Customized Version of FFMPEG for Professional Usage

[Soopafresh]

Stumbled across this - I don't know how different it is than recent ffmpeg builds, but at least it includes the command syntax. I successfully transcoded some stubborn AVCHD .MTS files into MPEG-2 I-frame Only format with it. Very fast and creates extremely high bitrate Mpeg2 files - 100-220Mb/s in many cases

See post below for batch files to automate AVCHD MTS or M2TS conversion

Place the batch files in the same folder as the ffmpeg.exe file and your MTS or M2TS file.



FFMedia Broadcast is a FFmpeg version customized for broadcast and professional usage.

What you can do :

* Import your files in Final Cut Pro or AVID Media Composer by:
o Creating XDCAM HD422 files in .mov or .mxf
o Creating XDCAM IMX/D-10 files in .mov or .mxf
o Creating AVID DNxHD files in .mov

* Transcode your MPEG-2 4:2:2 Tranport Stream files containing S302M audio.
* Transcode your AVCHD files correctly.
* Merge and split your audio tracks.
* Create Quicktime files containing timecode tracks.
* Advanced Metadata support.

#

* H.264 Long GOP
* D10 (aka Sony IMX)
* XDCAM HD 50Mbps in QuickTime (for Final Cut Pro import)
* DVCAM / DVCPRO25 / DVCPRO50
* VC-3 (aka Avid DNxHD)
* MPEG-2 I-frame only in Highest Quality
* MPEG-2 Long GOP
* MJPEG in Highest Quality




http://www.itbroadcastanddigitalcinema.com/ffmpeg_howto.html

Download

http://code.google.com/p/ffmbc/

[Soopafresh]

Enclosed batch files will convert your AVCHD MTS and M2TS files to

I Frame Only MPEG2

DNxHD Quicktimes (needs Avid codec pack to decode and edit). Doesn't work on all source files.

MJpeg AVI

Huffyuv AVI

_avchd_conversion_batchfiles_multicore.zip

_avchd_conversion_batchfiles.zip

Put all files in the same folder, including your MTS files. Double click on your desired batch format conversion.


Voila



Size Comparison

[b66pak]

thanks a lot...
_

[aedipuss]

ffmbc?

[Soopafresh]

ffmbc?

It's quite possible newer versions of ffmpeg will do the same thing. What I did notice with the above release is that AVCHD files seem to convert cleanly and with proper frame rate - something I haven't seen before with ffmpeg.exe.

[aedipuss]

i never was a bbmpeg/ffmpeg fan. i don't use it for anything. all the avchd i use imports fine to vegas and/or pp cs4 without any changes

[The village idiot]

Do you think this will work with AVIdemux since it uses some (all) of the FFmpeg libraries?

[Soopafresh]

Do you think this will work with AVIdemux since it uses some (all) of the FFmpeg libraries?

What do you want to do?

[The village idiot]

I guess I'm not thinking about this properly since AVIdemux already does codec conversions from the GUI, so I shouldn't need these batch files to do the jobs. I'll have to load up some of these codecs when I get my faster computer back online and see what happens.

[lordsmurf]

FFMPEG for "professional use" --- I'm dubious. Until I see this being reported on in respected industry news, I call bullshit.

[Soopafresh]

It should be called "FFmpeg for Editing Systems" since that's what it is accomplishing

[The village idiot]

How many high end professional editing places would admit to using something like this to expand their video? How many would admit to using Vegas instead of an Avid product? The smart professionals use whatever tools get the job done in the least amount of time, and often say nothing to the client about what was used before the client sits down in the room to edit. You can take most any input and let Media Composer convert it to something it can use on the timeline, but other applications might convert it much faster and this could be where this tool falls in the workflow. The last time I tried running some of the AVCHD content I can generate into Media Composer it took almost run time to import it into something that could be used on the timeline. If I was paying for that time I would certainly want something that worked faster.

[lordsmurf]

I don't detect any ego in the industry right now --- look at all the folks trying to make DSLRs replace full cameras. I've seen TMPGEnc and Besweet talked about.

[poisondeathray]

The BBC developed this a few years ago, and the DNxHD it creates complies with VC-3 SMPTE standard. The problem with the ffmpeg version is currently only 8-bit, but 10-bit is supposed to be in development. Lots of folks on PC systems use this as an alternative to ProRes, and is a great format for those who need interoperability between PC/MAC platform (functions on both mac/pc in .mov container)

http://www.osor.eu/case_studies/low-cost-high-tech-bbc-tries-out-open-source-based
http://ingex.sourceforge.net/
www.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp-pdf-files/WHP133.pdf
www.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp-pdf-files/WHP141.pdf
www.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp-pdf-files/WHP155.pdf

[Soopafresh]

Here's how I see the benefit of this app and the batch files -

Someone has a new AVCHD camera but a slower computer and/or an older version of Vegas or Premiere. They need a way to create an intermediate file that their NLE can work with.

A couple of years ago I posted a guide on converting AVCHD to other codecs/containers for NLE editing. It worked fairly well, but there were enough variations of AVCHD that 20% of the cameras out there wouldn't work with the guide. As you can see, the ffmpeg method works better for those cameras.

ffmpeg



Avisynth DGavcdec

[The village idiot]

That Ingex system is very interesting. I'll have to do some studying when I get back to work to see if it will solve any issues in our studio or Avid lab. It might possibly solve the nagging issue with needing to run an Avid Unity server for all of our client machines. We get educational discounts on everything but the cost of a new 16TB system is still a lot more than the pieces will cost and there are some significant limitations too.

In the frames above it looks like the FFmpeg frame has had some unsharp masking applied. The distortion in the vertical lines is kind of odd for the AVIsynth frame. With those two frames it is pretty clear which one has the better image.

[The village idiot]

Here is a question.... Can you drop multiple files for conversion into the folder and run the same batch file on all of them? As you can tell I know very little about FFmpeg and don't really have a machine set up to do testing yet, I'll have to get one working again shortly.

[Soopafresh]

Yes, the batch files are designed to process all .MTS or .M2TS you place in the folder, so multiple MTS files are fine. You should test the conversion process before you consider the applications. I noticed the DNxHD conversion didn't work on all of the MTS files I fed it. It seems to work on true 1920x1080 source files - not on 1440x1080 anamorphic. Perhaps there are some additional flags which need to be set in order to process those particular MTS files.

[vhelp]

Well, in looking at the two pics posted above, (and the 'staggering' artifacts) it would seem that the poor results from avisynth dgavc version points to its dificulty in decoding that particular source, and is prob related to that camera's method of container creation. Given another chance with another brand camera, it would prob do better. I mean, most of us been here long enough know that manufacturers / brand vary from camera to camera, spec to spec, and so on and so forth. Still, maybe it was related to the dgavc version used in the above test--there are several.

I would theorize that if you took a good video source and manualy converted it to AVCHD, that the two would look identical when run through the same workflow, each tool

soopafresh, good find in this ffmpeg build out and testing..thank you.

-vhelp 5296

[poisondeathray]

Well, in looking at the two pics posted above, (and the 'staggering' artifacts) it would seem that the poor results from avisynth dgavc version points to its dificulty in decoding that particular source, and is prob related to that camera's method of container creation. Given another chance with another brand camera, it would prob do better. I mean, most of us been here long enough know that manufacturers / brand vary from camera to camera, spec to spec, and so on and so forth. Still, maybe it was related to the dgavc version used in the above test--there are several.

No, this is a well documented issue with dgavcdec. It's based on an older libav build which has issues with PAFF streams. The author requires that old build for frame accuracy. Newer ffdshow builds (within the last year or so) that are based on newer libavcodec builds do not have this issue (e.g. using directshowsource() or dss2() with ffdshow, or even ffms2)

It seems to work on true 1920x1080 source files - not on 1440x1080 anamorphic. Perhaps there are some additional flags which need to be set in order to process those particular MTS files.

Regarding 1440x1080 , the ffmpeg version of DNxHD only supports full raster square pixel formats. There is a chart of supported resolutions and switches for ffmpeg
http://www.itbroadcastanddigitalcinema.com/ffmpeg_howto.html#Encoding_VC-3

[Soopafresh]

Regarding 1440x1080 , the ffmpeg version of DNxHD only supports full raster square pixel formats. There is a chart of supported resolutions and switches for ffmpeg
http://www.itbroadcastanddigitalcinema.com/ffmpeg_howto.html#Encoding_VC-3

Thanks a lot for that info!

[Goomie]

I'm trying to use that Customized Version of FFMPEG for Professional Usage to create a:

IMX 30 with a Quictime wrapper

When I convert an mpg using the:
D10 (aka Sony IMX) Encoding


ffmpeg -i <input_file> -vcodec mpeg2video -r 25 -pix_fmt yuv422p -minrate 30000k -maxrate 30000k -b 30000k -intra -flags +ildct+low_delay -dc 10 -flags2 +ivlc+non_linear_q -ps 1 -qmin 1 -qmax 3 -top 1 -bufsize 1200000 -rc_init_occupancy 1200000 -rc_buf_aggressivity 0.25 -an output.m2v

The file comes out without any audio.

Does anyone have any theories?

I was then going to run

D10 into QuickTime Wrapping


ffmpeg -i <input_file> -vcodec copy -acodec pcm_s16le -vtag mx3p -vbsf imxdump output.mov




Cheers

[txporter]

I'm trying to use that Customized Version of FFMPEG for Professional Usage to create a:

IMX 30 with a Quictime wrapper

When I convert an mpg using the:
D10 (aka Sony IMX) Encoding


ffmpeg -i <input_file> -vcodec mpeg2video -r 25 -pix_fmt yuv422p -minrate 30000k -maxrate 30000k -b 30000k -intra -flags +ildct+low_delay -dc 10 -flags2 +ivlc+non_linear_q -ps 1 -qmin 1 -qmax 3 -top 1 -bufsize 1200000 -rc_init_occupancy 1200000 -rc_buf_aggressivity 0.25 -an output.m2v

The file comes out without any audio.

Does anyone have any theories?

Theories why you don't have any audio? -an means no audio and .m2v files are elemental MPEG2 video streams. I think both of those are good reasons not to have audio.

[Goomie]

That would of done it, cheers for that. Could you recommend a video codec, that would contain the audio then allow me to convert it to a quicktime wrapper?

Shall I just use -vcodec copy

then run

ffmpeg -i <input_file> -vcodec copy -acodec pcm_s16le -vtag mx3p -vbsf imxdump output.mov

or can I add

-vtag mx3p -vbsf imxdump output.mov

into my IMX encoding

Cheers

[txporter]

Well, the video codec won't contain the audio. It is just for video. I don't know what exactly a IMX 30 file is, so I don't know if I am the best person to help with that exactly. Whether or not you copy your input video codec depends on whether it is in the format you want already or not.

It looks like you are ending up with a MPEG2 video stream with LPCM audio. Are the input files that you use for creating the video file and for creating the audio file different? I believe that you can you can drop the -an output.m2v from the first ffmpeg command line and add the -i --> end part of the second ffmpeg command to do it all in one. Not positive though. I use ffmpeg very rarely. Hopefully someone else with more direct knowledge can come along and provide more information.

[crockysam]

Does someone have the latest version of FFmbc (v0.4) ?... 'cause it's not available on the official site anymore...

Thanks,
Sam

[oscord]

Please message if anyone has a copy of ffmbc 0.4 tarball.
Need 302M demuxer asap.

Thanks.

[shaunthesheep]

I have Avanti GUI working with FFMPEG and AVISynth. Anyone know how to get Avanti working with FFmbc?

I tried putting it in the Avanti programme folder > ffmpeg folder. Can you use ffmpeg and ffmbc with Avanti? Or is it either one or the other?

[Chris K]

@shauntesheep

Rename it to "ffmpeg_ffmbc.exe".

You can keep "ffmpeg.exe" also there and switch over with the "Use other FFmpeg version..." at the "Start Process" button menu (right-click for it).

Chris