Possible to convert HDR10 to HDR10+?

[ShikuTeshi]

I know this sounds really redundant, but my Chromecast with Google TV is able to play some 4K HDR files via VLC and not others. Upon further inspection the difference appears to be HDR10+.

This doesn't make any sense to me as to why it can't play HDR10 but can play HDR10+. Maybe it's an issue with the Chromecast version of VLC. But it's the same version as the mobile one. Meanwhile another user got a different TV box utilizing Google TV and it can play HDR10 just fine. So I have no clue what's up.

But I wanted to try converting the HDR10 files that won't play into HDR10+ to see if this really is the issue. But I haven't found any existing topics on this subject. I thought it would theoretically be possible since a dumb-downed explanation said HDR10+ is just HDR10 but with the ability to dynamically change the values on a per-scene basis.
So if HDR10 is a single value for an entire video then theoretically I should be able to just set one value in an HDR10+ metadata and it would function the same but under a different HDR encoding.

[october262]

found this - https://codecalamity.com/encoding-uhd-4k-hdr10-videos-with-ffmpeg/
don't know if this will help or not.

[ShikuTeshi]

Yeah I've looked at that. The main issue is that HDR10+ metadata is in json format that I don't know which value is which or how to properly format it. HDR can just plug in values with ffmpeg because it's a single value for the entire thing.

[usually_quiet]

I know this sounds really redundant, but my Chromecast with Google TV is able to play some 4K HDR files via VLC and not others. Upon further inspection the difference appears to be HDR10+.

Do you have the Chromecast with Google TV connected to a 4K TV? What types of HDR does it support? HDR10? HDR10+? HLG?

What do you mean when you say the Chromecast with Google TV doesn't play some HDR10 files via VLC? The file doesn't play at all? The file plays but not smoothly? The file plays but the colors are wrong? What video format is used for the files that don't play? AV1? HEVC/H.265?

[ShikuTeshi]

What do you mean when you say the Chromecast with Google TV doesn't play some HDR10 files via VLC? The file doesn't play at all? The file plays but not smoothly? The file plays but the colors are wrong? What video format is used for the files that don't play? AV1? HEVC/H.265?

4k HDR10 TV
I'm not seeing HDR10+ support anywhere. Yet it's a playback issue so I don't imagine anything about the TV is part of the issue.

The video's lag. Maybe 1 frame per second. On any other device they playback just fine.
I can downscale an HDR10 video to 1080p and it'll playback just fine on the Chromecast. So I'm thinking HDR10+ is somehow easier to decode than HDR10. And the Chromecast is just unable to do 4K HDR10.

The files that don't work look like this.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L5.1@High
HDR format                     : SMPTE ST 2086, HDR10 compatible
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 2 h 10 min
Bit rate                       : 9 255 kb/s
Width                          : 3 840 pixels
Height                         : 1 600 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 2.40:1
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0 (Type 2)
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.063
Stream size                    : 8.44 GiB (56%)
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No
Color range                    : Limited
Color primaries                : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics       : PQ
Matrix coefficients            : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primar : Display P3
Mastering display luminance    : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 4000 cd/m2
Maximum Content Light Level    : 572 cd/m2
Maximum Frame-Average Light Le : 565 cd/m2

The files that do work look like this.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L5@Main
HDR format                     : SMPTE ST 2094 App 4, Version 1, HDR10+ Profile B compatible
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 1 h 58 min
Bit rate                       : 14.9 Mb/s
Width                          : 3 840 pixels
Height                         : 1 600 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 2.40:1
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.101
Stream size                    : 12.4 GiB (96%)
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No
Color range                    : Limited
Color primaries                : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics       : PQ
Matrix coefficients            : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primar : BT.2020
Mastering display luminance    : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 1000 cd/m2
Maximum Content Light Level    : 717 cd/m2
Maximum Frame-Average Light Le : 194 cd/m2

These are all in MKV containers. I've tried making sure they're on a Main profile and not High. Doesn't help.

[usually_quiet]

What do you mean when you say the Chromecast with Google TV doesn't play some HDR10 files via VLC? The file doesn't play at all? The file plays but not smoothly? The file plays but the colors are wrong? What video format is used for the files that don't play? AV1? HEVC/H.265?

4k HDR10 TV
I'm not seeing HDR10+ support anywhere. Yet it's a playback issue so I don't imagine anything about the TV is part of the issue.

The video's lag. Maybe 1 frame per second. On any other device they playback just fine.
I can downscale an HDR10 video to 1080p and it'll playback just fine on the Chromecast. So I'm thinking HDR10+ is somehow easier to decode than HDR10. And the Chromecast is just unable to do 4K HDR10.

The files that don't work look like this.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L5.1@High
HDR format                     : SMPTE ST 2086, HDR10 compatible
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 2 h 10 min
Bit rate                       : 9 255 kb/s
Width                          : 3 840 pixels
Height                         : 1 600 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 2.40:1
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0 (Type 2)
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.063
Stream size                    : 8.44 GiB (56%)
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No
Color range                    : Limited
Color primaries                : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics       : PQ
Matrix coefficients            : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primar : Display P3
Mastering display luminance    : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 4000 cd/m2
Maximum Content Light Level    : 572 cd/m2
Maximum Frame-Average Light Le : 565 cd/m2

The files that do work look like this.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L5@Main
HDR format                     : SMPTE ST 2094 App 4, Version 1, HDR10+ Profile B compatible
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 1 h 58 min
Bit rate                       : 14.9 Mb/s
Width                          : 3 840 pixels
Height                         : 1 600 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 2.40:1
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.101
Stream size                    : 12.4 GiB (96%)
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No
Color range                    : Limited
Color primaries                : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics       : PQ
Matrix coefficients            : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primar : BT.2020
Mastering display luminance    : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 1000 cd/m2
Maximum Content Light Level    : 717 cd/m2
Maximum Frame-Average Light Le : 194 cd/m2

These are all in MKV containers. I've tried making sure they're on a Main profile and not High. Doesn't help.

The Chromecast with GoogleTV recently received official certification for HDR10+ and supports HDR10 and Dolby Vision as well. This means it can pass these types of HDR to a TV for the TV to apply. A TV with the ability to apply HDR10 should also have the ability to apply the static HDR10 metadata that is included in HDR10+ for backward compatibility.

VLC itself can apply tone mapping to simulate HDR for videos that include HDR10, which allows something close to the real colors to be visible on SDR displays. I am not sure whether or not VLC always passes through HDR if it can be decoded by the attached TV. I have a Chromecast with Google TV (with VLC and Kodi installed) and monitor which accepts HDR10 but I probably won't have access to them for test purposes until late tonight.

[usually_quiet]

Last night I could not get the Chromecast to connect to the PC where my 4K HDR test files are stored. After I copy some 4K HDR test files to my HTPC, I will try again later. The Chromecast is already set up to use the HTPC as a file source.

[usually_quiet]

I was able to get the Chromecast with Google TV set up so it could "see" 4K HDR10 and 4K HDR10+ files stored on a computer and access them via SMB using VLC. The Chromecast with Google TV was connected to a Dell S2718N/NX 1080p monitor, which accepts and displays 4K HDR10 video input, which is downscaled by the monitor to 1080p for display. This monitor has no speakers so audio wasn't available.

I have slow broadband Internet service, so my test videos are short clips. The HEVC HDR10 videos I used are mostly from https://4kmedia.org (container files are mkv, ts, mp4). HEVC HDR10+ clips were hard to find, One of the HEVC HDR10+ test clips (mp4 file) I tried came from https://ff.de/hdr10plus-metadata-test/. The other HEVC HDR10+ test clip (mkv file) I used has been taken down since I downloaded it. It was about 1 minute of video taken from a recent movie.

The bad news is that VLC running on the Chromecast with Google TV played all the test clips smoothly regardless of container file format, HDR format, or fps. (Some HDR10 videos were 59.940 FPS.)

[Edit]
This is the MediaInfo report for the test video that had the closest specs to those for the 4K HDR10 that did not play smoothly for ShikuTeshi. This video played smoothly for me with HDR applied. I have the latest version of VLC for Android installed, dated Jan. 5, 2022.

Complete name                            : Samsung Wonderland Two HDR UHD 4K Demo.ts
Format                                   : MPEG-TS
File size                                : 802 MiB
Duration                                 : 2 min 10 s
Overall bit rate mode                    : Constant
Overall bit rate                         : 51.4 Mb/s

Video
ID                                       : 257 (0x101)
Menu ID                                  : 1 (0x1)
Format                                   : HEVC
Format/Info                              : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                           : Main 10@L5.1@High
HDR format                               : SMPTE ST 2086, HDR10 compatible
Codec ID                                 : 36
Duration                                 : 2 min 9 s
Width                                    : 3 840 pixels
Height                                   : 2 160 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Frame rate                               : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                              : YUV
Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0
Bit depth                                : 10 bits
Writing library                          : ATEME Titan File 3.7.9 (4.7.9.0)
Color range                              : Limited
Color primaries                          : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics                 : PQ
Matrix coefficients                      : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primaries        : Display P3
Mastering display luminance              : min: 0.0500 cd/m2, max: 1000 cd/m2

Audio
ID                                       : 258 (0x102)
Menu ID                                  : 1 (0x1)
Format                                   : AAC LC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Audio Codec Low Complexity
Format version                           : Version 4
Muxing mode                              : ADTS
Codec ID                                 : 15-2
Duration                                 : 2 min 9 s
Bit rate mode                            : Variable
Channel(s)                               : 2 channels
Channel layout                           : L R
Sampling rate                            : 48.0 kHz
Frame rate                               : 46.875 FPS (1024 SPF)
Compression mode                         : Lossy

[october262]

What do you mean when you say the Chromecast with Google TV doesn't play some HDR10 files via VLC? The file doesn't play at all? The file plays but not smoothly? The file plays but the colors are wrong? What video format is used for the files that don't play? AV1? HEVC/H.265?

4k HDR10 TV
I'm not seeing HDR10+ support anywhere. Yet it's a playback issue so I don't imagine anything about the TV is part of the issue.

The video's lag. Maybe 1 frame per second. On any other device they playback just fine.
I can downscale an HDR10 video to 1080p and it'll playback just fine on the Chromecast. So I'm thinking HDR10+ is somehow easier to decode than HDR10. And the Chromecast is just unable to do 4K HDR10.

The files that don't work look like this.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L5.1@High
HDR format                     : SMPTE ST 2086, HDR10 compatible
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 2 h 10 min
Bit rate                       : 9 255 kb/s
Width                          : 3 840 pixels
Height                         : 1 600 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 2.40:1
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0 (Type 2)
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.063
Stream size                    : 8.44 GiB (56%)
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No
Color range                    : Limited
Color primaries                : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics       : PQ
Matrix coefficients            : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primar : Display P3
Mastering display luminance    : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 4000 cd/m2
Maximum Content Light Level    : 572 cd/m2
Maximum Frame-Average Light Le : 565 cd/m2

The files that do work look like this.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L5@Main
HDR format                     : SMPTE ST 2094 App 4, Version 1, HDR10+ Profile B compatible
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 1 h 58 min
Bit rate                       : 14.9 Mb/s
Width                          : 3 840 pixels
Height                         : 1 600 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 2.40:1
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.101
Stream size                    : 12.4 GiB (96%)
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No
Color range                    : Limited
Color primaries                : BT.2020
Transfer characteristics       : PQ
Matrix coefficients            : BT.2020 non-constant
Mastering display color primar : BT.2020
Mastering display luminance    : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 1000 cd/m2
Maximum Content Light Level    : 717 cd/m2
Maximum Frame-Average Light Le : 194 cd/m2

These are all in MKV containers. I've tried making sure they're on a Main profile and not High. Doesn't help.

might try going into the chromecast settings and hit restart and see if HDR10 now works - https://www.reddit.com/r/AndroidTV/comments/jcgogk/chromecast_google_tv_hdr_not_working/