High Res Time Lapse images to AVCHD video (play on Viera TV via SDHC)

[Deefa]

Hi all - first post.

Just thought I would let you know that I was able to successfully convert a load of high-res still images (jpegs) which were a time lapse of some cloud activity to a 1080p AVCHD file that was successfully played on a Panasonic Viera (37G10A) TV via an SD Card.

Procedure was as follows:

1. Capture time lapse stills in wide-screen resolution (2272x1280) on a cheap Canon A430 point-and-shoot camera using awesome CHDK & scripting (see http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK

2. Use Virtualdub to turn stills into an (uncompressed, as I had no suitable compressor) AVI file. I used a resize filter settings to resize to horizontal resolution 1920: with 'Multiples of 4' ticked, which gave precise bicubic reduce 0.75 - 1920x1080 output resolution. (Had to set frame rate to 25fps - DivX conversion did not import into multiAVCHD at 30fps.)

3. Use DivX Plus converter to encode to .mkv.

4. Use multiAVCHD to create folder structure/clip previews etc. No re-encoding was done.

5. Copied multiAVCHD output folders to a newly created folder named PRIVATE on SD Card - it's a class 2 1GB card.

6. Inserted SD Card in TV, chose Movie Mode from SD Card menu, preview worked ok and clip play at 1080p.


I have the usual Avisynth, Haali MediaSplitter & FFMpeg installed, but I did get some errors in multiAVCHD regarding these bits of software, most likely due to them being installed after multiAVCHD.

I next want to find an easy way to use FFMpeg to encode to H264 .mkv so this can be a truly free method.

The resulting .mts file was ~26 seconds (around 800 frames) and was a grand total of ~31mb on the SD Card.

If anyone has some tips to improve what I have done - please let me know.

Deefa.

[poisondeathray]

you could simplify your process by using x264 the vfw version in vdub , or by using it's external encoder function in the beta builds

x264 vfw can export raw avc, or .mkv, or .mp4 container if you add the arguments in the command line box. If you are authoring, raw avc is recommended

vfw builds can be found here
http://komisar.gin.by/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/x264vfw/

ffmpeg encoding guide - I don't use ffmpeg for x264 encoding, and I think this guide is a bit outdated
http://rob.opendot.cl/index.php/useful-stuff/ffmpeg-x264-encoding-guide/

I think another option is to use avisynth to assemble your stills (i.e. make an .avs script with ImageSource() with Audiodub() if you have audio)and let multiavchd do everything for you, including the encoding. This is probably the easiest and most direct route

[multiAVCHD]

In fact, multiAVCHD allows you to import a folder with JPEG files and set picture-slideshow parameters...

[Deefa]

In fact, multiAVCHD allows you to import a folder with JPEG files and set picture-slideshow parameters...

However I am not wanting to play a slideshow.
Time lapse shows a slowly evolving subject quickly, by capturing frames every few seconds and playing them back at video frame rates.
Virtualdub and Avidemux are both able to create a movie by pointing to the first image in a numbered sequence (as the video file) - feel free to implement this in multiAVCHD although I'm not sure how many people would use the functionality.

BTW your multiAVCHD application is fantastic - keep up the excellent work!

[Deefa]

I have simplified the process, using Avidemux:

1. load the first image in sequence
2. Apply bicubic resize to 1920x1080
3. Set output container to mkv, codec to AVC.
4. Check frame rate is 25fps.

Output file gets copied (during multiAVCHD authoring) into BDMV\Streams with no encoding, plays fine on TV.

Happy with this method, I first had a play with Avisynth, but I like the ease of using avidemux.

[multiAVCHD]

About multiAVCHD 'slideshow'.

1) Set TV System in AUTHOR tab: NTSC will use 23.976fps, PAL/PAL 24p will use 25fps
2) Load you picture folder



3) Select "Transition effects: [none]"
4) Select "[-] Randomize picture order" (unticked)
5) Set desired resolution

and most important:

6) Picture still duration: 0 <-- using zero will make multiAVCHD generate 1 frame per picture

This option has hidden features:
Using value of 0 or -1 will get you 1 frame per picture.
Using values <-1 will get you abs() frames per picture.

For example using -2 will get you 2 frames per picture.

7) Set "Number of pictures per title:' to the total number of your still pictures.

I did a quick test and I got 797 pictures in NTSC converted to 33 seconds of video @24fps (with 0 option, 1 frames per pic)

[12:54:01] *** [AVS] Detecting script properties [Picture slideshow (797 pictures)[MAVCPSS-001].avs]...
[12:58:52] *** [AVS] Video: 720x480 @ 23.976fps, Duration: [00:00:33.279]
[12:58:52] [TRANSCODE]: Title#01 4000 kbps, 720x480 -> 720x480

You can set the bitrate and all for picture-to-video-encoding in the [transcode] window. Importing so many pictures via avisynth may be time/CPU consuming. On my laptop it took ~20 mins for import+detection+encoding to get these 33 seconds of video.

Dean

p.s. Make sure you're using the latest build 756 and execute multiUPDATE.exe to get the feature.

Let me know if it works at all for you.