Flac to Mka(container) audio

[RandomNewbe]

Hello

I was assembling some videos the other day using some Flac audio files(using MKV Toolnix Gui), however I noticed that the tracks, once added, lost all non technical information like Album/Artist/Performer/Track Number/etc.

Is there a way with MKV Toolnix Gui to mux Flac audios into a video without losing such information?

Thanks for any response

[sneaker]

Not directly. The chapter editor can load .cue files and convert some of the info into the chapters. And the GUI can add tags for tracks or globally but it needs them in xml format.

ffmpeg can copy at least some of the metadata but I don't know how "correct" the tag mapping is.
ffmpeg -i "input.flac" -map 0 -c copy "ouput.mka"
Or into video:
ffmpeg -i "video.mkv" -i "audio.flac" -map 0 -map 1 -map_metadata 1 -c copy "output.mkv"

Personally, I'd try to avoid such conversions. They usually only bring hassle. Why do you want to do this?

[RandomNewbe]

Well It's kind of complicated, but anyway, if can't be done like this, is there a way then to batch-extract multiple audio files's metadata at once? I normally use MediaInfo Lite when I want to get the metadata of something, but I don't know of a way to batch extract it from hundreds of files at once.

[sneaker]

The ffmpeg operations can be batched rather easily. But what do you want now? First you asked to have them from FLAC to MKA. Now you ask to "extract".

[RandomNewbe]

The whole point was to preserve the audio file's metadata even after muxing them with a video stream, I don't see how's strange to ask how to keep it somehow.

[sneaker]

Yes, but in post #3 you ask to "extract". Be more in exact when asking questions. Why do you want to extract and in what format? Only to later load in MKVToolNix GUI? Why not use the ffmpeg command?
Note: if you use the first ffmpeg command to create .mka files you can then load the .mka files in MKVToolNix GUI. Since the metadata is now in the appropriate mkv format MKVToolNix will copy it.

Example batch. Paste the following in e.g. notepad and save as "whatever.bat". Then drag&drop the FLAC files on it.

PUSHD %~dp0
if [%1]==[] goto :eof
:loop
ffmpeg -i %1 -map 0 -c copy "%~dpn1.mka"
shift
if not [%1]==[] goto loop

If video files and FLAC files share the same file name you could also easily adapt this for the second command and skip MKVToolNix GUI altogether.

[RandomNewbe]

I don't know much about ffmpeg / and the commands you posted seems quite complicated / so I was thinking to simply extract the flac file's metadata (txt format or whatever) and keep the data in separate files rather than figuring a way to keep it within the files with ffmpeg and then muxing them with MKVToolNix with video files.

(also the command you posted applies to a single file only, which would make the whole process rather slow / also I don't even know how and where I should input that command to begin with / does ffmpeg has a built-in console of some sort?)

[sneaker]

There's metaflac:

PUSHD %~dp0
if [%1]==[] goto :eof
:loop
metaflac --no-utf8-convert --export-tags-to="%~dpn1.tags.txt" --export-cuesheet-to="%~dpn1.cue" %1
shift
if not [%1]==[] goto loop

[RandomNewbe]

Thanks for the help, I kinda still have no idea on how to use such command codes tho.

[sneaker]

1. Download and extract the FLAC tools.
2. Put "metaflac.exe" from the win32 folder into whereever you want. E.g. "c:/program files/flac/metaflac.exe".
3. Paste the following in e.g. notepad and save as "whatever.bat". (If you put the metaflac.exe in a different folder edit the path accordingly.)

PUSHD %~dp0
if [%1]==[] goto :eof
:loop
"c:/program files/flac/metaflac.exe" --no-utf8-convert --export-tags-to="%~dpn1.tags.txt" --export-cuesheet-to="%~dpn1.cue" %1
shift
if not [%1]==[] goto loop

4. In Windows Explorer drag&drop one or multiple .flac files onto "whatever.bat" and let it do its work.

[RandomNewbe]

Oh thanks, I got it working now <3