x264 Demo Blu-ray: Preliminary Announcement

[Dark Shikari]

To celebrate and announce x264's official Blu-ray encoding support, we are releasing a demo Blu-ray disk containing entirely free content, encoded in crystal-clear HD.

Before I make the official announcement, I'd like at least some testing of it on actual Blu-ray players. This thread is for posting results/testing information.

Some information from the upcoming official announcement:

On this Blu-ray are the Open Movie Project films Big Buck Bunny and Elephant's Dream, available under a Creative Commons license. Additionally, Microsoft has graciously provided about 6 minutes of lossless HD video and audio (from part of a documentary project) under a very liberal license. This footage rounds out the Blu-ray by adding some difficult live-action content in addition to the relatively compressible CGI footage from the Open Movie Project.

You may notice that the Blu-ray image is only just over 2GB. This is intentional; we have encoded all the content on the disk at appropriate bitrates to be playable from an ordinary 4.7GB DVD. This should make it far easier to burn a copy of the Blu-ray, since Blu-ray burners and writable media are still relatively rare. Most Blu-ray players will treat a DVD containing Blu-ray data as a normal Blu-ray disc. A few, such as the Playstation 3, will not, but you can still play it as a data disc.

Finally, note that (in accordance with the Blu-ray spec) the disc image file uses the UDF 2.5 filesystem, which may be incompatible with some older virtual drive and DVD burning applications.

Download it now! (http://x264.nl/x264_Demo_Blu-ray.torrent) And remember to seed!

[Blue_MiSfit]

Downloading and seeding for all I'm worth!! I won't be closing this torrent any time soon.

~MiSfit

[dwrbudr]

What kind of ISO is that? It cannot be mounted with Daemon Tools (tried both ISO and MDS) and cannot be opened with WinRar (shows it as empty).

Edit: I see now the UDF note...

[Dark Shikari]

What kind of ISO is that? It cannot be mounted with Daemon Tools (tried both ISO and MDS) and cannot be opened with WinRar (shows it as empty).Works just fine in Daemon Tools here and plays in TMT3. I suspect, as noted in the OP, that your software is too old and doesn't support UDF2.5.

[shon3i]

Thanks. Who is creator? Kolak?

[Dark Shikari]

Thanks. Who is creator? Kolak?digitalvideo.

[prOnorama]

Works fine mounted on Virtual Clone Drive and TMT3, also works fine burned to DVD-RW, played back on LG GGC-H20L BD-ROM drive with TMT3.

I'm kinda missing basic information on the clips used (like their titles) and x264 settings used.

2 out of 3 clips are animated content and the non-animated content is 720p (maybe it's done to keep bitrate down for DVD media). Ideally I'd like to see 1 non-animated (TV) clip with "live" footage (16:9 AR), 1 animated clip and 1 non-animated movie clip (2.35:1 AR), all 1080p.

[kevcampbell]

i have made a blog post about this on my blog

http://internalreleases.wordpress.com/2010/04/25/x264-demo-blu-ray/

[Blue_MiSfit]

Yep, the encodes are absolutely spotless. Tallship is particularly impressive. I'll be showing this to the boys at work next week :)

~MiSfit

[kevcampbell]

by the way i am using xbmc for windows, and this does not work, just the iso in a folder and also if i mount the iso

[shon3i]

BBDT folder can be safetly deleted :)

Nice done, realy like menu, it's realy simple and nice.

[iwod]

Cant wait to see an Commercial BluRay Disc with x264 logo on it.

[BoNz1]

Hi,

I burned it and tried it in my blu-ray player. My blu-ray player is an LG BD350C and the movies are viewed on a Samsung PN50B650 plasma screen. A few first impressions:

1) Quality is what you expect with x264. Completely blows away any commercial blu-rays I have seen.

2) When I first put it into my player it ejects it immediately and says there is something wrong with the disc. However, when I put it back in...it plays just fine.

3) How was the audio track made? According to my receiver it is dts. As far as I know there are no open source dts encoders? I guess you are using a commercial encoder?

4) Just to echo what others are saying...can't wait to see this in action on some future blu ray releases.

[Dark Shikari]

3) How was the audio track made? According to my receiver it is dts. As far as I know there are no open source dts encoders? I guess you are using a commercial encoder?Audio was handled by the guy who authored it, I think he used DTS-MA.

[mp3dom]

It has both dts-HD Master Audio and classic dts.

[Stephen R. Savage]

Yep, the encodes are absolutely spotless. Tallship is particularly impressive. I'll be showing this to the boys at work next week :)

~MiSfit

?

In the Tallship sequence, I saw significant blocking in the water when it turned a sort of purple color, as well as strong aliasing from the deinterlacing and one long shot where the ship was heavily smeared.

[Dark Shikari]

?

In the Tallship sequence, I saw significant blocking in the water when it turned a sort of purple color, as well as strong aliasing from the deinterlacing and one long shot where the ship was heavily smeared.Yes, there's no way that Tallship is going to look perfect with a maxrate of 14745kbps, particularly in the sequences with extremely bright lighting.

[mariush]

I downloaded the ISO yesterday and just got around to watching it. Well... as I have Windows 2003 I can't actually use a burned DVD 'cause apparently windows 2003 doesn't support udf 2.5. But anyways, PowerISO to the rescue, extracted the .m2ts files out with no problems.

Elephant's Dream and the other 1080p played flawlessly but Tallship had some issues ... I don't know how to explain it best so i recorded a clip .. though my digital camera can only do 20 fps but I think it's good enough.

Video card is Radeon 4850 with 10.3 drivers : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwX7-Xo02ic

ps. in case it's not clear... it goes back a few frames every couple of seconds, it's glitches, and at some point in the movie for a second sound goes bad. it plays fine in VLC with a few slowdowns in some areas even though the CPU is only at around 30-40%

ps2. with internal filter dxva disabled, mpc-hc recognizes the m2ts file as 6 fps and plays it like that. With both internal filters disabled it falls back to CoreAVC which plays it smoothly.

Mpc-hc version is 1.3.1249

[SeeMoreDigital]

Hi,

I have a Panasonic DMP-BD35 Blu-ray. I used the newest version of ImgBurn (with default settings) to create a Blu-ray compatible DVD and sadly it would not play... disc unrecognized!

By contrast, the AVSHD ITU-R BT.709 (.ISO without .MDS) file I downloaded and burned with ImgBurn (with default settings) a couple of weeks ago plays okay.

If it helps, when I get back from work, I'll see if I can find the link over on the AVS forum...

[Emulgator]

Interestingly enough:
I just compared mounted .isos (VirtualCloneDrive) played back on PDVD 7.3

My VCD-mounted .iso muxed from DS's ES with SONY DVD-A 5.0b Build 180 plays choppy in PDVD 7.3,
reaching 40..60% CPU load.

No choppiness noticeable when burnt to BD-RE 25, viewed on Standalone Panasonic BD-50.

The VCD-mounted .iso muxed by digitalvideo plays smoothly in PDVD 7.3, reaching 60..90% CPU load.

This suggests that DVD-A introduces flaws.
May I ask what authoring software has been used to build digitalvideo's .iso ?

Will make a BD-RE 25 from digitalvideo's mux in a few minutes.

[mp3dom]

I think it uses Scenarist.

[Emulgator]

My guess too.

Now digitalvideo's mux burnt to BD-RE 25 played on Panasonic BD-50:

All 3 movies are playable. Looks nice as well !

Almost same behaviour as with my SONY DVD-A mux.
(Digitalvideo's mux takes a bit longer to get to the main menu. Ah, PGS/IGS preload)

The same navigation issues occur as mentioned in
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=152127&page=31
post610:
All 3 encodes/muxes have one navigation issue in common.
FFWD is ok. REW tries to rewind for a brief moment, (counter skips back one step,) then skips to movie start.

Both muxes bring up the same behaviour.
My collection of pressed BD's does not exhibit this behaviour on this particular player.

If one assumes that digitalvideo did not use SONY DVD-A:

This would suggest that still some tiny timestamp thingy
with the x264 output might be inconsistent somewhere.

P.S. PDVD is able to do REW from this disc.

[dwrbudr]

Is it only me that sees a lot of slutter on vertical/horizontal panning scenes in the video with the ship? I've extracted the M2TS and played them using KMPlayer + CoreAVC on X2 5000+

[Emulgator]

Yes, with tallship there is some occasional block in the sky around 0:08 and some more heavy blocks in the tailwater around 1:40,
2:09 morphing tailwater, 4:02 blocky rock shades, but we have limited bitrate here anyway to accomplish 3xDVD-VBV.
But I see not much of panning issues.

[kieranrk]

Is it only me that sees a lot of slutter on vertical/horizontal panning scenes in the video with the ship? I've extracted the M2TS and played them using KMPlayer + CoreAVC on X2 5000+

It means your decoder can't handle the 720p60.

[davidcw]

Hi,

I have a Panasonic DMP-BD35 Blu-ray. I used the newest version of ImgBurn (with default settings) to create a Blu-ray compatible DVD and sadly it would not play... disc unrecognized!


Same thing with my Panasonic DMP-BD30

davidcw

[SeeMoreDigital]

Same thing with my Panasonic DMP-BD30

davidcwI wonder if creating a disc structure using the "more relaxed" AVCHD file/folder authoring standard would help?

[Emulgator]

Panasonic Blu-ray players don't like BD structure on DVD, they expect BD structure to be on BD discs only.

As SMD says, use multiAVCHD, deank has introduced a Panasonic mode
("AVCHD strict") to make a plain AVCHD structure, like pure streams without menus (but there is more about that)

[Emulgator]

Now ES authored to DVD+RW as "AVCHD strict" using multiAVCHD 4.0.747+
(Long time no see, I like the multiAVCHD auto menus!)

Beautifully playable on Panasonic BD-50.
Recognised as +RW(AVCHD)

Oddities:
A.:Navigation: REW tries for a brief moment, then skips to movie start as with the .iso and with my mux.
B: For each video asset multiAVCHD reports double playing time in its preview.

[HJRodrigo]

I burned the image with ImgBurn on a DVD-R and played it on my Sony Blue ray player (BDP-S350). It recognized the disc as a DVD-R AVCHD and played it perfectly and seeking seemed to work just fine.

[RedAlert]

Burned the image on a DVD-R tried playing it on Panasonic DMP-BD60 and got disc unrecognized. My LG Blu Ray drive wont even play it.

[Dark Shikari]

Burned the image on a DVD-R tried playing it on Panasonic DMP-BD60 and got disc unrecognized. My LG Blu Ray drive wont even play it.My hunch says that the player probably wants a Blu-ray disc :mad:

[SeeMoreDigital]

It would seem Panasonic has released some updated firmwares for their Blu-ray players.

Here's a link for the DMP-BD35: http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd35/bd35_euro.html

I have not tried it myself yet because I'm off to work now ;)

[Golgot13]

My hunch says that the player probably wants a Blu-ray disc :mad:

All BD player can play BD9/BD5 (BD on DVD disc). But BD9 have specific declaration and many restriction (bitrate, mux,...).

[Dark Shikari]

All BD player can play BD9/BD5 (BD on DVD disc).The Playstation 3 certainly can't.

[kolak]

Just watch it on our 60' Kuro and does look quite good. There is some blocking on some scenes, but there is no magic- 15Mbit is not enough for some shots.

One question: are there any plans to implement open GOP and more important Adaptive GOP support. Adaptive GOP seams to work very well for fades, cross fades, pans, etc. It does work very well in Carbon Coder and latest version of Cinemacraft for SD- SP3, also adds it and there is massive improvement over SP/SP2 version due to this feature.


Andrew

[deank]

Now ES authored to DVD+RW as "AVCHD strict" using multiAVCHD 4.0.747+
(Long time no see, I like the multiAVCHD auto menus!)

Beautifully playable on Panasonic BD-50.
Recognised as +RW(AVCHD)

Oddities:
A.:Navigation: REW tries for a brief moment, then skips to movie start as with the .iso and with my mux.
B: For each video asset multiAVCHD reports double playing time in its preview.

I converted it to AVCHD for my USB HDD and all works just fine in my PS3. FF/REW work in all three clips without any problems (trickplay, 10x, 20x).

I couldn't see any blocking or anything at the scenes you posted about. :)

About 'video assets' - if you imported elementary streams multiAVCHD can't know the exact length of the video and guesses it based on the bitrate.

[Emulgator]

About 'video assets' - if you imported elementary streams
multiAVCHD can't know the exact length of the video and guesses it based on the bitrate.
Ah, ok.
I was wondering why h264visa still reports MaxFPS=48 for BBB and ED, 120 for TS,
timescale=48/1 for BBB and ED, 120000/1001 for TS
and guessing there may be something like double framerate. Is it fieldrate ?
All 3 movies are frame-based. But there may be a reason for that.

The blocking and morphing in Tallship is hardly visible on my TFT-TV too, (more S-Curve Gradation there)
but my TFT-Notebook with a little more linear gamma does exhibit this a bit more.
So I guess that people who own TFTs with too bright shades will see it too.
Around 1:40 there is a more prominent example of morphing blocks
in the water left of the ship as she pulls up from the bottom of the picture.
For animation (BBB and ED) the quality is awesome already.

Can anybody repeat the REW issue on standalones ?
This seems more serious to me.

deank says REW is fine on Playstation.
I can confirm that PDVD 7.3 can do REW on these encodes/muxes too.

But how is it on BD-standalones ?

BTW, on my Panasonic BD-50 FFWD over 2x is skippy too a bit,
2x FFWD is fine and with smooth accelerated audio.

Above 2x FFWD the counter does not step too smoothly.

The same REW issue occurs on 3 disc types and over 3 different authoring apps:
BD-RE 25 and DVD+R and DVD+RW:
Scenarist (I guess), Sony DVD-A, multiAVCHD.

The same standalone player can REW any pressed MPEG-4 AVC BD-ROM properly.

My MPEG-2 encodes on BD-R 25/BD-RE 25 can be REW'd properly as well.
(TAW4, Sony DVD-A 5.0b, Sonic/Roxio DVDitProHD6.4)

[SeeMoreDigital]

It would seem Panasonic has released some updated firmwares for their Blu-ray players.

Here's a link for the DMP-BD35: http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd35/bd35_euro.html

I have not tried it myself yet because I'm off to work now ;)Update...

I upgraded my players firmware to v1.8. And tried spinning the "demo disc"....

Sadly all I could see on-screen was: "The disc is incompatible" :(

[Lyris]

Time to buy a BD-RE drive and a few -RE discs :) I got one 2 years ago for not too much cash.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Time to buy a BD-RE drive and a few -RE discs :) I got one 2 years ago for not too much cash.Personally speaking. I don't see the point in buying a Blu-ray burner and creating discs.

I currently back-up my DVD, HD-DVD and Blu-ray discs (using an LG GGC-H20L hybrid ROM drive) to "movie only" .ISO files for storage on HDD's.

The .ISO files are distributed over my home network to various network media players connected to TV's in my house.

[k-c-ksum]

Panasonic Blu-ray players don't like BD structure on DVD, they expect BD structure to be on BD discs only.

As SMD says, use multiAVCHD, deank has introduced a Panasonic mode
("AVCHD strict") to make a plain AVCHD structure, like pure streams without menus (but there is more about that)

yeah panasonics dont like BD structured content on DVD. The same material burned to a BD-r though works.

[deank]

I knew there will be such reports - that's why I suggested the AVCHD/Blu-ray compliant structure.

Although not produced by $$$ software it works with virtually all BD/AVCHD players. It is even possible to convert it in just 2 or 3 minutes and watch it with just a Panasonic Viera TV, using SDHC card (no BD player needed).

I reauthored the structure from the official Blu-ray x264 demo disc into a structure, which should play in all players, burnt to DVD or BD-R.

It has the intro video and a simple static menu with 3 titles + 12 chapters for each title.

http://multiavchd.deanbg.com/x264_demo/x264_run2_1.jpg

http://multiavchd.deanbg.com/x264_demo/x264_run2_2.jpg

Here is the torrent (http://multiavchd.deanbg.com/x264_demo/x264_Demo_Disc_AVCHD_BLURAY_COMPLIANT.torrent) file.

I hope it helps.

Dean

[SeeMoreDigital]

Wow... thanks Dean.

I'll start downloading it tonight, ready for testing tomorrow :)

Who needs Blu-ray, when we've got AVCHD....

[Dark Shikari]

Added your Blu-ray to the blog post.

[SeeMoreDigital]

I knew there will be such reports - that's why I suggested the AVCHD/Blu-ray compliant structure.Now that's more like it... The AVCHD sample burned to DVD-R works perfectly on my Panasonic DMP-BD35 Blu-ray player :)

When I find my 8GB SD card, I'll try the AVCHD sample in my Blu-ray player and in my Panasonic TV...

[deank]

:) Nice... Well for your SDHC card you'll need to pass it through multiAVCHD again, but you already know that. It will take just few mins. I'd suggest to use the .m2ts files directly and not import the whole structure.

***

DS:
The primary missing application is a free software Blu-ray authoring tool, to combine the video and audio streams to create a Blu-ray file structure with the menus, chapters, and so forth that we have all come to expect.

Just a note about this: multiAVCHD kind of does that for over an year now. :) Not that flexible as some folks would like to, but still...

//
Don't be mislead by the "AVCHD" thing in the name. It authors a lot of things and one of them is Blu-ray.

Dean

[shon3i]

Isn't just patching Index.bdmv and MovieObject.bdmv and deleting some folders will create AVCHD structure. We can do that on original structure.

[deank]

You can and it still won't play in Panasonic (and probably Samsung or Philips or LG...). It will however work in PS3 and most of the Sony BDPs (and that's it).

AVCHD is not 'just patching' some files... A lot of people underestimate AVCHD, but its structure and capabilities in fact are far more better / complex than Blu-ray HDMV. If you download the one I'm seeding and check the files you'll see the difference. We can discuss the differences and similarities for both in another thread.

Dean

[shon3i]

Yes i already downloaded, and saw that difference that some folders are missing, and bdmv's have different headers. Only thing that AVCHD allow only AC3 audio. I ask because i can demux whole BD and remux it to whole structure again including original menus.