RealVideo 9 codec

[31 Flavas]

Dunno how "capable" this forum thinks RealNetwork's RealVideo codec is but version 9 codec and encoder were just released along with some samples on realnetworks.com.

One of the samples is a movie trailer at 640x480 @ 786k @ 24fps. It 2:24 long, 13.4 meg big. How does that compair to divix?

-Thanks

[outlyer]

This information is useless to compare against other codecs, for bitrate the file should have a known size (if the codec has not a very bad prediction...).

I guess some moderators will be "no happy" seeing me explaining this here but...

For instance,
2:24s = 144s

786kbps * 144s = 113184 kb

and as 1KB = 8kb

113184 kb / 8(kb/KB) = 14148 KB

14148KB = 13.81MB

The numbers you give doesn't mean anything related to quality, ANY bitrate based codec will fit, more or less, this numbers. You'll have to compare the same scene encoded by the two codecs with the same numbers to be able to compare.

Have a look at Doom9's articles and look for codec comparisons.

ANyway, I guess most of the people here will have not a lot of trust on Real's codecs, just guessing, at least that's what I feel.

[Neo Neko]

I have not played with RV9. But if I am not mistaken they licensed VP4 for use with their latest version. If it is similar to VP3 though you will have to convert you numbers to get equal bitrate comparrisons. VP3 bitrate is entered in Kilo Bytes per second instead of Kilo Bits per second like most everyone else. Either way I will have to give it a look.

[outlyer]

Originally posted by Neo Neko
I have not played with RV9. But if I am not mistaken they licensed VP4 for use with their latest version. If it is similar to VP3 though you will have to convert you numbers to get equal bitrate comparrisons. VP3 bitrate is entered in Kilo Bytes per second instead of Kilo Bits per second like most everyone else. Either way I will have to give it a look.

Well, given numbers almost fit to theoretical (if misspelled this, sure :) ) ones so it seems that it uses kilobits (786KB are 6288Kb so...)

[Antimon]

Well if it's using vp4, then divix is supiorior.

[31 Flavas]

Wow, ok, i'm impressed with RV9. I just encoded an episode of an anime I have on dvd at 640x480 @ 750k VBR (two pass) and it is literally almost the same as the DVD. The picture is just a tiny bit soft and during the ending credits where all that text is scrolling up the screen there is noticable mosquieto noise / crap around the text edges. But, the opening and content of the show are practicly flawless AT FULL SCREEN :D

But then again, I guess divix5 as been the same for better for a lot longer now.....

Anyway, i'm happy with RV9 and I don't have to dick around with Flask or Vdub or LAME, anymore. RV9 Does everything by itself: video, audio, and multiplexing. All I have to do is supply the avs file and content.

RV9, though, at the moment (it is in "preview") is command line only. It is well documented though so even a total n00b like me was able to figure it out.

Use though, whatever floats your boat. I'm not looking for flames. Just posting what I found.

-Flavas

[ammer]

For ease of use, try vidomi to do all the parts in the encoding. It encodes with divx3,4,5 + xvid or choosable codec. Easy to use for noobs.

[Razorblade2000]

Where can I download this command line version???

[Razorblade2000]

...got it...

[Neo Neko]

When it comes to current streaming solutions I much prefer Real Networks over Windows Media. They both have their problems believe me. But at least Real Networks is willing to play with everyone. With Windows Media there is little penetration outside of Windows Oddly or purposefully enough. The main problem with real in the past has been that there player is a bit bulky and likes to monopolise things a bit. But all that can be alleviated after the fact. But when it comes to cross platform or cross OS support no one has beat Real. Apple would be in second with Microsoft at best a dissapointing third. And if this is the VP4 technology which I am prety sure it is we should see some good things. VP3 was and VP4 should be excelent for streaming at low bitrates. MPEG4 can out perform the VP codecs at medium to high bit rates. But the VP codecs shine at low bitrates. Their sweet spot is far below where Divx or any other current MPEG4 codec dare to tread at this point.

As was mentioned the VP codecs also seem to do better with animation even if they soften the details a bit. But unless VP4 has been sped up considerably over VP3 I could not justify the time expense. On the faster encode settings if I remember right VP3 could hit about 5 to 7fps on an encode. On the high quality encode settings it was 2 to 3fps. This on an Anthlon XP 1600+! For any lengthy piece of material it would have me pulling my hair out. For those that have tried it what speeds are you getting on encode?

[Dali Lama]

Originally posted by Neo Neko
For those that have tried it what speeds are you getting on encode?

I am getting something around 7fps. I know this by doing an Xvid 2 Pass encode at 15fps (approx 7 min.) and RV9 takes about double the time.

I have a Duron 900. 640x288 Res.

Dali

[31 Flavas]

Regarding the encoding speed of RV9...

I just encoded only the intro of the anime I encoded last night. It is a 1:33s long clip (640x480 @ 24fps) and took 3:45-46s per pass to encode. So that's what maybe 9-10 fps (per pass)? I suck at base 60 so correct me if i'm wrong...

I have a athlon xp 1700+ and this was my encode string.

producer -i C:\temp\gasaraki01intro.avs -o C:\temp\gasaraki01intro.rmvb -ad
"C:\Program Files\Real\RealSystem Producer 9\audiences\750k VBR Download.rpad" -vm sharp

[nordloewe]

btw, isn't it better to use 15fps for cartoons??? i mean, i know that regular cartoons are originaly made at this FPS and then telecined to be showed on TV. is it the case for anime as well? i always wondered that....

another question: has anyone tried to frameserve from AVIUtil or VirtualDub to the new RV9? from VDub it doesn't work at all! from AVIUtil i'm only getting the sound.... the curious thing is that, when frameserving to RealProducer 8 Plus, everything goes right! so i'm still stuck with the old RV8 for now. hopefully, the final version of RV9 (with GUI) will also handle frameserving correctly here.

one note: my WMP has never been able to play my frameserved files from VDub. but that hasn't ever obstructed RealProducer 8 Plus of doing its job.... (!) quite strange, huh?

--
nordloewe

[outlyer]

Originally posted by nordloewe
btw, isn't it better to use 15fps for cartoons??? i mean, i know that regular cartoons are originaly made at this FPS and then telecined to be showed on TV. is it the case for anime as well? i always wondered that....

I really can't give you an answer as I didn't know that but you can guess it if you play with the video. If you openit in VirtualDub for instance and play it frame by frame, you should notice repeated frames if it's originally in a lower framerate or at least I think it should work. I've used this method when using avisynth and a wmv (as avisynth usually can't guess the framerate of this kind of vids) and it worked for me (in this particular case I set the framerate in the avisynth script to 29.970 and then I do the trick, if it's for instance 15fps, there'll be aprox. two frames for each one).

I hope you understand me :P

[RadicalEd]

24 fps is the original framerate of telecined material, including most cartoons and almost all anime (blast you evangelion... why must you be so good and yet such a pain to encode ><). I've never heard of 15 fps being telecined into 29.97, I'm not even sure if this is possible. Much of the anime you download will be 15fps to save bits but it never originates at that rate. 24fps progressive and 29.97 interlaced are the two flavors that anime will come in (and sometimes they come in both at the same time.. another topic for another thread. Oh yea, and don't even start to ask about those blasted 60fps computer animated jobs..). So there ya have it nordloewe, you're 9 fps smarter ;)

[nordloewe]

well, i have always heard (since i was a kid) that cartoons are made using individual cells that are photographed to create the motion. maybe it's not only 15 photos per sec, but certainly it's not 24 either. take a look at the link below and come to your own conclusions. if anyone here has anything else to add to this subject, please, do so. i'm quite curious! saving bitrate on unecessary frames is everybody's goal.

and if the cartoons online were really missing 9 of each sec, they would suck for having lousy motion, not for having macroblocks, which is usually their problem.

Here's how they make a cartoon:
http://www.csmonitor.com/durable/1999/11/09/p18s1.htm

[RadicalEd]

"It takes 16 pictures to make one second of an animated TV cartoon. That's 5,720 images in an 11-minute cartoon."

11 minutes at 16 fps would be 10,560 pictures, not 5,720.
That there shows how consistant that site is.

Nup, any and all anime that you can find on VHS, DVD, or cable is no doubt either 23.976 fps progressive telecined to 29.97, or naturally 29.97 interlaced (although we dont like those, interlacing is much too messy). To convert 16 fps to 24 fps, one frame would have to be repeated every 3 frames, and mixing that in on a field based level on top of the normal 24 > 30 telecine would make a real big mess for both an interlaced and a progressive display.

[LotionBoy]

To jump in here as an animation student. The timing of animation is something that can really vary from source to source.

First, almost all CG is done at 24 fps. If it needs to go to video, a 3:2 pulldown is done to make it 29.97. The pulldown gives it a very 'film' look that people seem to respond to. For scenes with very fast motion that can cause strobing after a pulldown, CG is rendered at 60 fps and converted to 29.97 interlaced (trying to rendered out interlaced video at 30 or 29.97 fps doesn't work really well. 60 works much better). So CG is pretty simple.
Traditional animation is much trickier. pretty much all disney stuff and the classic warners brothers stuff is all done on 1's (meaning that 1 frame = 1 drawing). In these cases, every frame is different. A lot of independant and lower-budget stuff is done on 2's (which means 1 drawing = 2 frames). This halves the amount of work that needs to be done on the cartoon, something which is really important when you're working low-budget or by yourself. People also shoot animation on 3's and 4's. Each time you increase the number of frames a drawing stands in for, you are making the motion mroe jerky, but on slow motions, it isn't really noticeable. Now there are lots of other things that go on too. There is the classic anime drawing slide, where on drawing can be used for several second with a flashing background behind it. However, something like this is usually shot on 3's or 4's, since the only real motion in the scene is the background and you don't want to cycle that too fast or it can cause popping in the image.
Now, the way a lot of productions work is that they mix 1's, 2's, 3's, and 4's together. 2's for fast action, 3's for slower action, 4's for basically no movement, and 1's only when absolutely necessary. This means there is no set formula for how you can kill the fps on a cartoon becase the frequency of drawing is not constant.
If you know for sure what the rate of the animation is, then you can decimate without a problem. But if the source is good enough, then there is no need to do even that. Consider an animation shot on 2's. Every other frame is exactly the same as the one before. What info do you need to save for that frame. None. Because nothing has changed. Of course, this assumes a perfect source, which never happens. But on a good enough source, there shouldn't be huge savings when you decimate.
I prefer my animation at 24 or 25 or 29.97 fps, because it looks best that way. just my 2 cents.

LotionBoy

[fluor]

RealVideo 9 is only VP4.

"... VP4 Encoder for Real – On2’s encoder software now encodes VP4 with AVC audio files that are supported in RealPlayer with On2’s Real VP4 plug-in. ..."

Here's the full article:

http://www.on2.com/pressreleases.php3?qs1=vp4_certified_by_realnetworks

[Razorblade2000]

Could someone write a GUI...

Or tell me how to execute files in Delphi (I know... I'm soooooo lame :( )

[Razorblade2000]

How do you get your anime DVDs into real media format???

Also:
Rip->create .d2v->open in tmpeg, resize and save as .tpr->Vfapi to make avi incl audio->encode???????

Or is there an easier solution???

[Latexxx]

Originally posted by fluor
RealVideo 9 is only VP4.

"... VP4 Encoder for Real – On2’s encoder software now encodes VP4 with AVC audio files that are supported in RealPlayer with On2’s Real VP4 plug-in. ..."

Here's the full article:

http://www.on2.com/pressreleases.php3?qs1=vp4_certified_by_realnetworks

It says plug-in.

[atracus]

Originally posted by Razorblade2000

Or is there an easier solution???

@razor, this is my way 2 go:

1. DVD2AVI for creation of .d2v and .ac3

2. BeSweet for creation of a .wav out of the -ac3, remember: downsample Dolby Surround (if any) and to 44k frequency (otherwise RV9 will do it, in any case, but at your risk in terms of qty!)

3. GordianKnot Step 1: BITRATE: the bitrate is exactly as DivX4 without sound, then add "000" and write it down at the top of the audience file u want 2 use, at the XML tag named "avgBitrate type". Here u may find a sample audience file I used for 1072kbits total streaming (audio + video) with 96k Surround audio:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<audience>
<avgBitrate type="uint">1072000</avgBitrate>
<maxBitrate type="uint">4000000</maxBitrate>
<streams>
<videoStream>
<pluginName type="string">rn-videocodec-realvideo</pluginName>
<codecName type="string">rv9</codecName>
<encodingType type="string">vbrBitrate</encodingType>
<quality type="uint">92</quality>
<maxStartupLatency type="double">4</maxStartupLatency>
<maxFrameRate type="double">25</maxFrameRate>
<maxKeyFrameInterval type="double">12</maxKeyFrameInterval>
<enableLossProtection type="bool">false</enableLossProtection>
</videoStream>
<audioStream>
<pluginName type="string">rn-audiocodec-realaudio</pluginName>
<codecName type="string">cook</codecName>
<codecFlavor type="uint">28</codecFlavor>
<streamContext type="bag">
<presentationType type="string">audio-video</presentationType>
<audioMode type="string">music</audioMode>
</streamContext>
</audioStream>
</streams>
</audience>


4. GordianKnot Step 2: for avs production, retouch the .avs as to include:

video=mpeg2source("moviename.d2v")
audio=wavsource("moviename.wav")
audiodub(video,audio)

5. if u want subtitles, rip them with Subrip into a .sub (version2) format, then include in .avs the rows:

LoadPlugin("TextSub.vdf")
# SUBTITLES
TextSub("moviename.sub")

...you'll find textsub.vdf in the Vobsub package, u just have to drop it in the same folder as the .avs

6. open a char console, and type:

producer -i moviename.avs -ad audiencefilename -vm sharp

and wait consistently... on my athlon/1GB i get ab. 8fps for 1st pass, a little faster for the second (just my feeling, I didn't use a chrono to take the times..:!)


This way, I got really _impressive_ results with 3 full-length movies I tried out, and comparing frame-by-frame with the corresponding DivX5 2-pass I have no doubts RV9 looks superior in details and in "hiding" the blocky effects on plain colour surfaces and smoky/foggy areas.... that's typical from a codec known for its attitude to blur images, but you should check the sharpness of details as well to have your OWN final judgement.

As Doom9 stated in his last codecs comparison, between DivX and VP4 tere is "no clear winner".... do I remember well...? and... is RV9 really VP4 or do I need a plugin? :)))

Let us have your thoughts to share!

cya

[atx]

[Razorblade2000]

Why does everybody call me Razor??? This does even sound dumb for german ears... Razorblade sounds quite nice and the meaning is OK... but Razor??????
:devil: :devil: :devil: :devil: :devil: :devil: :devil: :devil: :devil: :angry: :angry: :angry: :angry: :angry: :angry:


...

[Razorblade2000]

but thanks for the answer...

[atracus]

ok razorBlade2000 ok ... but ... next time why dont u choose a shortest nick, eh? :D :D :D

Let's address this: why is everyone so definitely skeptical about this codec? I have no personal interest in Real, I just tried as everyone else can do, if they don't have anything better to do :)

Just post your results, noone knows if even Doom9 will take it seriously (he posted in another thread that he'll be prob doing a thorough test of the codec, let's stay and see if a Guide may see the light.... my collection of hints is open to huuuge improvements).

Maybe someone less "qualitative" than me, as he is, may help out.

bye

[atx]

[Latexxx]

Maybe you should check the streaming samples from http://www.realnetworks.com/solutions/leadership/realvideo.html even the 56k samples looks good.

[atracus]

Originally posted by Latexxx
Maybe you should check the streaming samples from http://www.realnetworks.com/solutions/leadership/realvideo.html even the 56k samples looks good.

done man, and that' smainly why I'm experimenting with this set of codecs.

Sony provided the Surround technology (http://www.powerpage.org/story.lasso?newsID=9276), as it seems from this news, and from the link you included (http://www.realnetworks.com/solutions/leadership/realvideo.html)it might also include 5+1 streams as well.

For your eyes and ears only.. ;)

bye
[atx]

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by Razorblade2000
Rip->create .d2v->open in tmpeg, resize and save as .tpr->Vfapi to make avi incl audio->encode???????

What?! Don't use tmpg or gordianknot they're both stupid :devil: Just rip the dvd, make the .d2v using DVD2AVI, and write yourself an .avs file. You will need avisynth, mpeg2dec, decomb (if your material is interlaced), and vobsub (if you want to do burned in subtitles). I use DVD2AVI to get the .wav audio, but use what ever floats your boat.

This is what is in my .avs

LoadPlugin("C:\Temp\mpeg2dec.dll")
LoadPlugin("C:\Temp\decomb.dll")
LoadPlugin("C:\WINNT\System32\vobsub.dll")
video=mpeg2source("C:\Temp\gasaraki01.d2v")
audio=wavsource("C:\Temp\gasaraki01.wav")
audiodub(video,audio)
Telecide(guide=1,gthresh=50,chroma=true,threshold=30)
Decimate(cycle=5)
VobSub("C:\Temp\output2")
BiCubicResize(640,480)
ConvertToRGB

Open up a command prompt window and launch RP9. The input file is the .avs file also make sure to use -vm sharp and encode at 750k VBR download. I posted my RP9 command prompt line in this thread already (first page).

RAZOR :devil: :devil: :devil: :p

-Flavas

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by atracus
Sony provided the Surround technology (http://www.powerpage.org/story.lasso?newsID=9276)

That powerpage article is stupid and written by a moron. I'll just leave it at that :)

-Flavas

[teplun]

I encoded a movie with RealVideo9 and made .avs with GKnot. Everything worked fine but the audio was not sync with the video. How can I delay the audio about 200 ms by editing the avisynth script?

[Peters]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas

This is what is in my .avs

LoadPlugin("C:\Temp\mpeg2dec.dll")
LoadPlugin("C:\Temp\decomb.dll")
LoadPlugin("C:\WINNT\System32\vobsub.dll")
video=mpeg2source("C:\Temp\gasaraki01.d2v")
audio=wavsource("C:\Temp\gasaraki01.wav")
audiodub(video,audio)
Telecide(guide=1,gthresh=50,chroma=true,threshold=30)
Decimate(cycle=5)
VobSub("C:\Temp\output2")
BiCubicResize(640,480)
ConvertToRGB

-Flavas

hem, why loosing time with ConvertToRGB? :confused:

[The People's Elbow]

31 Flavas wrote:Don't use tmpg or gordianknot they're both stupid
- Would you tell me what is stupid about GKnot? I could write those nasty avs scripts by myself, either, but its really faster with GKnot and by the way: How do you crop away the borders without the GKnot preview?

PS: The last line in your avs script is useless and makes the encoding slower - one of the pros of avs is the speed increase which is mainly gained through getting around the YUY2TORGB conversion that VDub performes (if some filters are enabled).

PPS: The Real8 Video Codec already was very good for anime content, especially at low bitrates (300-600Kb) and the new one seems to even have improved!

greetz, Elbow!

[atracus]

Originally posted by teplun
How can I delay the audio about 200 ms by editing the avisynth script?

If you start from the original ac3 just use BeSweetGui for conversion to .wav audio, and on the last form (BeSweet pushbutton), in the frame named "Overall Track Adjustements" flag the "Set Delay to" mark, entering the right amount of msecs (from the DVD2AVI delay, eventually with a leading minus sign).

If you start from other formats (mp3,...) just output a .wav and edit it with CoolEdit or Sound Forge to add / subtract silence at the beginning.

Hope it helps!

Btw, my 2 last rips with RV9 were impressive!, after 91 DivX I think I'm switching to Real... as long as it's preview=free!

bye all

[atx]

[Latexxx]

Converting/editing realmedia is hard and realplayer takes too much processing power with my 500 MHz Pentium III

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by Peters


hem, why loosing time with ConvertToRGB? :confused:

I do not think that RP9 supports YUY2. At least RP8.5 didn't. So I have to ConvertToRGB unless i want bandy off color rips :)

I'm encoding anime right now so I can not check at the moment. But I will check later today.

or else if there is a way (using RM), educate me.

-flavas

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by atracus

Btw, my 2 last rips with RV9 were impressive!, after 91 DivX I think I'm switching to Real... as long as it's preview=free!

As far as I can tell, RP9 preview is fully functional. They also included rmeditor to edit your files afterwards.

It probably will be that the RP9 GUI will be limited again, like RP8.5 "basic".

So just make sure you keep your copy of 'preview'.

-flavas

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by The People's Elbow

Would you tell me what is stupid about GKnot? I could write those nasty avs scripts by myself, either, but its really faster with GKnot and by the way: How do you crop away the borders without the GKnot preview?FrontPage is to HTML as GKnot is to AVS. They both get the job done, but write nasty (bloated) code. I'll contiune to use GKnot to get the croping info, but use it to generate my avs? no way!

-flavas

[atracus]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas


As far as I can tell, RP9 preview is fully functional. They also included rmeditor to edit your files afterwards.


Yeah, I confirm that the RV9 is (for what I've tested) fully functional. rmeditor, instead, can't cut a .rmvb at a certain point in time before the movie-end, but it may possibly depend on my setup. Did anyone succeed to cut a rv9 movie successfully, with the flag "-e 00:00:00:00.000" ?


@31 Flavas:

I didn't ConvertToRGB in my 4 movie-rips, and the colors look OK to me. I'll do a check tomorrow on a small sample, in order to compare "with" and "without" rips. I'll let you know.

bye

[atx]

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by atracus

Yeah, I confirm that the RV9 is (for what I've tested) fully functional. rmeditor, instead, can't cut a .rmvb at a certain point in time before the movie-end, but it may possibly depend on my setup. Did anyone succeed to cut a rv9 movie successfully, with the flag "-e 00:00:00:00.000" ?

try to find RealProducer 8 Plus online. you can use its RealMedia Editor to cut and tag RV9 files as well. i find it an easier approach cause you can actually "see" where you are cutting! but here in my system i'm being forced to rename my files from RMVB to RM in order to open them in RMEditor 8. just an idea.

i'm having a problem here. i can't encode "Transformers, The Movie". RP9 crashed 3x already (after hours of work). i believe the problem is that my Win2K default TEMP directory is located in a tight drive.... i changed a few settings in the system to move it to other partition and, just in case, i also altered the TEMP string in my PRODUCER.PREF file. i'll try a new encode tonight, but if doesn't work, i won't know what else to do.... :(

does anyone have any suggestions? my AVS plays normally in WMP6.4.

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by atracus


Yeah, I confirm that the RV9 is (for what I've tested) fully functional. rmeditor, instead, can't cut a .rmvb at a certain point in time before the movie-end, but it may possibly depend on my setup. Did anyone succeed to cut a rv9 movie successfully, with the flag "-e 00:00:00:00.000" ?I don't understand what you are trying to do...

i've use rmeditor to chop off 30 seconds from the beginning of a clip.


I didn't ConvertToRGB in my 4 movie-rips, and the colors look OK to me. I'll do a check tomorrow on a small sample, in order to compare "with" and "without" rips. I'll let you know.[/B]

I definatly stand corrected here!

Just made my own clip without ConvertToRGB. Thank you!!!

-Flavas

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe
i'm having a problem here. i can't encode "Transformers, The Movie". RP9 crashed 3x already (after hours of work). i believe the problem is that my Win2K default TEMP directory is located in a tight drive....I've encoded up to an hour and fourty minutes so far without a problem. Then again, I don't have a space issue...

Are you using dvd2avi and avisynch?

-flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas

I've encoded up to an hour and fourty minutes so far without a problem. Then again, I don't have a space issue...
Are you using dvd2avi and avisynch?

well, i don't have a real space problem. i have a 28Gb HD but the system partition is only 2Gb. :p i thought about using PartitionMagic to fix that, but i have Win98 (that i haven't used for the past 2 years!) set as an alternate boot. i believe that changing the size of partitions from inside one of the OSs, will mess up with the other one.... someday, when i'm not lazying around, i'll format the whole thing, re-arrange my space and install Win2K only. and yes, i'm using DVD2AVI and Avisynch. i'll try encoding again tonight and see if the new roomy TEMP will work. hope so!

any hints to speed up the encoding? i'm using AVISynch's Bilinear resizing & SmartDeinterlace in my procedure. should i use RP9's filters to do these jobs, instead?

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

any hints to speed up the encoding? i'm using AVISynch's Bilinear resizing & SmartDeinterlace in my procedure. should i use RP9's filters to do these jobs, instead? Make sure you are using mpeg2dec and keeping the video in YUY2 (RP9 supports YUY2). I use decomb to do the deinterlacing (rather than smartdeinterlace() ). It's better and probably faster.

Bicubicresize() will give a better picture, but it is slower.

Other than that I dunno what to say about your crashing problem.

-flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas

Make sure you are using mpeg2dec and keeping the video in YUY2 (RP9 supports YUY2). I use decomb to do the deinterlacing (rather than smartdeinterlace() ). It's better and probably faster.

how to NOT keep the video on YUY9? there would be a color conversion only if i used a script to perform it, right? there goes my AVS:

LoadPlugin("e:\win2k\GORDIA~1\mpeg2dec.dll")
video=mpeg2source("TF.d2v").BilinearResize(480,360)
audio=wavsource("TF.wav")
audiodub(video,audio)
SmartDeinterlace(2,15,true,true,true)

how to use Decomb for the de-interlacing?

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

how to NOT keep the video on YUY9? there would be a color conversion only if i used a script to perform it, right?Right, as long as you don't have ConvertToRGB your ok.

how to use Decomb for the de-interlacing? Doom9 has it in his download section. Main advantage of it is that it will get rid of the judder caused by deinterlacing. Doom also wrote a guide to decomb http://www.doom9.org/decomb.htm

-Flavas

[oddball]

What I am interested to know is how well it fares on audio. The video may be nice but if the audio is only up to par with 128k MP3 then it's not that great IMO.

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by oddball

The video may be nice but if the audio is only up to par with 128k MP3 then it's not that great IMO. I can not comment on this because I bash anyone who would spend X hundered dollars per foot for "mysitcally better" video and audio cable. (i.e. anyone who buys Monster or "BetterCable")

Godforbid, anyone discuss or tell me about "rainbow foil"

-Flavas

[oddball]

Or green marker pen around the edge of CD's? ;)

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by oddball
Or green marker pen around the edge of CD's? ;) For the 'ultimate' in audio "mystisism" go here:

http://www.belt.demon.co.uk/product/qrfqc/qrfqc.html

Look at the 'other' products they sell. Then take a look at their price list :)

http://www.belt.demon.co.uk/priceus.html

-flavas

[nordloewe]

RP9 finally finished encoding "Transformers - The Movie"! the picture is pretty good but i have some observations to make and questions to ask. can any of you please comment some? here they go:

1. Net Congestion: i constantly get this warning and it interrupts the playback for about 1sec. my PC is a P3-700 with 384Mb RAM and my movie bitrate is 1059Kbps. is it too much bitrate to my machine??? maybe, right? my 450Kbps cartoons rarely have this problem.

2. ocilation: from time to time, some parts of the picture (that are supposed to be static) keep moving up and down a few pixels. i also had noticed that behaviour with my "Simpsons" encodings, however i thought it was due to their low bitrate (450Kbps). (?)

3. SmartDeinterlace: either i made my script wrong, or it's just a case of bad-naming (DumbDeinterlace). the movie is still interlaced! any comments? i posted my script about 4 msgs above....

4. chopped sound: well, i'm pretty sure it has nothing to do with RV9! the WAV i extracted from my VOB doesn't play AT ALL via WMP 6.4! it plays ok through WinAmp, though. :confused: (un)fortunately, WinAmp is my default audio player so i only noticed this strange fact this morning when i heard the chopped sound coming out of the RM and then decided to check my WAV source. i extracted the WAV using Flask 0.6. i boosted the audio a bit using its Dynamic feature. is it a bug?

5. MPEG Ligos: when i tried to play the WAV via WMP, i noticed it says that Ligos MPEG Audio Decoder is handling this WAV playback. (?) i thought that *only* the DirectSound filter was supposed to do it! this WAV is 48Khz. is this normal for this sample rate?

5. MP3: i also have the audio of this movie on Lame MP3....and it plays fine through WinAmp and WMP! is there any script i can add to my AVS that would allow me to combine MP3-audio and video???

well, i'm having a lot problems with RV9 when it comes to DVD backup. i think i will keep using it only for TV cartoons.... anywayz, if anyone has experienced any of these problems and has suggestions, pls, verbalize. i'm quite curious! right now i'm gonna re-extract the WAV using AC3Dec and try to (at least) fix the audio issue....

[31 Flavas]

1.)

If you are playing the files off of your hard drive are getting "net congestion" *AT ALL* then something seriously strange is going on with your computer. What kind of computer is this (speed / processor)?

2.)

Er, i've made about 10 full length rips using RP9 and I don't get any jumping or shaking of the picture. What is the command line you are feeding RP9?

3.)

I espically tried your smartdeinterlace() this morning (as i was typing my reply) and it worked for me. Dunno what is going on with your setup...

4.)

Something had to have gone wrong with your .wav extraction. You may have used some audio codec w/o knowing... I'm no audiophile as long as it is "sounds clean" I don't care what program does the extraction / compression. This is why I just have DVD2AVI do it for me. Either re-try extracting the .wav audio again or have DVD2AVI do it and then try again.

5.)

ok, see i think you extrated the .ac3 but gave it a .wav extenstion or else you mpeg audio compressed it somehow by accident. Ligos is a mpeg codec and if its being used to play back the audio then you don't have uncompressed .wav audio.

----

I'm not having any of the problems you are having so I dunno whats going on. All of my rips are coming out perfect.... :(

-Flavas

[nordloewe]

1)

P3-700, 384Mb RAM, 28Gb HD, ATI AiW 128 Pro.... this Net Congestion is bizarre!

2)

producer -i d:\movies\vobs\TF.avs -ad 800k -am music -vm sharp.

despite its name, my audience is set for a maximum bitrate of 1100Kbps. btw, the suggested M$ XML Notepad is great for audience editing! later i'll try to cut a 10sec part of it and post it here in the forum. but i believe my PC configuration is responsible for that. i just don't know where exactly is the source of this prob.

3)

i have more info on the SmartDeinterlacing thing. i tried old Flask 0.6 de-interlace filter set on "blend" mode and threshold = 2 and the interlacing didn't disappear! although slow, Flask's de-interlacing filter never dissapointed me. i was quite surprised! i decided to try Xmepg 4.5 de-interlacing filters and the only one that improved (but didn't completely fixed it either) was "Greedy Odd". i'm quite sure that this cartoon is one of those problematic ones that never come out perfect. well, i'll stick with "Greedy Odd"....

4)

i tried AC3Dec and now the resulting WAV plays fine via WinAmp and WMP. cool! i used Flask to extract the WAV. i don't know how it could have messed with the file.... it was strange.

well, i won't try RP9 on high bitrate files anymore.... that Net Congestion issue is strange and annoying. and the funny thing about it is that it always comes in the same parts of the movie. no matter how many times i rewind it and play it back.... :confused: tonight i'll try to encode with DivX 5. i don't like the macroblocks it generates along the edges of the objects, but i have no other choice since i tried GKnot already and it really messed with the picture. it's noteworthy the fact that it was the only single time GKnot let me down.... maybe i should have tried it with the "AntiShit" option on.... GKnot ROCKS!

[nordloewe]

does anyone here knows the functions of the settings below?

quality: 30-100
maxStartupLatency: 4-25 seconds

i believe the "Quality" value is only used when encoding on "vbrQuality" Mode.... as for "maxStartupLatency", i'm puzzled!

another question.... which audio format (cook + falvour) is everybody using? i'm starting to think that "atrac 3" (132 Kbps Stereo Music - RA8) is too much to my machine.... i'm considering "cook 25" (96 Kbps Stereo Music - RA8).

btw, all RA8 formats are VBR, right? RealNetworks should provide a help file with some more details on the prog. i find myself guessing quite often. :( that's really a wasting of time. any URL where i could find more in-depth information about RV9???

last question: did anyone get to make batch processing work? i mean, i tried to encode 2 files but only the first ones were done. RP9 seemed to have closed (or crashed) after finishing with the first files. :confuse:

[Peters]

@nordloewe

Choose File->Work Offline to avoid this strange Net Congestion (well i hope)

[Latexxx]

Maybe your hard disk is so fragmented that real player doesn't get the file fast enough and gives you then the error "Net Congestion"(normally it appears when bandwith goes too sloooooow when streaming).

[atracus]

hey man,
I read from your banner that you happened to release a couple of GUIs for other commandline proggies - why don't you consider to develop a GUI for rv9 too, provided that the "non-preview" release will probably be

1. with a GUI, *BUT*
2. not for free,

so we'll probably stick to this pre- for a while?

thanks in advance for your kind response.

bye
[atx]

[31 Flavas]

is it *REALLY* that hard to figure out command line RP9?

Or are you just a lazy ass that wants 'point & click' :p :p :p

[atracus]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas

Or are you just a lazy ass that wants 'point & click' :p :p :p

hehehe

yes im a lazyass dude, :D !!!

no of course I like to play with the win32 console, as well as you did, but I think that a gui might help this release to spread about amongst those who dont bother to spend time on a pdf "manual", as the included prerelease :|

anyway, Ur choice man!

take care

[atx]

[ECY]

Just a question
is that right that RV9 the codec from ON2 (VP4) use ?
If so is it possible to playback RV9 files on WMP6.4 with Vp3.2 installed ? since VP3.2 can decode Vp4 stream.

[Neo Neko]

No. WMP can not open or understand RM files. If it could and you have a directshow or VCF version of VP4 installed then yes. So the answer is no.

[oledoe]

Did you notice that when you open a .wmv file with MediaPlayer it takes a couple of seconds till you get video playback? Streaming media for the web tries to mantain a constant "download" bitrate, while having variable video bitrate. Suppose you are encoding video at 300kbps, and your video starts with an easy compressible 10 seconds video sequence, that only takes 150kbps to encode. Let's say the next 10 sec. scene needs more than 300kbps to encode. The codec can encode it at 450kbps. The codec can use the unused bits (10 sec * 150kbps) to expand the bitrate available to this scene without really transmiting over 300kbps.
So far, so good. The problem arises when you have the opposite case: a high bitrate scene followed by a low bitrate scene. In this case, you can do something similar, but you have to decide how much time you're willing to wait, once you've opened the file, to have smooth video playback. That's because the player has to buffer the received stream until it has all the encoded video it needs to have smooth playback.
That's what this parameter indicates. If you're using RealProducer 8.5, you will notice that the configuration dialog doesn't allow you to set a MaxStartupLatency higher than 25sec. Luke's Guide (http://www.geocities.com/lukesvideo -- a must read if you're encoding cartoons) shows how to avoid this limit editing the Windows registry, so that the codec uses the whole lenght of your video to implement the variable bitrate encoding.

[nordloewe]

thanx for the hint! i checked Luke's page and it is really good! unfortunately he hasn't updated it yet (there's no mention of RV9). well, i first developed this theory about maxStartupLatency after reading the DivX options throughly (as one of them does the same), however i could never know it for sure. well, now i found someone else that thinks the same way i do.

i increased my mSL inside my audience file but now i get an error message that says the value i chose "isn't allowed and therefore RP9 will employ the default value" (probably 4). i tried the registry but the key Luke mentions on his site only applies to RealProducer 8.x!

does anyone have anything to add?

[Latexxx]

Originally posted by atracus
hey man,
I read from your banner that you happened to release a couple of GUIs for other commandline proggies - why don't you consider to develop a GUI for rv9 too, provided that the "non-preview" release will probably be

1. with a GUI, *BUT*
2. not for free,

so we'll probably stick to this pre- for a while?

thanks in advance for your kind response.

bye
[atx]

I'll see what I can do. It may take a while, because of lots of options.

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe
thanx for the hint! i checked Luke's page and it is really good! unfortunately he hasn't updated it yet (there's no mention of RV9). well, i first developed this theory about maxStartupLatency after reading the DivX options throughly (as one of them does the same), however i could never know it for sure. well, now i found someone else that thinks the same way i do.

Just be aware that if you use the RP8.x VBR hack, the files will be unstreamable. The startup delay (the buffering part) will take the entire lenght of the clip pretty much.

Not that you are going to be streaming the files.... but just so you know.

-Flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas

Just be aware that if you use the RP8.x VBR hack, the files will be unstreamable. The startup delay (the buffering part) will take the entire lenght of the clip pretty much.



roger!

after a week of probs, i finally finished my TFs rip. i don't know what was causing the Net Congestion but whatever it was, it's not acting anymore. the cartoon looks great and the sound is pretty good too. i ended up trying RP9's de-interlacing filter to fix my picture and it worked well. it's not perfect, but it's good! RealProducer is really unbeatable when it comes to cartoon encoding!

i just hope i can find a way to increase the maxStartupLatency value for RP9. that would definitely be a bonus! well, i'll try "Akira" next weekend and if everything goes well, i'll be ready for the main mission: "Star Blazers"! :cool:

btw, anyone knows how to add subtitles to RM files??? is it possible using SML?

[slavickas]

Originally posted by nordloewe


btw, anyone knows how to add subtitles to RM files??? is it possible using SML?

download from realnetworks production guide and look @ realtext examples, but i don't know any tool for automatic conversion

[Latexxx]

rm9gui released @ http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25088

Fastest GUIs on web ;-)

[travis morgan]

nordloewe,

use an .avs file to add subtitles to your .rm files.

the process is similar to to adding subtitles to a divx file using gknot.

all you need to do is modify the .avs file a little bit that gknot produces.

realproducer can read the .avs file.

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

it's not perfect, but it's good! RealProducer is really unbeatable when it comes to cartoon encoding!yea, now if we can just get that clueless n00b, *ahem* I mean doom9, to take a look at it... :p :p

-flavas

[travis morgan]

31 flavas,

didn't doom mention in a previous post about maybe doing some tests with rv9?

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by slavickas
download from realnetworks production guide and look @ realtext examples, but i don't know any tool for automatic conversion
thanx for the hint! too bad there's no tool for conversion. :( i thought that SMI subs (used by WinMedia Player) could also be displayed via RealPlayer. aren't they based on RealNetworks' SMIL technology??? here in my system, SML files used to be associated with RealPlayer....they even had the Real's icon representing them! nevertheless, i never experienced RealPlayer handling them.... :confused:

Originally posted by travis morgan
use an .avs file to add subtitles to your .rm files.
the process is similar to to adding subtitles to a divx file using gknot.
i did consider this option however, from what i know, it has some drawbacks (pls, correct me if i'm wrong):

1) you can't turn the subs off;
2) extra keyframes will be genereted to accommodate the subs.

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
yea, now if we can just get that clueless n00b, *ahem* I mean doom9, to take a look at it... :p :p
like Travis said, he "probably" will.... i also read somewhere that he was planning to do some tests. if he tries RV9 on movies, he will likely get dissappointed as the codec smoothes textures quite a bit -- which is, in turn, the very reason why RealVideo codecs are better suited for cartoons! :D) someone had to explore this segment and fill this gap, after all!

well, now we finally have a GUI! cool! thanx Latexxx! i'll try your GUI with tonight's Simpsons eps. i'm quite curious about it! i'll report my findings later on.

[atracus]

Originally posted by nordloewe


btw, anyone knows how to add subtitles to RM files??? is it possible using SML?

quite simple man, if u managed to use subtitles w/ DivX! you just need 2 files, one .rt and one .smil, formatted the right way.

Here is "my way":

1. rip subtitles out of your vob's using i.e. Subrip: in=vob files out=.srt or .sub (v2) files, containing OCR'ed version of your preferred language

2. open the .sub file with Radlight Subtitle Studio 2.0, set the right FPS both in "IN" and "OUT", convert on the second frame to "Realtime" format: in=.sub out=.rt

3. substitute the top rows in the .rt file (the ones containing the <window> statement) with the following lines:


<window duration="2:00:00.00" width="544" height="50" wordWrap="true" loop="true" bgcolor="black">
<font color="white" face="Arial" size="+2">
<center>
<b>


where duration is the total movie length, width the movie width (i.e. from the .avs), height my suggested subtitles' window vertical size

and add at the bottom of the file (after the last <Time Begin> statement) the following lines:


</b>
</center>
</font>
</window>


then, save the file with the name you prefer for the sub's, i.e. "movie-subtitles.rt"

4. edit the .smil file as from the following example:


<smil>
<head>
<layout>
<root-layout backgroundColor="black" width="544" height="338"/>
<!-- on prev. line, add 50 to the actual movie heigth to get "338" -->
<region id="video_region" z-index="1"/>
<region id="text_region" top="288" z-index="2"/>
<!-- top is = height minus 50, i.e. actual movie heigth -->
</layout>
</head>
<body>
<par>
<video src="movie-noaudio.rmvb" region="video_region" fill="remove"/>
<textstream src="movie-subtitles.rt" region="text_region" fill="freeze"/>
<audio src="movie-audio.rm"/>
</par>
</body>
</smil>


In the .smil example, movie-noaudio is a rip done on a .rmvb file not containing audio (for easy switching of audio streams), movie-subtitles.rt is the sub's file created at previous step and movie-audio.rm is the preferred-language audio.

You can make your life easier i.e. by coding a single rip including audio + video by omitting the <audio src> statement and referring to the "complete" .rtvb file in just the <video src> statement alone.

My results were impressive, in my (up to now) 4 rips I never had sync problems, neither with audio nor with sub's.


Please let me have your opinions, or alternative / most efficient methods.

tia

bye

[atx]

[Latexxx]

Take a look about this! http://www.ultraplayer.com/

A free player capable of playing directshow + real media !!!

I'm downloading now.

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by atracus
quite simple man, if u managed to use subtitles w/ DivX! you just need 2 files, one .rt and one .smil, formatted the right way. so is the total amount of files "3"??? which one of them will trigger this "system"? i mean, after preparing all files, which one is supposed to be double-clicked to launch video + subs? well, i will only try RealText subtitles in my next rip in the weekend, but i'm quite curious about this.

You can make your life easier i.e. by coding a single rip including audio + video by omitting the <audio src> statement and referring to the "complete" .rtvb file in just the <video src> statement alone.btw, here in my system, although the extension .RMVB is associated to RealPlayer (they even have the RP's icon), my RV9 files aren't opening in RealPlayer! :confused: i'm being forced to rename my RV9 files to *.RM in order to play them. what's the reason for the new extension, anyway?

[31 Flavas]

Hey uhm... I've gotta ask this, the standard "streaming" audience definitions encode to CBR right? Assumeing that is true, would it mean I can skip analysis pass (since it is redundant) and just encode off the bat? Or am I wrong?

Will the analysis pass still help even though it is CBR encoding?

I tried compairing a clip w/ and w/o 2 pass and the end result was I think the 2nd pass didn't do anything (i.e. supporting my theroy) ... but can anyone comfirm / deny?

(I'm doing cartoon encoding)

-Flavas

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe
so is the total amount of files "3"??? which one of them will trigger this "system"? i mean, after preparing all files, which one is supposed to be double-clicked to launch video + subs? well, i will only try RealText subtitles in my next rip in the weekend, but i'm quite curious about this.Well, dunno about using realtext... I guess it's an option if you want to be able to "turn off" the subtitles... Otherwise, I would just 'burn in' the subtitles using an avs scrip and vobsub.

(my avs file is listed on page 2 of this thread and shows it being used)

Feel free to PM me if you need help with vobsub. Doom has vobsub in the downloads I think...


btw, here in my system, although the extension .RMVB is associated to RealPlayer (they even have the RP's icon), my RV9 files aren't opening in RealPlayer! :confused: i'm being forced to rename my RV9 files to *.RM in order to play them. what's the reason for the new extension, anyway? Well, I don't exactly know either... I think it may just be to differentiate the 'stream-able' realmedia from the 'download' realmedia. Other than that dunno.

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
Hey uhm... I've gotta ask this, the standard "streaming" audience definitions encode to CBR right? Assumeing that is true, would it mean I can skip analysis pass (since it is redundant) and just encode off the bat? Or am I wrong?
i believe the CBR mode isn't a true CBR. from what i see, its bitrate vary inside a small range -- for all audiences. on the other hand, VBR mode's variation is inside a much larger range. check your audience files and notice that...

56k Dial-up:
avgBitrate = 34k
maxBitrate = 56k

26k Substream:
avgBitrate = 26k
maxBitrate = 34k

750 VBR Download:
avgBitrate = 750k
maxBitrate = 2000k

well, the "VBR Download" presets puzzle me a bit.... what's the reason of limiting the bitrate to the small value of "2000k" in a mode that is supposed to be used for playback from disk???? personally, i never use any of the preset audiences! i always use my own tweaked ones:

maxBitrate = 7000k
quality = 100 (just matters on VBRQuality mode, right???)
maxStartupLatency = 25 (no way to increase it more???)
maxFrameRate = 15/24

in addition to this, i deleted 3 of the 4 "audiostream" tags, leaving only one with the *exact* codec flavour i want! and sometimes, depending on the video source (cable or DVD), i change the flavour (from 32k Mono to 64 or 96K Stereo RA8).

for those that are using Notepad to edit the audience files, i strongly suggest you to switch to Microsoft XML Notepad (http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnxml/html/xmlpaddownload.asp)! it's a *freeware* recommended by the RP9's documentation itself! it makes life a lot easier! :cool:

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
Well, dunno about using realtext... I guess it's an option if you want to be able to "turn off" the subtitles... Otherwise, I would just 'burn in' the subtitles using an avs scrip and vobsub.
but that method generates the following issue: new keyframes will be inserted for all frames where a new sub appears....right? can anyone confirm if this theory is right, please? VOBSub seems to be a more practical approach, indeed. i don't know.... i'll give RealText a try before definitely sticking with either method.

can i have multiple subtitle languages in the same RM video? i find it a really cool feature....specialy for language-studying purposes! i like Deutsch! :cool:

thanks for the help, Flavas!

[travis morgan]

31 flavas,

i was going to ask the same question about 2-pass and cbr, but you beat me to it. :)

nordloewe,

i have to agree with you. i don't believe the cbr mode is a true cbr. if it was, why would those audience file contain an aveBitrate and maxBitrate setting. that looks like vbr to me.

i'm assuming to get a true cbr encoding, you'll need to tweak those audience files and set aveBitrate to equal maxBitrate (or vice versa). by doing this, i would see no need in doing a 2-pass now.

[atracus]

Originally posted by nordloewe


can i have multiple subtitle languages in the same RM video? i find it a really cool feature....specialy for language-studying purposes! i like Deutsch! :cool:



Of course you can, just add an extra window of 50 in heigth with the second .rt language added.

And - you won't have 2 bother with keyframes insertions, since you won't touch the video-track! (and can have a second audio-track as well for dynamically switching to a second language when you want to go back to German and have enough of English...! just use the "preferred language" on RealOne preferences, and the suggestions contained on the REALSYSTEM IQ PRODUCTION GUIDE pdf, on the realsystem site).

please ask if you need clarifications from me!

bye

[atx]

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by travis morgan

nordloewe,

i have to agree with you. i don't believe the cbr mode is a true cbr. if it was, why would those audience file contain an aveBitrate and maxBitrate setting. that looks like vbr to me.I dunno, they also have "quality" settings in the streaming definitions (which are ignored, AFAIK) so I would assume the maxbitrate argument is also ignored if encodingtype is cbr...

I (or someone at least) should just fire off an email asking real...

-Flavas

[daiSho]

is media created w/ RM9 protected from being opened back up and converted to other file formats (Mpg, Avi, etc.)? i realize that any video format that is output to 'TV' and recaptured can be re-encoded and such, but does the RM9 format itself afford protection from programs like TMpeg that can crack open .Wmv and most other formats? is there any protection at all? thx in advance all..

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by travis morgan
i'm assuming to get a true cbr encoding, you'll need to tweak those audience files and set aveBitrate to equal maxBitrate (or vice versa). by doing this, i would see no need in doing a 2-pass now.
the very philosophy of developing efficent codecs is to avoid waste of bandwidth, right? so the only format truly CBR is probably the ol' Uncompressed AVI.... :) all others must require the addition of a setting ot two in order to become CBR. in this particular case of RV9, i believe that making "max = avg" would really do the job. but i don't see any advantage of using "true CBR"....not even for streaming.

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by atracus
and can have a second audio-track as well for dynamically switching to a second language when you want to go back to German and have enough of English...! just use the "preferred language" on RealOne preferences, and the suggestions contained on the REALSYSTEM IQ PRODUCTION GUIDE pdf, on the realsystem site).
i never made a movie with two soundtracks... it's an extra load of work that i prefer not to have.... :D and besides, it would inflate the movie size quite a bit. i'd rather use one single audio stream in German and two subs: Eng & Deu.

in order to take advantage of RealText subs, do i have to use RealOne??? i tried it once and didn't like it at all! that player is for RP-8 what WMP-7 is for WMP-6.4: a huge and unecessary conglomeration of features in a cute but heavy interface. i stick with RP-8 for now.

regarding the IQ Guide, i took a look at it at Real website but i found it quite technocratic.... i'll use your guide, instead! ;) and yes, i'll probably need some support. thanx!

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
I (or someone at least) should just fire off an email asking real...
their progs are quite mal-documented. i don't believe they would bother replying to an email about this matter.... i'm actually more curious on the "maxBitrateLatency" option. that would significantly increase the quality of the output file, IMHO.

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

in order to take advantage of RealText subs, do i have to use RealOne??? i tried it once and didn't like it at all! that player is for RP-8 what WMP-7 is for WMP-6.4: a huge and unecessary conglomeration of features in a cute but heavy interface. i stick with RP-8 for now.RealOne is an aquired taste, I hated it guts as well, at first. But i'm just going to leave it at that; I want to keep this thread open. I don't want it getting locked because of a childish argument... :)

-Flavas

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

their progs are quite mal-documented. i don't believe they would bother replying to an email about this matter.... i'm actually more curious on the "maxBitrateLatency" option. that would significantly increase the quality of the output file, IMHO. (Although I just posted I didn't want to start a flame war, I have to say something here :p So i'm going to tread pretty lightly, please don't mis-understand me)

We are using RP9 to quote unquote "back up" our movies and cartoons. This isn't exactly what Real has built RealVideo for... Wouldn't you agree that documenting 'out of spec' options (i.e. by finding a way to set VBR latency to 4000 again) is beyond Real's responsibility?

RP9 is pretty well documented as far as operating it and explaining the basic features and editing the audience definitions. How is it that you think RP9 is mal-documented?

-flavas

[travis morgan]

Originally posted by nordloewe

the very philosophy of developing efficent codecs is to avoid waste of bandwidth, right? so the only format truly CBR is probably the ol' Uncompressed AVI.... :) all others must require the addition of a setting ot two in order to become CBR. in this particular case of RV9, i believe that making "max = avg" would really do the job. but i don't see any advantage of using "true CBR"....not even for streaming.

i was mainly looking at "true CBR" in terms of encoding time. by using "true CBR", it would eliminate the need for the analysis pass.

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
We are using RP9 to quote unquote "back up" our movies and cartoons. This isn't exactly what Real has built RealVideo for... Wouldn't you agree that documenting 'out of spec' options (i.e. by finding a way to set VBR latency to 4000 again) is beyond Real's responsibility?
well, RealVideo is for video encoding, right? so all options should be very well explained, regardless of the application each user will give to it. for a Co that is so well-established in this field, i would definetly expect more details about its new codec. remeber that professionals (i'm not a pro, at all!) from all over the world will use it.

and the latency isn't the only thing that bothered me.... they don't say whcih resizing method is used for "fast resizing"....bilinear? near-neighbour? what about the "quality" option? is it just for VBRQuality mode? there are other things that i can't remember now...

i don't wanna start a flame war either, but the help file of WinMedia 8 is quite detailed! just my opinion.... :)

[atracus]

Originally posted by nordloewe


in order to take advantage of RealText subs, do i have to use RealOne??? i tried it once and didn't like it at all! that player is for RP-8 what WMP-7 is for WMP-6.4: a huge and unecessary conglomeration of features in a cute but heavy interface. i stick with RP-8 for now.


Yes man,
afaik RealOne is needed for RealText, at least for me it was the only one that worked. The more I use it, the more I appreciate it - I just disabled the IE window (Preferences/General/RealOne Player Options/On startup display/Player only (no Media Browser)).

Also, the .smil capabilties look great, powerful and atm ...very cryptic to me, I agree they're VERY BADLY documented and a Forum like this does not exist on their site, as it's like honey instead for those like you and me who try to get "the best way" to obtain results.


Originally posted by nordloewe

i'm actually more curious on the "maxBitrateLatency" option. that would significantly increase the quality of the output file, IMHO.

I'll experiment and go through it, if I find something significant I'll let you know.

have fun!

[atx]

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by atracus

The more I use it [RealOne], the more I appreciate it - I just disabled the IE window (Preferences/General/RealOne Player Options/On startup display/Player only (no Media Browser)).

hehe :D

RealOne is radically different than RP8 and i'm sure that is what turns of technophiles initially. But, give it a chance though ;)

-Flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by travis morgan
i was mainly looking at "true CBR" in terms of encoding time. by using "true CBR", it would eliminate the need for the analysis pass.
i think there's a command that "disables the analysis": -dt.
it's better to use it than trying true CBR cause you lose less quality with the fake CBR (if such theory is really correct!).

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
RealOne is radically different than RP8 and i'm sure that is what turns of technophiles initially. But, give it a chance though ;)

i don't find it difficult to use at all. and i like its new look, however it became a big whale. the JukeBox comes integrated with it (or at least, its capabilities) which means that by opening RealOne, i'm loading 2 progs to my memory.... i do like RealJukeBox! although WinAmp is my default MP3 player (it's *light* and functional), i sometimes use RealJukeBox to see the tracks' details such as album artwork and lyrics (i'm one of those nerds that bother to add this extra info to the the ID3 tags. it's a cool feature!).

but i don't want RJB loaded if i'm just watching a cartoon.... when i tried it here, it made my work quite slower. besides, i don't like the new RJB. if i could have RealOne "only-video" player and RealJukeBox 8 installed in my system, i would do the switch. but AFAIK it's impossible.... and it goes against the Real's premise of being "One". :p

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

but i don't want RJB loaded if i'm just watching a cartoon.... when i tried it here, it made my work quite slower. besides, i don't like the new RJB. if i could have RealOne "only-video" player and RealJukeBox 8 installed in my system, i would do the switch. but AFAIK it's impossible.... and it goes against the Real's premise of being "One". :p

:p and I do understand the concept that people don't want a big monolithic program chewing up memeory as well as disk space. To each his own.

I just think that techophiles (I am a technophile myself) sometimes get too "technical" and dismiss a product before even trying it. If you tried it and didn't like it, that's all that is nessary :)

-flavas

[iwod]

I like the new interface of RealOne very much... only if they could skim it down so that we could choose what we install, and may be real could have them better programmed and uses less memory...

[MoonWalker]

where can i download/buy the new Real9 codec?? The RealOne is Real Player 9??

Thanks,
MoonWalker

[philippas]

I really dislike Real and any other Spyware software.
Some people said in previous posts,that R9 is much better than divx & xvid @ lower bitRates, but if you try some smoothening filters you'll have the same or even higher quality than Real9.

[nordloewe]

i finally started working on Akira this week. right now i'm encoding the movie and getting the fllowing msgs:

Warning: Channel 0 below -40 dB since 10 seconds.
Warning: Channel 0 below -40 dB since 11 seconds.
Warning: Channel 0 below -40 dB since 12 seconds.
.
.
.

the msgs keep coming up for a little while then stop for 20-40min. then they start again and disappear again. i encoded a little part of the movie (about 4000 frames) and everything was perfect. this msg only comes up when econding the whole thing. :confused: and by the way, i played the WAV file via WMP and it sounds fine! i also used WMP to test the AVS script and it plays fine as well.

if both script and audio file are ok, how come i get this strange msg?

with this movie i'll try the RealText subtitles and i will definitely need you guys help with that. can anyone confirm wheather RP8 supports RT subs? i really don't wanna upgrade to RealOne. i tested it before and i didn't like it.

[Peters]

@nordloewe

It's not a pb.
Use -daw option (Disable Audio Watchdog ) if you don't want such msg

(silence detection - below -60dB for longer than 10 seconds)

For Realtext subtitles, i got pb too , i try Atracus .smil example and it didn't work (no subtitles..) and i use Realone.

EDIT: sorry, it works, i've made a mistake with the movie time
(window duration tag)

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by atracus
quite simple man, if u managed to use subtitles w/ DivX! you just need 2 files, one .rt and one .smil, formatted the right way.


hi, Atracus! i've been trying to make your subtitle scripts work but i haven't been successful so far. i do get the 50px-high black box where the subs are supposed to be in, but no text appears in it. i made all files just like you said.... :( are you sure there's no mistake in the scripts? i also used RadLight to create the RT sub like you suggested!

do you think that it has to do with the fact i use RP8??? i don't think it should matter cause the SMIL language is old. besides, like i said, the subtitle box already appears, which means that the subs are supported.

btw, from what i understood, the subs only appear inside the box. there's no way to put them on the top of the video? on a widescreen anime it doesn't matter cause we have some unused room on the screen, however on a 4:3 cartoon the subtitle box would affect the video's fullscreen size, i believe.

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by Peters
It's not a pb.
Use -daw option (Disable Audio Watchdog ) if you don't want such msg
(silence detection - below -60dB for longer than 10 seconds) but what's the reason for the msg??? the video isn't supposed to have such long periods of silence.... that seems strange to me. the encoder is still running and right now i already got 66 Warnings. ( ! ) hopefully, they won't interfere with the audio quality....

[RadicalEd]

@nordlowe, no effect on the audio whatsoever, I got a bunch of these doing Miyu the other day.

@.. er... nordlowe again...
Surprisingly enough, I had this problem until I deleted the
<!-- Written by RadLight MSS -->
thing at the very beginning of the subtitle script. Give it a try.
You should probably upgrade to RealOne too since RealPlayer 8 dosent support smil 2.0
Oh and about fullscreen movie size... um.. it dosent work. If you try to fullscreen a movie being fed through smil, it pretty much just puts borders around the movie.

[Peters]

@RadicalEd

'Comment' trick: funny, i removed this without knowing it was a pb!
:)

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by RadicalEd
@nordlowe, no effect on the audio whatsoever, I got a bunch of these doing Miyu the other day.
i hope so. the encoding is taking a lifetime! i don't wanna do it again.
Surprisingly enough, I had this problem until I deleted the
<!-- Written by RadLight MSS -->
thanks! it worked here too. :)
Oh and about fullscreen movie size... um.. it dosent work. If you try to fullscreen a movie being fed through smil, it pretty much just puts borders around the movie.
i'm not sure if i understood you.... here i get perfect fullscreen playback. the subs are placed on the bottom of the screen.

about the lauching: i'm being forced to drag the SMIL file onto the RP8 window to start the playback of the video. i was planning to make an autorun CD with a HTML menu. but i don't think i can run a SMIL file from a webpage. it works fine with AVIs and RMs, though. btw i use JMenuCD to make my menus.... it's pretty good!

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by philippas
I really dislike Real and any other Spyware software. Oh blah blah blah... What Spyware (insert scary spookey dramatic theatriacal effects) is real using besides serving up ads when you view/listen to content without a 'super pass'?

[nordloewe]

after 30hs of encoding (i used AVS with Medium De-noising) i finally finished my Akira backup. and i made 3 RealText subs for it! they look good, but i was wondering if there's a way to choose the subtitle language from RealPlayer itself? what i'm doing here is kinda cumbersome: i made 3 different SMILs (each pointing to a different .RT file) and i'm dragging one of them onto the player's window.

When making SAMI subs for WMP, i can make one single sub file containing all subtitle languages. and i can use WMP to switch between any sub at anytime. it's very practical.

regarding the transparent box for the subs, i found some info about it on the RealNetworks' website. according to them, this option isn't supported yet. :(

well, i'm very happy with RV9 overall results! this is by far the best codec for cartoons! none of the DivX versions can beat it in the animation field! i tried both SBC and DivX 5.02 before moving to RP9 and they got me a lot of macroblocks....and DivX 5.02 still generates that annoying pixelation on the edge of the objects!

[atracus]

Originally posted by nordloewe


do you think that it has to do with the fact i use RP8


First of all, sorry formy late reply: I was off working for 5 days, and I checked the forum only now.

RP8 vs RealOne: surely it does, afaik only RealOne is enabled to the current release of smil, that's the one I'm using (and the only one I'm familiar with!).




btw, from what i understood, the subs only appear inside the box. there's no way to put them on the top of the video?

no, to my knowledge there's no way. may anyone else help out nordloewe on this?

have fun

[atx]

[atracus]

Originally posted by nordloewe
but i was wondering if there's a way to choose the subtitle language from RealPlayer itself


yes, there's a way and is documented in the ProductionGuide.pdf documentation, page 454 at the chapter "Subtitles and HTML Pages in Different Languages".

you may download the pdf from the Real site, it's a 648-pages bunch of really useful information - who did say that rv9 is not well documented, at least from the end-user/encoder point of view ?

bye

[atx]

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

after 30hs of encoding (i used AVS with Medium De-noising) i finally finished my Akira backup. Just curious... What are the specs on you computer? A 2 hour movie only takes RP9 6 hours to finish for me...

I have an Athlon XP 1700+ and a 15,000 rpm hdd.

-flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
Just curious... What are the specs on you computer? A 2 hour movie only takes RP9 6 hours to finish for me...

my PC is 2 years old. it's a P3-700, 384Mb RAM. My HD is probably 7500 rpm. my encoding took a while cause i used Medium De-noising on the AVS script and that means SpatialSoftenMMX + TemporalSmoother applied one after the other. In addition, i also used the Low De-noising of RP9. I made a whole bunch of small encodings before going for the entire cartoon and this heavy combination of filters was the one that yelded the best results here! the resulting picture is pretty much macroblock-free! it looks great!!! INFINITELY better than my previous encoding: Transformers! no comparission!

well, when i'm encoding ordinary Simpsons episodes, i only use one filter: RP9's Low De-noise. a 20min ep is encoded in 3hs. (!) that means that a 2hs movie would normally take 18hs to be finished in this ol' system of mine. :)

[31 Flavas]

Er.. that you need all this filtering and de-noising makes me even more curious... Are you encoding vhs recordings taped off of tv? You shouldn't need any filtering if your working with dvd source files...

-Flavas

[nordloewe]

i was surprised by the need of them too. but i belive that the noise of those two cartoons comes from the fact they are old. "Transformers" is from '87 and "Akira" from '88. i noticed the noise of the picture since the 1st time i played the DVDs. i think the noise is purposely added during the DVD authoring process. they actually make the movie look good! but some cartoons on DVD have no noise at all and also look great! i have "Armitage III" and its picture is quite clean. "Harlock Saga" is also another exemple of clean DVD picture.

the "TF" case is pretty bad. the DVD has lots of macroblocks. i think a good DVD authoring is a privilege of only few co's.

do you have any of those cartoons on DVD? if you have, check their picture quality and tell me what you think.

well, my next anime encoding will be "Star Blazers". i just donno when.... this recession is killing me.

[31 Flavas]

I've watched the TF dvds on my tv. The picture is pretty bad (scratches and nicks everywhere); Although that just comes from its age and its poor storage. I'll encode an episode and see what I get. Btw, what bitrate are you using?
Edit: Er.. I was talking about the Transformers Season 1 DVDs here... I'll look at TF the movie too.

As far as the Akira DVD, yes I own it, and i've watched it like a million times ( :) ) and the scenes that were not fully restored stick out like a sore thumb. I can't imagine, though, that the movie as a whole would need as much filtering as you listed... :confused: :confused: :confused: I'll take a look at it as well.

-flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
I was talking about the Transformers Season 1 DVDs here... I'll look at TF the movie too.
the specs of my "TF - The Movie" are: Video: RV-9 @ 990Kbps; Audio: RA-8 @ 96Kbps; Res: 480x360. i can't remeber wich filters i used anymore. i think i just used RP9's Low De-noising....

with Akira i tried both DivX 3.11 via GKnot and DivX 5.02 and i got a whole buch of macroblocks. i did dozens of tests with that cartoon and took me a week to have it finished! but i'm proud of it! it looks great!!!

btw, which version of Akira do you have? i was lucky enough to find the Special Limited Edition (the one on a tin) at a HMV store. it's beautiful! :cool:

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

btw, which version of Akira do you have? i was lucky enough to find the Special Limited Edition (the one on a tin) at a HMV store. it's beautiful! :cool: Hehehe, Special Limited Edition :cool: I got it at Suncoast video in the mall near my house and they had a special on it for the first week of its release so I only paid $29.95 + tax. I picked up two additonal copies too. I might sell one of them if I can find a suck... er... I mean a "collector" willing to pay $60 for it. Otherwise, I'm going to keep both unopened just for the coolness of the it :cool:

I'll post again when I get a chance to encode some.

-flavas

[nordloewe]

Originally posted by 31 Flavas
I might sell one of them if I can find a suck... er... I mean a "collector" willing to pay $60 for it. Otherwise, I'm going to keep both unopened just for the coolness of the it :cool:
the video rental store around my block is selling it at $60 too. :D why don't you sell your extra discs via ebay?

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by nordloewe

why don't you sell your extra discs via ebay? Because eBay is flooded with $15 bootlegs of it :( And eBay won't remove or terminate any auction (for bootleg) without a court order :rolleyes:

They make way too much money on bootleg auctions.....

-Flavas

[nordloewe]

hey, Flavas! i sent you a private msg. did you get it? i'm asking cause i don't know if the forum automatically sends you an email to let you know about new pvt msgs.

[31 Flavas]

Unless I accidentally deleted it, i didn't get an email about your pm. I did get it though though. i'll respond!

-flavas

[NoLogo]

Atracus>
Hi, could you tell me where this .pdf is available for download, no way to find it on realnetwork.com...
Thanks

Regards
NoLogo

[NoLogo]

Ok, I think I found it, but it seems it's limited to Real Producer 8.5, right ?

[Peters]

@NoLogo

http://service.real.com/help/library/guides/productionguidepreview/PDF/productionguide.pdf

[atracus]

right man,
my "productionguide.pdf" is 6,569,344 bytes long and last updated on April 6th, 2002, i.e. with RealOne and rv9 release / version level.

have fun.

[atx]

[NoLogo]

Thx a lot for the URL, don't know why i wasn't able to find it...

Regards
NoLogo

[ToiletDuck]

I've been having a problem with the RV9 codec. Sometimes it makes a nice movie and like %60 of the time it freezes up before it is done... Any Idea why? Have you guys had this problem? I'm using the same GUI that Doom9 used. If you have any idea let me know. Thanks TD.

[JasonFly]

I used real system producer and now helix producer. It's the best I think.

This codec is very powerful but had some drawbacks.

It split the screen during playback of fast horizontal movings.
And it has also a problem with light in dark areas(try "The others for that).

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by ToiletDuck
I've been having a problem with the RV9 codec. Sometimes it makes a nice movie and like %60 of the time it freezes up before it is done... Any Idea why? Have you guys had this problem? I'm using the same GUI that Doom9 used. If you have any idea let me know. Thanks TD.

There were a couple of threading deadlock problems in the preview and possibly beta version of producer 9, which could cause freezes when running on a multi-CPU system. These problems were resolved in the Gold version of Producer, as well as the latest Helix Producer.

If you have same the trouble with this latest version of producer, please send email, so we can try to narrow down the problem. Work email address provided on request.

Thanks!

[-h]

Wow! Good to see a RealNetworks developer on the forum.

Any chance you'd field some technical questions about the format?

-h

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by -h
Wow! Good to see a RealNetworks developer on the forum.

Any chance you'd field some technical questions about the format?

-h

Only in very general terms, I am afraid. We're going open source with Helix by the end of the month. This includes almost everything, but *not* the codecs :)

http://www.helixcommunity.org/

[-h]

Only in very general terms, I am afraid. We're going open source with Helix by the end of the month. This includes almost everything, but *not* the codecs :)

I was after tidbits like whether the post-processor is in the encoder loop (like H.26L), whether you're using an arithmetic coder for entropy coding, etc. Nothing that'd help someone reverse-engineer it, just some notes on how "cutting-edge" RV9's internals are.

-h

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by -h

I was after tidbits like whether the post-processor is in the encoder loop (like H.26L), whether you're using an arithmetic coder for entropy coding, etc. Nothing that'd help someone reverse-engineer it, just some notes on how "cutting-edge" RV9's internals are.


Without answering your question directly, you can be sure RV9's internals are as cutting edge as can be, while still maintaining encode and playback performance.

We have been active participants in the H.26L development, and several of our proposals were adopted into the current standards draft for H.26L aka MPEG4-AVC aka JVT.

[RadicalEd]

awesome to see an actual Real developer on the site

Originally posted by karl_lillevold


We're going open source with Helix by the end of the month. This includes almost everything, but *not* the codecs

Does this mean that eventually it will be possible to use the RealVideo and Audio codecs inside alternative container formats such as Ogg? Because that would just be downright awesome. :D

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by RadicalEd

Does this mean that eventually it will be possible to use the RealVideo and Audio codecs inside alternative container formats such as Ogg? Because that would just be downright awesome. :D


What will be released next week is the Helix DNA client source code. This will include APIs to the binary codecs, so yes, it should be possible to play back RV and RA content inside alternative containers + many other usage scenarios, not the least of which will be open source players of RealMedia content. In December, the server and producer source code will be made available (again with binary codecs), and by then it should be possible to create an open source mux for the type of content you mention, and of course open source encoders for RealMedia content, RealMedia or RV9 plugins for VirtualDub, FlaskMPEG, AVISynth, and whatnot.

[RadicalEd]

Oh man...
too
stacked
that is mindblowing dude, I'll be looking forward to it

[iwod]

i am not exactly a expert.... so something i don't understand.

Sinc eeverything is opensource apart from the format...... how can you program the encoder with out letting its sources out??

And i am glad the player is now open sources as well... Since previously WMP has always has the edge of using lower memory usuage than RealONE. ( Although i still uses RealONE player simply because its interface is a impressive piece of work. )

I hope the memory usuage problem will be iron out with the effect of open souces.

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by iwod
i am not exactly a expert.... so something i don't understand.

Sinc eeverything is opensource apart from the format...... how can you program the encoder with out letting its sources out??

And i am glad the player is now open sources as well... Since previously WMP has always has the edge of using lower memory usuage than RealONE. ( Although i still uses RealONE player simply because its interface is a impressive piece of work. )

I hope the memory usuage problem will be iron out with the effect of open souces.

The RealVideo and RealAudio codecs are not open sourced. What has been made open source is the client and framework for playing back streamed and locally stored media files. The RV and RA codecs are included in binary formats. Any codecs can plug into this framework though, and the source code for H.263 and MP3 was included. Same with source for the MPEG-4 file format, but not the MPEG-4 video codec (due to licensing issues). So anyone can now take this source and make their own universal media player.

Similarly, in December the source code for the server and the producer will be made available, again with binary RealMedia codecs, but almost everything else in source code form. Then it will be possible to create the kind of tools I mentioned.

It is true RealONE v.1 used more memory than WMP. We were aware of this, and significant improvements were made in v.2. I just did a comparison a few weeks back with RealONE v.2. For all types of media I tried, RealONE would use less or the same amount of memory WMP did, playing back the exact same type (WMV, MPEG, MP3). This was on a WinXP box. We all know other problems that has plagued RealPlayer in the past and given it a bad rep: stability problems, startup times, taking over media types, running in the traybar all the time... The latest RealONE has none of these, and this is not just me as an employee speaking, but as a computer user and engineer. In fact, over on Versiontracker, the OS X version is receiving really great feedback. If there are any problems with the latest version, we would like to hear about them!

[ToiletDuck]

I am running a multi processor system. I just got the Helix Producer file from www.real.com so i'm going to give it a try. btw any chance on yall renaming stuff so it isn't confusing and re doing the website lol :P

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by ToiletDuck
I am running a multi processor system.

That's what I thought. The deadlock problems we had in the preview were resolved few months ago.

Originally posted by ToiletDuck
btw any chance on yall renaming stuff so it isn't confusing and re doing the website lol :P

I always liked http://www.realnetworks.com/ better anyway ;) The naming "Helix Producer" simply means that it was built on the open source Helix platform, even though it may be a little confusing.

[wmansir]

I just encoded the Powerpuff Girls movie with RV9 and all I can say is WOW. It looks awsome, almost as good as the DVD and it fits on one CD (not that it needed the whole CD). I tried VCD, SVCD, and Divx 5.02, but even at very high bitrates they could not keep up. RV is the king of animation.

I only wish it could be played in a standalone. So, with Divx and MS looking to get into standalones, is Real trying to get it's codec on them? Or could any MPEG4 complient player play a RV9 file, if it was contained in the mpeg4 file format?

[norxh]

@karl:
i've been encoding my tv toon captures with helix producer, and i have to say i am simply amazed. i tried everything with divx and all its variations, it just could not keep up with real video. it took about twice the bitrate to get my videos to look anything like the real video 9 encodes.

What has been made open source is the client and framework for playing back streamed and locally stored media files. The RV and RA codecs are included in binary formats. Any codecs can plug into this framework though, and the source code for H.263 and MP3 was included. Same with source for the MPEG-4 file format, but not the MPEG-4 video codec (due to licensing issues). So anyone can now take this source and make their own universal media player.

i took a look at some of the stuff on helix community.com. its very all very interesting. but how long do you think it will be before we actually start seeing some of the alternative real media players become available? it looks like you've provided everything necessary for someone to do it. (i wish i could do it myself. i bought some big fat c# books :) )

how hard would it be to make some kind of directshow wrapper for the realvideo binaries that you have made available? has anyone thought about this? so we could play back real media in any of favorite players?

i think you have made great progress with realone. it is defintely much cleaner that before. but i still am not crazy about it. i can't even figure out how to unlock the aspect ratio? i encode my realmedia toons at 480x480, so i have to use media player classic to play them back with correct aspect ratio. which is the only prog besides realplayer i know of, that can play realmedia.

This will include APIs to the binary codecs, so yes, it should be possible to play back RV and RA content inside alternative containers + many other usage scenarios, not the least of which will be open source players of RealMedia content. In December, the server and producer source code will be made available (again with binary codecs), and by then it should be possible to create an open source mux for the type of content you mention, and of course open source encoders for RealMedia content, RealMedia or RV9 plugins for VirtualDub, FlaskMPEG, AVISynth, and whatnot.

do you have any more or new information on this? any word on development progress? i want to hear anything you have to say :)

when i can start putting ogg vorbis audio and real video 9 together i will cry tears of joy :D and i wouldn't mind plunkin down some of my hard earned cash to actually buy some real media products for the first time :)

thanks man!

[theReal]

For cartoons, RM9 is really amazing. With the realproducer 9 commandline I can encode a 140MB video from a Futurama Episode (DVD source) in near DVD quality and with good atrac 132kbit sound.
I make all my Simpsons tv-captures into 100MB files that look better than Divx at 140MB.
The new Realone player is also a pretty good media player and very much an improvement over the old, clumsy advertising pop-up that called itself Realplayer 8 ;)
However, I have a hard time explaining to some of my friends why they should install RealOne player - the bad reputation of Realplayer is quite strong, I think...

[RadicalEd]

Yeah, Real is excellent with animated stuff, although XviD fairs just as good in a lot of cases and in some it looks better while others it looks worse. For instance the Hellsing intro and trailer looked better in XviD whereas the Love Hina intro looked much better in Real9. But I still stand firm in saying that one thing Real has that noone else can touch is audio. The video codecs are great, but its the only audio codec that goes below 96 kbps without degenerating into an artifacting mess. I've encoded stuff at 48 kbps without any artifacting, genreal sweet spot I'd say is 64. When you're doing anime with sub and dub the difference is 128 kbps total for audio vs 192 with vorbis. Thats a 60 mb difference for a 2 hour movie. I'm really looking forward to combining ogg's subtitle and chapter capabilities with Real's audio and video codecs as well as XviD. Not that vorbis + real9 isnt tasty sounding :]

As for the publicity, yeah, it's really bad over on animemusicvideos.org where people still scoff at real for being capitalist bastards. Unfortunately they're missing out on a great way to distribute their amvs. Anyway, the critics over there always shut up as soon as I mention that real went opensource ;)

[theReal]

where people still scoff at real for being capitalist bastards....and most of those who say so are at the same time using WinXP, lol

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by norxh
i took a look at some of the stuff on helix community.com. its very all very interesting. but how long do you think it will be before we actually start seeing some of the alternative real media players become available? it looks like you've provided everything necessary for someone to do it.

how hard would it be to make some kind of directshow wrapper for the realvideo binaries that you have made available? has anyone thought about this? so we could play back real media in any of favorite players?

i think you have made great progress with realone. it is defintely much cleaner that before. but i still am not crazy about it. i can't even figure out how to unlock the aspect ratio? i encode my realmedia toons at 480x480, so i have to use media player classic to play them back with correct aspect ratio. which is the only prog besides realplayer i know of, that can play realmedia.


Included in the available source code is a very very simple 'guiplayer', that contains nothing but "open file", "open url", "play", "pause", and "stop", so everything needed is indeed available right now. It should not take long before some of the general media players include Helix code, but I can't really make any promises. Personally I would like to see it happen as soon as possible. Even though I know RealOne is currently a solid product, I am perfectly aware of the bad reputation older RealPlayers have. It is also clear RealOne contains a lot of extra functionality not everybody is interested in.

On that topic, one "powertip" I'd like to share is to go into Tools->Preferences->General and set the pulldown menu "On startup Display" to "Player Only". Then at least you hide the browser. Another useful little tip to keep the player small is to set View->Album Info to Hide.

You mention you can not change the aspect ratio during playback. In many cases this should not be necessary. This is why : if you encode at a *higher* resolution than your source file, we will encode at the source file resolution and simply set a flag in the bitstream to tell the player to resize up to the size you specify. For instance, if your source AVI is 480x480, and you tell producer to encode at 640x480, the native encode resolution will remain at 480x480, but the player will use native video card hardware to resize to 640x480 (the aspect ratio you want). However, if you use something like AutoRV9, which is great for convenience, it is somewhat flexible for resizing, and will resize the source before passing it into producer, and then you lose this advantage.

Still, I understand how it might be desirable to be able to change aspect ratio during playback. I have run into plenty of encodes done at the wrong aspect ratio. I will pass this idea to the right people. Thanks!

[iwod]

sorry... Is the Helix totally different to the VP3 + OGG project??

Since VP3 + OGG ( something called theroa ) is opensorce than shouldn't it be able to have a directshow filter than?

And does RV9 currently support Muti Audio sound track ( like two audio track used for two lanagauges ) and Subtitle encoded allow to be played on and off??

And does RV9 support chapters??

[RadicalEd]

oh boy :sly:

sorry... Is the Helix totally different to the VP3 + OGG project??

Helix is Real's project to make the format opensource as a good marketing strategy against M$ and a response to their bad rap. But RealNetworks has absolutely no affiliation with Xiph except for the pact to include ogg playback support in realone. Real is a corporation commercial codec/format deals, ogg is an originally opensource project to develop royalty free codecs and formats.

Since VP3 + OGG ( something called theroa ) is opensorce than shouldn't it be able to have a directshow filter than?

that has nothing to do with anything :/

does RV9 currently support Muti Audio sound track ( like two audio track used for two lanagauges ) and Subtitle encoded allow to be played on and off??

RV9 is a codec, RealMedia is the format that RealVideo has been restricted to in the past but may not be from now on ;)
Does RM, then, support multiple audio, subs, and chapters, the answer is no. No muxxers exist capable of combining a RealVideo stream with two RealAudio streams and furthermore RealOne has no stream switching capability (at least on an RM file level). RealMedia is soley a container which can either hold a realaudio stream, a realvideo stream, or one of both. There is a RealText format for storing subtitles, but that can only be implemented below:
This is where SMIL comes in. RealOne can read a scripting language called SMIL, in which you create a script file that links to a video file, one or more audio files, and subtitle files. I'm not sure if there's a way to implement chapters. Anyway scripting smil is a pain in the ass which is why using RA and RV in ogg will be much nicer ;)

[norxh]

Originally posted by karl_lillevold
You mention you can not change the aspect ratio during playback. In many cases this should not be necessary. This is why : if you encode at a *higher* resolution than your source file, we will encode at the source file resolution and simply set a flag in the bitstream to tell the player to resize up to the size you specify. For instance, if your source AVI is 480x480, and you tell producer to encode at 640x480, the native encode resolution will remain at 480x480, but the player will use native video card hardware to resize to 640x480 (the aspect ratio you want). However, if you use something like AutoRV9, which is great for convenience, it is somewhat flexible for resizing, and will resize the source before passing it into producer, and then you lose this advantage.
thanks for your reply.

i tried doing resize to 640x480, and it worked. im so glad the resize feature just sets a flag, i certainly did not want the video resized up, before encoding.

but i do not understand what the high quality resize option could possibly be for? i saw this in the helix producer documentation:
Whenever you resize input video, you can degrade the quality of the image. The High Quality Resizing filter is designed to make up for this degradation if it is selected for resized video. The trade-off is that more processing, and time, is needed during the encode to fix the resized video.
i used 35 second 480x480 test avi clip. i encoded 3 clips, with all setting constant except resize, first no resize, then resize to 640x480, then high quality resize to 640x480.

all three clips were the exact same size to the byte. and all three clips took the exact same time to encode to the second.

thanks.

[31 Flavas]

Originally posted by RadicalEd
I'm not sure if there's a way to implement chapters. Anyway scripting smil is a pain in the ass which is why using RA and RV in ogg will be much nicer ;)

If I were doing it, i'd just treat each chapter as a job (video clip) then write smil to load all of them into realone's playlist and choose audio language. Then you could go back and forth between them. But, obviously you would have one cohesive file to give to your buddies and there would be a pause to load each chapter. Not to mention the scripting would be a bitch :)

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by norxh
i tried doing resize to 640x480, and it worked. im so glad the resize feature just sets a flag, i certainly did not want the video resized up, before encoding.

but i do not understand what the high quality resize option could possibly be for? i saw this in the helix producer documentation:


I am glad to hear my suggestion worked. the different resizing filters are for downsizing, for instance for aspect ratio correcting 720x480 to 640x480, or encoding 320x240 videos from 720x480 source. This fact should probably have been documented better. When downsizing, producer will resize the video before encoding, since it does not make sense to encode at a larger resolution than the display size.

[norxh]

downsizing! god, im sorry for asking such a dumb question. i should have realized thats what the hq option would apply to :)

thanks karl.

btw, i downloaded the binary helix client from helixcommunity. i click fullscreen, watched in fullscreen, then tried to go back to normal size. my computer froze completely. i rebooted and now when ever i bring up or leave a file save or file open dialog, my computer just freezes for like 30 seconds. i thought it may be a file system problem, so i ran chkdsk /f. but it didnt help. i'm not mad. im sure it was somewhere in those liscenses i had to agree to, that i should be aware somethin like this could happen :). but it does kinda suck. i dont have time to reformat, reinstall, etc, right now. im using win2k sp3 on ntfs. heard anything like this before?

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by norxh
btw, i downloaded the binary helix client from helixcommunity. i click fullscreen, watched in fullscreen, then tried to go back to normal size. my computer froze completely. i rebooted and now when ever i bring up or leave a file save or file open dialog, my computer just freezes for like 30 seconds. i thought it may be a file system problem, so i ran chkdsk /f. but it didnt help. i'm not mad. im sure it was somewhere in those liscenses i had to agree to, that i should be aware somethin like this could happen :). but it does kinda suck. i dont have time to reformat, reinstall, etc, right now. im using win2k sp3 on ntfs. heard anything like this before?

That's really weird. I don't think there even is a ready to use player available. You have to download, via CVS, a combination source code and binary libraries, all into a well defined location, which you can then use to build a simple command line player (or very simple gui player). Did you build and run the guiplayer or 'helixplay'?

I have done this myself, and not had any serious problems, besides bugs we have to expect during such a significant code rewrite that Helix has been) These players are very simple, all files reside in one directory structure, and I can not imagine them having any effect system wide. Any app resulting in a freeze and reboot could potentially result in file systems problems, I guess, but I have never seen this happen where chkdsk would not fix it. You could try the helix IRC channel for help. There's almost always someone helpful there.
https://www.helixcommunity.org/2002/irc/

[iwod]

Originally posted by RadicalEd

This is where SMIL comes in. RealOne can read a scripting language called SMIL, in which you create a script file that links to a video file, one or more audio files, and subtitle files. I'm not sure if there's a way to implement chapters. Anyway scripting smil is a pain in the ass which is why using RA and RV in ogg will be much nicer ;)

But i thought AutoRV9 support 2 audio streams... is that done by SMIL as well?? coz the site is in german i can understand.

[31 Flavas]

Yea, to do two languages, you just encode each lanuage seperatly and use smil so the player automatically picks the language based on your settings in your RealOne player.

or make a smil file for each language.