[SATLUG] Video formats

[Brian Brice]

On 3/15/07, Bruce Dubbs <bruce.dubbs at gmail.com> wrote:
> I am not a complete novice when it comes to video on a PC, but I'm no
> expert.  I have a problem getting videos formatted properly for playing
> on a Windows box.
>
> Background:  I am a member of an organization from my undergraduate days
> where we have reunions every two years.  At the last reunion we took
> about an hour's worth of video and someone put them on a DVD.  I want to
> put the clips on our web site.
>
> I was able to extract the .vob files and convert them into .avi files.
> They play fine on Linux with mplayer.  The problem is that most of the
> members of the group are typical Windows users and they can't play the
> files.  They say the sound plays, but the picture does not.
>
> tcprobe gives me:
>
> tcprobe] RIFF data, AVI video
> [avilib] V: 29.970 fps, codec=FMP4, frames=7840, width=704, height=480

It seems that it was transcoded with an ffmpeg based encoder.  The
codec (or fourcc) indicates that it's MPEG 4 compatible.  A lot of
players use that fourcc to determine if it can decode the video or
not.  If you could simply change the fourcc from 'FMP4' to 'DIVX',
then the DivX decoder for Windows would be able to handle it.  Of
course the Windows users would need DivX.  In the transcoding process,
you would most likely be able to set the fourcc for video to something
other than the default.

> [avilib] A: 48000 Hz, format=0x50, bits=0, channels=2, bitrate=224 kbps,
> [avilib]    10901 chunks, 7325472 bytes, CBR
> [tcprobe] summary for pdt1.avi, (*) = not default, 0 = not detected
> import frame size: -g 704x480 [720x576] (*)
>        frame rate: -f 29.970 [25.000] frc=4 (*)
>       audio track: -a 0 [0] -e 48000,0,2 [48000,16,2] -n 0x50 [0x2000] (*)
>                    bitrate=224 kbps
>            length: 7840 frames, frame_time=33 msec, duration=0:04:21.594
>
> My questions are:
> 1.  What format should I be using to support the Windows users?

This one's hard to answer.  I think it would be safe to assume Windows
users are always able to play DV or MPEG 1 (through Windows Media
Player) right out of the box.

> 2.  What can I use to convert to that format?

I'm partial to using ffmpeg directly than through another program, eg. mencoder.


-- 
Brian Brice
http://www.heapify.org/