still interested in Avanti .

Thanks,
Chris.

[Chris K]

Are you planning to fix the avisynth detection problem?

Hi 45tripp,

As far as I can evaluate the problem by now, not the path of Avisynth but that where you have installed Avanti could be of influence.
Windows OS is a mess where it concers the use of back- and normal slashes. MS says Windows supports both but it appears it does in certain cases and doesn't in others.
For that reason the run routines in the DLL convert them always to back slashes. It could be that this fails if there are special characters in the file paths. Almost all the shifted charactes on the top row of your keyboard are accepted in file paths. Perhaps it's worthwhile to install Avanti in a simple first level path to see what happens. At seconds, also the path of your sources and destination could be of influence. I always run a version of Avanti on other drives (and partitions) then C:\ and have no problems. Earlier I mentioned that I already installed Avisynth several times on different places and directory levels without any negative influence.

Chris.

[wiseant]

Yeah - I just installed the new version on a fresh Vista install - it picked up ffmpeg and avisynth and I had just installed Avisynth2.57.exe into the C:\Avisynth 2.5 directory - but there are no Icons on the top like in XP

Then I installed the new version of Avanti on my XP (where I had renamed Avisynth 2.5 to Avisynth 2.5.7) and everything is fine and i got some wild encoding speeds for 352X480 DVD = from 2.7X to 3.5X = 102 fps! simple avisynth script with addborders, bilinear resize, changefps(29.97) and ac3 audio at 192 - to me this is the fastest way possible to make DVD complaint files that DGIndex, ProjectX, Muxman, and DVDAuthorGUI accept - throw in a quick denoiser (Deen) as I'm all set converting analogue to DVD - and they played OK on a very old Electrohome DVD player

By the way I did several Avisynth 2.57.exe installs - the previous version of Avanti did not seem to like the initial install directory - I used different directories and as far as i can rememeber I had to change the directory name slightly - once it even affected VDub - I even did some registry editing changing Avisynth 2.5 to Avisynth 2.5.7 - this seems to fix the uninstall for Avisynth but not the finding ffmpeg/avisynth bug - I think it might have something to do with ffdshow and avisynth

[Chris K]

i got some wild encoding speeds for 352X480 DVD = from 2.7X to 3.5X = 102 fps! simple avisynth script with addborders, bilinear resize, changefps(29.97) and ac3 audio at 192 - to me this is the fastest way possible to make DVD complaint files that DGIndex, ProjectX, Muxman, and DVDAuthorGUI accept

Wow!... that's speed. I have to seriously consider to switch over to dual core too.

By the way I did several Avisynth 2.57.exe installs - the previous version of Avanti did not seem to like the initial install directory - I used different directories and as far as i can rememeber I had to change the directory name slightly

It's still a mystery to me because the program doesn't (and need not) to refer to the Avisynth install directory. It does somewhere but that's only used for the "index.htm" of the Avisynth help. And it's the user who sets this path.
I haven't ffdshow installed. Installed the codecs that I need for de-compression seperately from a k-lite codec pack.

If you find somthing new about it please let me know.

Thanks for your efforts,
Chris.

[45tripp]

Perhaps it's worthwhile to install Avanti in a simple first level path to see what happens. At seconds, also the path of your sources and destination could be of influence. I always run a version of Avanti on other drives (and partitions) then C:\ and have no problems.

C:\avanti\

no change.

[Chris K]

Perhaps it's worthwhile to install Avanti in a simple first level path to see what happens. At seconds, also the path of your sources and destination could be of influence. I always run a version of Avanti on other drives (and partitions) then C:\ and have no problems.

C:\avanti\

no change.

Pity. I'll continue to do tests to find out what goes wrong.

Thanks for trying,
Chris.

[wiseant]

Hey Chris K

Could you post a sample command line for ffmpeg that takes an .avi source and creates a .m2v Video file and an .ac3 Audio file?

I know you have a template - but I can't find a way to turn the info into the appropriate commands.

Thanks

[Chris K]

Hey Chris K

Could you post a sample command line for ffmpeg that takes an .avi source and creates a .m2v Video file and an .ac3 Audio file?

I know you have a template - but I can't find a way to turn the info into the appropriate commands.

Thanks

You ask me something.

"NTSC_MPEG2_ES_DVD" was used where only audio mp2 was changed in ac3.

Actually the final FFmpeg command line is composed on the fly from source and destination paths and the prepared lines below.

-vcodec mpeg2video -aspect 4:3 -s 720x480 -r 23.976 -b 4000000
-acodec ac3 -ab 192000 -ar 48000 -ac 2

Note that newer FFmpeg versions expect bits/sec or as alternative k or kb so 192k, 192kb and 192000 are all valid. But Avanti only allows settings in kbit/sec and multiplies these according to the chosen "bitrate factor" to be still compatible with older FFmpeg versions (see Avanti help on this).

I had to add some code to get the whole line. This also brought me the idea to add a option to get it this way in a future version if it's useful. E.g. to the report window from where you can copy/paste it?

FFMPEG.EXE -i "G:/VirtualDub/source.avi" -vcodec mpeg2video
-aspect 4:3 -s 720x480 -r 23.976 -b 4000000
-y "G:/VirtualDub/destination.m2v" -acodec ac3 -ab 192000 -ar 48000 -ac 2
-y "G:/VirtualDub/destination.ac3" -map 0:0 -map 0:1

It's a quite long line already without any extra user tweaking so I had to split it up in four parts to be able to post it clearly.

I hope this is what you meant,
Chris.

[wiseant]

Thanks Chris - yes, this is what I meant

Also, just for the heck of it I have been converting Avi's (XviD/DivX) to half D1 (352x480) w/ ac3 at 192 kbps - I have been using the -sameq switch. This has been working quite well for me - until I got the dreaded buffer underflow - at first ffmpeg did not show this (I was using Ctrl-S for ffmpeg console) - but later when I used Muxman and DVDAuthorGUI - they failed and indicated that my MPEG2 Decoder had buffer underflow problems. So I decided to play with the ffmpeg buffer using values of 512k, 1024k, 2048k, 4096k, 8192K, even 12000k - each time I got an ffmpeg buffer underflow message - this was when I was using mpeg2video - when I used -target ntsc-dvd (without any buffer) there seems to be no problem - but this way the audio and video are not separate.

I have checked the forums for buffer_underflow - what I gleaned was to use -bufsize 224k; but there is no mention of using -sameq

I suppose using -sameq causes the problem in isolated instances - any advice on this?

I should mention that I am using an avisynth script - so ffmpeg "sees" raw video and audio . . .

Thanks