Making a very high quality streamable flash video (vp6) at sane bitrates

[Blue_MiSfit]

Hey everyone,

So I need to create some very high quality trailers for a website. The source material is pretty much all NTSC 60i DV. Some of it is 24p, but it's all getting deinterlaced anyway. I can get the files into AviSynth using QTInput(), and have my way with them, no problem.:devil:

I want to make VP6 encoded Flash video (flv), at the highest quality I can squeeze out of a total data rate of under 1500kbit, preferably around 1024 (including audio) for full resolution (16x9 cropped) NTSC.

We have Flash and it's encoder, and it does a decent job at these bitrates (and supports AviSynth input, which is great). However, it seems to only support 1 pass mode, and since it's geared towards streaming, I cant help but guess that it only does CBR. Obviously, being a DVD backup geek, this irks me terribly, as I know what a difference 2 pass VBR can make!

SO. Is there any way to encode VP6 using VirtualDub (I cant seem to find an encoder anywhere online, I'm assuming it's payware), in a proper 2 pass mode, with VBV so that it never goes over a certain data rate (say 1500kbit), and still streams nicely? It seems to be possible (theoretically) to mux a VP6 AVI into an FLV.

I guess my real question is - what's a good way to integrate high quality streaming video into a flash-based web design.

Any input would be appreciated, and I may very well end up just sulking as I filter my video with AviSynth, and run it through the Flash video encoder and call it a day. BUT I want to see what the possibilities are!

Thanks in advance
~MiSfit

[pmedia]

Hi Misfit,

I'm also very interested in the VP6 encoding topic,

have you looked at:
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=991155

i'm a streaming n00b, can you tell me if we should encode to VBR or CBR (we bought Flix Pro for our local batch encoding)? we're going to "stream" the files via one of the simple embedded flv players so there's no streaming server involved so that made me thinking that we need to use CBR but it's just a guess.

thanks

[Blue_MiSfit]

That's a good thread. It looks like ffmpeg can use the VP6 codec directly, and even mux the FLV. I guess it's just a matter of testing to determine how streaming works :)

Thanks - maybe someone else has input as well!

~Misfit