How to ensure that x264 encode is h264 compliant?

[hwjohn]

Ok guys, some background (I'll try to keep it short).

I'm working on a freeware TV calibration disk with some other guys over at AVS Forums(http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=12373254#post12373254). We currently have both an HD DVD and AVCHD version of the disk available. We encode the test patterns as MPEG2, which goes straight to HD DVD, but is transcoded to H264 by Ulead for AVCHD. All authoring is done in the Ulead software.

Now, the Ulead software supposedly accepts H264 (must be muxed to .mov I think). We tried forever to get a an x264 encode that would be accepted by the Ulead software, but to no avail (so we let it transcode the MPEG2 files).

After some discussion on the AVS Forums, someone stated that x264 does not produce a compliant h264 stream, and that no authoring software, including Scenarist, would accept an x264 encode. I thought this was a pretty broad statement, so I thought I would ask here to find out the truth.

Is it possible to produce x264 encodes that will be accepted by authoring software such as Ulead? Can someone point me in the right direction? I apologize for my ignorance on h264 (I have more experience with MPEG2). I have been trying to read through the h264 specs, but it isn't exactly a cake walk.

I'm using MeGUI and a profile/level of 4.1. I tried turning off as many "extras" as I could to make it simple for the decoder, but Ulead still won't accept it. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Casey

[akupenguin]

x264 is H.264 compliant. HD-DVD authoring programs don't want just any H.264 compliant stream, they want specific extra annotations which are optional according to the H.264 standard. The H.264 reference decoder only checks the real video stream, not the optional stuff, so I have no idea how to verify HD-DVD compliance.
See http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=125568 for an attempt to add those to x264. I don't know the current status of the patch.

[hwjohn]

x264 is H.264 compliant. HD-DVD authoring programs don't want just any H.264 compliant stream, they want specific extra annotations which are optional according to the H.264 standard. The H.264 reference decoder only checks the real video stream, not the optional stuff, so I have no idea how to verify HD-DVD compliance.
See http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=125568 for an attempt to add those to x264. I don't know the current status of the patch.

Thanks aku. I took a quick look at that thread and it looks like they are primarily interested in doing 3:2 pulldown for HD DVD. I'll definetely read the whole thing and try out the latest build from that thread, but I don't know if it will address our issues since our target format is AVCHD in 1080p/24 (we use MPEG2 for HD DVD). Thanks much for the input.

[drmpeg]

I wonder if Ulead for AVCHD will even take a compliant 24 fps progressive frame based bitstream, since all AVCHD cameras produce interlaced field based bitstreams.

Have you fed Ulead for AVCHD a bitstream from an H.264 Blu-ray rip?

Ron

[hwjohn]

I wonder if Ulead for AVCHD will even take a compliant 24 fps progressive frame based bitstream, since all AVCHD cameras produce interlaced field based bitstreams.

Have you fed Ulead for AVCHD a bitstream from an H.264 Blu-ray rip?

Ron

Best I remember, alluringreality over at AVS tested a Planet Earth trailer off the web and it worked, but I can't remember the details. I think it was 1080i60 tho.

We originally tried 29.97 progressive, and I think interlaced. We ran through so many tests I can't really remember to be honest. We still haven't found any definitive specs for AVCHD vs. Blu ray, so I'm not 100% sure it will even accept 24p.

alluringreality expressed some interest in getting AVS HD to 24p, so that is really why I'm working on it. There are a couple advantages, mainly for deinterlacing purposes (we already have the HD DVD version in 24p, using pulldown). I'm not really sure what other advantages 24p would have except for specific 24p test patterns, but he was interested in it so I thought we would give it one more shot.

You don't have any specific info on AVCHD do you? I'll try a Blu-ray rip and see what I get.

[valnar]

Take a look at this thread. Perhaps the same recommendations will help your cause.
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=132924

Use the latest AutoMKV or Megui with an updated x264 and the changes mentioned in that thread.

-Robert

[hwjohn]

Take a look at this thread. Perhaps the same recommendations will help your cause.
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=132924

Use the latest AutoMKV or Megui with an updated x264 and the changes mentioned in that thread.

-Robert

Thanks Robert. I'm reading through all the threads slowly, so I appreciate any links provided. I haven't used x264 much, so I am just learning the CLI options and what they do. If you have any other suggestions/reading, I'm all ears.

[bond]

hwjohn, for being able to produce a hddvd compliant stream you need to know how a hddvd compliant stream needs to look like (eg what features are not allowed to be enabled). do you know the hddvd specs in that regard?

[hwjohn]

hwjohn, for being able to produce a hddvd compliant stream you need to know how a hddvd compliant stream needs to look like (eg what features are not allowed to be enabled). do you know the hddvd specs in that regard?

No, not completely. I'm not all that familiar with x264 (or h264), but I'm learning as fas as I can. Do keep in mind that we want to use x264 to produce an AVCHD disc. We do provide a HD DVD version of the disc, but it is MPEG2, which I have a lot more experience with. AVCHD seems to be scarce on documentation, but we did find one link that indicates that 1080p24 is allowable. We also found some info regarding "BD9", which appears to be nothing more than BDMV on a standard DVD. We tried that option but the resulting disc wouldn't play on the PS3, which is by far the largest installed base of Blu-ray players. If BD9 would somehow work, then that would be great as we aren't really concerned with disc space and we could just use MPEG2.

Right now Ron (drmpeg) has been helping us determine what Ulead will accept without transcoding. We tried feeding Ulead a 1088x1920@24p .m2ts, but it transcoded it. The output was cropped to 1080. I don't know if the frame rate or anything else changed as I don't have the output file yet to examine. It looks like our best chance is to make the input as close to what Ulead outputs to avoid transcoding. At this point we aren't even in the ballpark yet, so any direction would be greatly appreciated.