Working with .m2ts files / What's a free and simple way to add watermark

[poisondeathray]

Thanks, PDR.

When you mention other encoders that give better compression efficiency, can you name a couple? Vegas is the only product I've found that will allow me to produce a .m2ts file after adding the watermark. Other programs only save it other other formats, which I assume will lead to more degrading of resolution, right?

No, .m2ts is a transport stream. It's just a container. It's the video compression inside that matters

There is actually about 5-7% overhead. It's not a good container if you want smaller filesizes, and it's not suitable if you are embedding in a website for example (eg. flash)

What is the reason for .m2ts ? Why are you adding a watermark ? (Presumably it's not so you can watch it yourself ?)

So is using Vegas to add the watermark and save the same .m2ts file format (with upped bitrate) my best bet? Thanks.

Using vegas to add the watermark is definitely the easiest for you . There are other methods, encoders but you have might have to learn a bit to use them

[imrealdumb]

I just assumed a resulting file also in .m2ts was best. When I've added a watermark using other programs that save the resulting file in, say, .mp4, the file always looks worse.

I'm just adding a watermark to deter people from unauthorized duplication of these video files.

[poisondeathray]

I just assumed a resulting file also in .m2ts was best. When I've added a watermark using other programs that save the resulting file in, say, .mp4, the file always looks worse.

No, both .m2ts and .mp4 are containers. The difference you observed is in either the processing or encoding/encoding settings you used

I'm just adding a watermark to deter people from unauthorized duplication of these video files.

I don't understand this. Is somebody going to break into your home and duplicate your videos ? What is the context of these videos ? Are they for commercial use and distribution ? For some other reason ?

There are reasonable scenarios where you might watermark, and unreasonable scenarios - where the negatives of quality loss and wasted time far outweigh any perceived benefit




The easiest way is just to use a higher bitrate in vegas. If you want to spend some time learning other methods, settings ,encoders, go ahead. There should be guides

[imrealdumb]

Yes, I am selling copies of videos I've made. I understand the watermark can be worked around, but it should offer protection/deterrence among the people I'm selling the videos to.

[poisondeathray]

Yes, I am selling copies of videos I've made. I understand the watermark can be worked around, but it should offer protection/deterrence among the people I'm selling the videos to.

OK, but what is the context ? Is it a finished ,edited, final product? or unedited/semi edited stock footage that you sell to people for use in their own projects ,etc.. ? Some background information would be nice - because that normally dicatates your choices

eg. It's stock footage that people use for their own projects, they won't want a watermark. That's not something people would pay for. Previews are watermarked, but the actual product is not. And you usually don't watermark until the final product, because you would lose quality again when it gets edited and re-encoded again (generation loss)

If it's a finished , edited , final product that you are delivering - you usually don't deliver in a transport stream, unless it's for broadcast . So who are the people buying this ? Who are the potential customers ?

Also, these days, the amount of people that want interlaced footage is dwindling. Are you selling it as an interlaced transport stream ? or maybe as a video file (maybe downloaded from your website) ? Transport stream is not something that is typically sold, it would normally come as a MP4 for compatibility (you would probably deinterlace it to make it progressive). You're just going to piss off a lot of customers and get complaints all day from joe public. They're going to ask: "WTF are all these interlaced lines?" and you will waste 24hours a day replying to senseless emails.

Or is this on optical media (e.g. blu-ray) or some other delivery format ?

Are you doing this yourself, or through some 3rd party ? (3rd party sites often have submission guidelines for formats, deliverables)

[manono]

...but it should offer protection/deterrence among the people I'm selling the videos to.

And maybe piss the hell out of them in the process. It would me, if I bought something only to find the producer had defaced it with a watermark. I might even go so far as to demand my money back. Do you see a lot of watermarks/logos in Hollywood DVDs and Blu-Rays of movies?

[imrealdumb]

...but it should offer protection/deterrence among the people I'm selling the videos to.

And maybe piss the hell out of them in the process. It would me, if I bought something only to find the producer had defaced it with a watermark. I might even go so far as to demand my money back. Do you see a lot of watermarks/logos in Hollywood DVDs and Blu-Rays of movies?

It's actually a sports film, and it's pretty standard to put a company logo unobtrusively on it.

[imrealdumb]

Yes, I am selling copies of videos I've made. I understand the watermark can be worked around, but it should offer protection/deterrence among the people I'm selling the videos to.

OK, but what is the context ? Is it a finished ,edited, final product? or unedited/semi edited stock footage that you sell to people for use in their own projects ,etc.. ? Some background information would be nice - because that normally dicatates your choices

eg. It's stock footage that people use for their own projects, they won't want a watermark. That's not something people would pay for. Previews are watermarked, but the actual product is not. And you usually don't watermark until the final product, because you would lose quality again when it gets edited and re-encoded again (generation loss)

If it's a finished , edited , final product that you are delivering - you usually don't deliver in a transport stream, unless it's for broadcast . So who are the people buying this ? Who are the potential customers ?

Also, these days, the amount of people that want interlaced footage is dwindling. Are you selling it as an interlaced transport stream ? or maybe as a video file (maybe downloaded from your website) ? Transport stream is not something that is typically sold, it would normally come as a MP4 for compatibility (you would probably deinterlace it to make it progressive). You're just going to piss off a lot of customers and get complaints all day from joe public. They're going to ask: "WTF are all these interlaced lines?" and you will waste 24hours a day replying to senseless emails.

Or is this on optical media (e.g. blu-ray) or some other delivery format ?

Are you doing this yourself, or through some 3rd party ? (3rd party sites often have submission guidelines for formats, deliverables)

Thanks for taking the time to respond. It's actually a full, unedited sports game film with my logo on it. Similar people put their watermark unobtrusively on it as well, and nobody seems to mind. But I appreciate your input.

I tried rendering it as a .avc file, but it ended up being a much bigger file. If this film is intended for someone to view and edit themselves, should I be saving it in a different format? Will, say, saving it as a .mp4 file result in degraded quality?

[imrealdumb]

Thanks to everyone kind enough to offer feedback. I'm not a professional, so I appreciate the education.

I've made three different sport game films. Each was originially a series of .m2ts files that were joined together into one game film. I rendered it in the template closest to what these are, and increased the bitrate to 18.

The first video looks exactly the same as the original, just with my logo attached.

The 2nd and 3rd ones, however, are a little funky. They look perfectly, but if I jump head to a later section, all I hear is audio until the video catches up 10/20 seconds later (e.g. I hear audio, then the video picks up and visibily FF'ed to the new section where it catches up). I'm pretty sure I rendered it exactly the same as the custom render settings I used the first time.

Is there a simple explanation to what I'm doing wrong? All three files are huge (4-5 gigs). I didn't want to degrade the video quality, but should have I rendered them to a different format that is smaller in size, etc?

Thanks in advance for any help.

[poisondeathray]

Thanks for taking the time to respond. It's actually a full, unedited sports game film with my logo on it. Similar people put their watermark unobtrusively on it as well, and nobody seems to mind. But I appreciate your input.

I tried rendering it as a .avc file, but it ended up being a much bigger file. If this film is intended for someone to view and edit themselves, should I be saving it in a different format? Will, say, saving it as a .mp4 file result in degraded quality?

If it's going to be edited by the customer, I would leave it as AVCHD, same as the original.

Again, the container doesn't matter as much. If you took the .m2ts and remxued it into mp4 it would be identical. It's what's inside that counts (what codec, and what settings like bitrate). I wouldn't do that, because interlaced AVC can be tricky and it's best handled in a transport stream

I've made three different sport game films. Each was originially a series of .m2ts files that were joined together into one game film. I rendered it in the template closest to what these are, and increased the bitrate to 18.

The first video looks exactly the same as the original, just with my logo attached.

The 2nd and 3rd ones, however, are a little funky. They look perfectly, but if I jump head to a later section, all I hear is audio until the video catches up 10/20 seconds later (e.g. I hear audio, then the video picks up and visibily FF'ed to the new section where it catches up). I'm pretty sure I rendered it exactly the same as the custom render settings I used the first time.

Is there a simple explanation to what I'm doing wrong? All three files are huge (4-5 gigs). I didn't want to degrade the video quality, but should have I rendered them to a different format that is smaller in size, etc?

If they are meant to be edited, I would do it as you are doing now. If you're happy with the quality , leave it like that or adjust it if you feel it needs more

I don't know what's wrong with your 2nd or 3rd clips. There isn't enough information. Maybe try rendering it again, or checking the preview before rendering (maybe something went wrong with the other program you used to join) ?

4-5GB isn't "huge" at all. At ~16Mb/s, that suggests your event is 30-40min long only.

Also , typical pro sports event recordings are usually recorded at 50-100Mb/s (3-6x the size that you're recording at)

[imrealdumb]

Thanks for the replies.

When I render these files that now have the watermark on Track 1 (~4 gig in size, 40-50 minutes) as .m2ts extension, Sony Vegas takes about 2 hours to render each one.

Does that sound about right? Will closing the preview window appreciably speed up the process? Are there other file formats that would render quick and still have comparable resolution?

Thanks.

[imrealdumb]

Thanks for all the replies. The issue for me now isn't the watermark, but the resulting video.

I started with a bunch of .m2ts files my Sony camcorder made (1920x1080i). I usually use Sony Playmemories to join them, but I need to place a watermark on these now.

So I used Sony Playmemories to make the enjoined file. Then I opened that .m2ts enjoined file, along with the watermark, in Sony Vegas. I rendered it in the closest settings I could find to the original .m2ts enjoined file.

The resulting file takes about 2 hours to make (45 minute video). The quality looks great and plays fine start to finish. But if I jump ahead to a later time stamp, the audio runs without the video (which either eventually catches up or doesn't). I have a pretty fast PC and I did what I could to make sure nothing was interfering with Sony Vegas while it rendered the file.

I've tried Vegas and other programs to render a .mp2, .mp4, .avc, etc. versions. When I create a .mp4 version, though, the picture quality isn't as good. With the .m2ts shell, the videos look very bright and clear - almost a satin finish to them. The .mp4 version looks duller, almost matte.

Is there a simpler solution to my problem? Maybe I should enjoin all the files in Sony Vegas without using Playmemories first? Any advice would be great. I'm stumped.

[poisondeathray]

RE: levels with MP4. It's a complicated issue. Studio RGB vs. Computer RGB for some file input formats, and expected export formats. You can read more about it when you have more time, but the workaround is to apply a "studio rgb to computer rgb" filter before rendering .

If you render a 30p MP4 file, you will throw away 1/2 the information (motion will look choppy, espeially for something like sports footage). If you double rate deinterlace, you can retain the full motion data (60p), but vegas has a crappy deinterlacer, quality isn't that great. So the "best" format is to keep it interlaced if it's to be edited later , as mentioned earlier. There are good deinterlacers in avisynth, but there is a bit of a learning curve.

I have no idea why you have seek errors on the export. Are you sure it's not a playback problem? Did you try another player ? or re-importing the export into vegas ? The included software should be able to append clips properly. If not, you can try appending in vegas instead (must have the original clips and folder structure), but appending is unlikely to be the issue. Most likely an export issue. If you used Mainconcept AVC for exporting, then try Sony AVC instead. Or vice versa

[imrealdumb]

PDR,

Yeah, have tried different players (VLC, WMP, etc.) and different PCs. If it's a smaller length video like 7 minutes, not a problem. But if it's 30+, then I consistently see playback issue unless I'm watching start to finish.

I've tried both MC AVC and SONY AVC. The Main AVC is huge and doesn't play. The Sony AVC is what I tried originally, and it is the one that skips.

Any other ideas out there?

[imrealdumb]

Could it be the watermark that's causing the issue? In Sony Vegas, I've been using a PNG file as the watermark. Should I switch to a JPEG, BMP or different file format?

[poisondeathray]

Could it be the watermark that's causing the issue? In Sony Vegas, I've been using a PNG file as the watermark. Should I switch to a JPEG, BMP or different file format?

It's not the issue. PNG works fine. JPEG doesn' t contain alpha channel (won't work for transparent watermark)

[budwzr]

I'm late getting in on this thread but I don't want to read the whole thing. What should I do?

Anybody have a Cliff Note?

Mwahahahahaha!!!!!

[DARR-of_the-DEAD]

im late too

[imrealdumb]

Thanks to poisondeathray and many others for all the help. I finally solved my problem. It wasn't the introduction of a watermark after all. For some reason, I haven't found a way for SV to use .m2ts files and render a .m2ts file (or any format, for that matter) that didn't have playback issues (unless the video was short in duration). Not only was the file halted in playback, but it seemingly added a few extra minutes of blank audio/video.

So I rendered the new file as a .m2ts file. I then used tsMuxer and did "m2ts muxing". Process was quick and created a perfect file.