blocky pixel in every avi file

[horny_german]

I'm encoding some time now with the xvid codec using very simple settings. I'm using these settings :
1 Pass CBR - 900 kbps -
Motion search precision : 6
Quantizations type : H.263
FourCC used : xvid
Min I-Quant. + Min. P.Quant : 2

rest remains like default config.
I'm encoding small scenes @ 352*288 resolution.

Now my issue to start this threat...
Playback @ normal size is o.k. but when I switch it to full screen
the pixel are looking very blocky. I mean not the compression artifacts
wich will be there of course. This only occurs when I use WMP 6 or 7.
When I playback this scene with the bs player the scenes is perfect even @ fullscreen. Does the bs player use some filter ? Or what problem
may WMP have ?
my second question is that I receive nearly the same size of the scene when I use a bitrate of 750 or 650 for example.
Since I'm not a pro with this I hope you'll not blame me for my
perhaps silly questions ....

Thanks for any help.

hg

[kvs]

@bitrate: it may be that the actual bitrate is way below 900, even 650 perhaps, because that was all it needed.. in other words you're giving your encode more bits than it needs.

@blocks: well, I do not know what bsplayer does differently, but I do know that with a low resoultion of 352*288, everything will most likely look blocky, regardless.

[horny_german]

@kvs Well your answer regarding the pixelblocks isn't correct imho.
Using Divx3 for example does not give me these blocky pixels. I don't mean compression artifacts !

@ bitrate Maybe but the final size is bigger than estimated @ 650 kb.
Perhaps I have to reduce Quantizer ? :confused:

Cheers
hg

[Belgabor]

If you mean it looks like a bitmap watched at a high zoomfactor in a painting app it means the DSF somehow isnt used. Try to render the file in Graphedit and see if it includes the XviD DSF.

Regards
Belgabor

[horny_german]

@ Belgabor : This is the effect I meant.
I'm sorry I'm not a pro ... I attached a snapshot of the
rendered media file. I on't see the exact mention of a DSF
but is this here Xvid Mpeg 4 decoder ?

Thank you !
hg

[rui]

Both Nic's and Koepi's xvid builds include the xvid ds filter, which is instaled by default.
Are you using uManiac's build? Because uManiac's doesn't install a ds filter.

For Nic' and Koepi's sites, see the Q&A thread.

EDIT: To see if the ds filter is being used, try, in media player 6.4, clicking the File tab, then the properties tab, then advanced, and look for xvid mpeg4 video decoder.

[horny_german]

@ rui : The Mpeg4 video decoder is in use. At least it's listed. But there is no option activated.
I use nics latest release fom May,2nd.
I attached a two second avi file with my problem. When you start the file please pause it and maximize it to fullscreen.
Then you should see the blocky pixels ... hope so.

Thanks
hg

[horny_german]

@ rui : The Mpeg4 video decoder is in use. At least it's listed. But there is no option activated.
I use nics latest release fom May,2nd.
I attached three files with my problem. When you open the pics you may see the blocky pixel.
But maybe any other codec has these too ? But they use some kind of filters to smooth them ?


Thanks
hg

[rui]

Well, the attachments have to be validated by a Moderator, so until they are i can't download them
About the ds filter: you say that no options are activated? You mean that, in the ds filter there are no options enabled? Try to enable the deblocking options and see if there is any diference.

I don't know if this is your problem (blocks, but i suspect it isn't) but, without seeing the attachments i can't think of anything else.

[horny_german]

@ rui : I could email you a picture from a recently done vid.

hg

[uManiac]

@rui
Are you using uManiac's build? Because uManiac's doesn't
install a ds filter.

Actually it installs a DS filter, it just dosn't install a post-processor like Nic's and Koepi's builds do. However since core 2.1 there was an error in the API for the DS filter which was just fixed today so a newer build might be required if one from me is being used. ;)

[horny_german]

@ Umaniac : I did not try your version yet.
But here are the pictures. Somehow they don't seem to show up before.
hg

[rui]

About the ds filter: you are correct, uManiac's build does install a ds filter, like you said it doesn't have post processing.
Sorry to you and uManiac for my mistake.

My mail is rui_tecedeiro@gmx.net

But, since you confirm that the problem isn't in the lack of deblocking options enabled (right?), maybe it's something that the developers should see.

[avih]

Originally posted by horny_german
Playback @ normal size is o.k. but when I switch it to full screen
the pixel are looking very blocky. I mean not the compression artifacts
wich will be there of course. This only occurs when I use WMP 6 or 7.
When I playback this scene with the bs player the scenes is perfect even @ fullscreen. Does the bs player use some filter ? Or what problem
may WMP have ?

hi.
i think i know what your problem is, but can't have a 'scientific' solution.

it's not related to the ds filter since the filter doesn't filter the PIXELS. it filters on pixel level, and not sub-pixel level anyway.

this smoothing (like billinear filterring on 384x288 resized to 1024x768) is handled by default by the display card.

i experienced this problem on win98 when another application is using overlay (i.e. when vdub is in overlay mode, and i play a clip), then no other app can use overlay, and this overlay display is the one that 'filters' the image by the display card.

i'd say:
1. enable overlay display somehow (might be through display card control pannel, or with from player)
2. try one of the playback resizers (there's a bicubic resize dshow filter). it should filter the image if the display card can't do that (some laptop display chip can't filter while resizing).
3. try the latest drivers, or 'alternatives' ones if your display card has such and hope the overlay issue is solved.
4. give us details about your display card and driver.

regards
avi

[Belgabor]

Hm, this Filtergraph is strange. As I'm not on my own pc, I'm not really sure (= cant chack a correct Xvid Graph), but imho the AVIdecompressor definately shouldn't be there. That should be handled by the XviD DSF. Could you please check (by looking at the filters properties) if the Xvid MPEG4 decompressor is NICs? If so, try to manually delete the AVIdecompressor and try to directly connect the XviD decompressor to the Video Renderer.

Regards
Belgabor

[horny_german]

Thanks for your help.

@ rui : I sent you the pictures to your email
@ avih : Vdub is open while I play the clip. But isn't the overlay modus active while compressing ? I thought it would only be enabled when I capture with virtual Dub ( wich unfortunately doesn't work either ... I'm only able to cap with the Asus Live App. ).
I have an Asus V7700 Deluxe ( Geforce 2 GTS ) with 32 MB RAM, AGP4x enabled & in use, Vesa VBE Ver 3, VGA Bios Ver 2.15.01.14, Driver Ver 6.31c & Directx 8 (build 881). I dl the most recent driver for my Win98 system & .... it crashed while the setup ... I love Windows ;)


@ Belgabor : I deleted the AVI decompressor but had no luck with a better result ....

Cheers
hg

[horny_german]

@ all : Does someone now the BS Player ? There must be something different from the other players. I enabeled now all Xvid Post processing possibilities and the picture is still blocky @ fullscreen. The same vid played with the BS player is @ fullscreen smooth.

Just wanted to mention that. Don't know if this is a help :confused:

Thank you again.

hg

[horny_german]

.... Sorry for the next ....

Encoding the video with Divx5 or 4 or 3 is fine ... Except the colour problem of 5.0 ...

But to be honest I don#t want to use Divx anymore ...


Cheers
hg

[rui]

horny_german, i gave a look at your jpegs that you sent, and i must say that, for the resolution you encoded them, they seem ok to me. The blank points, that i believe represent stars, are from the original video, correct?
Other than those, i believe that you should encode at a larger resolution to make the avi in fullscreen not so blocky.

About bsplayer, i can’t say why it improves the avi. (?) But my opinion is that you should try at a higher res.

About divx5 looking better, i think that is because divx is known to make blurier images in comparison to xvid. And since you are using a low resolution, it makes sense that divx5 looks better, because when bluring it hides the artifacts better.

[bill_baroud]

i want report the same problem ... or close to the same

from the begining of my test of xvid, with all(or almost all) the build i have install an co, i have this pb : WMP xvid playback is so bad....like a the noise filter of ffdshow (well at least, ffdshow's playback is bad too...)

here 2 files for the comparaison between fullscreen post-processing with both WMP and BSplayer

http://breizhbill.baroud.free.fr/Xvid-WMP.JPG
http://breizhbill.baroud.free.fr/Xvid-BSplayer.JPG

in this case, it's a 512x288 video, but with 640x*** and other it's the same thing.

Ffdshow offer to me the same type of render, with divx4/5 , 3.11 etc...

in this case , i have the latest Nic's build with max post-processing(and i don't see the difference between no & max post-process)
i'm running under win2k, athlon XP on nForce chip...
strange isn't it ?

(well and i'm very sad to not could see xvid fullpower)

[avih]

bill:
it definately seems like a lousy resizing algorithm. and i'm 99.99% sure it has nothing to do with xvid.

i think that bsplayer uses it's own resize filter/module which is either billinear or bicubic, hence the nice pics.

seems like wmp (would wmp8.0 be a good guess on xp?) either doesn't resize well (your image looks like nearest neighbour resize), or change the display resolution for full screen (maybe to 640x480?). to check if your resolution is changed, go to full screen and move the mouse around. you should see some playback controls at the bottom, and some info on top. does it seems like your regular desktop resolution? or like a lower resolution?

another possibility, try increasing your desktop resolution, and/or increase/decrease the color depth (16/24/32 bit/pixel).

another suggestion: from wmp8 goto tools->options->performance->(and try to set video acceleration once to 'full' and once to 'none', or continue)->advanced and 'play' with the settings on the 'video acceleration' section.

also, you may try to tweak your display card settings,. search for 'video' or 'overlay' sections and tweak the settings.

hope it helps.

regards
avi

[bill_baroud]

well i was using WMP6.4 for sure ;)

but my desktop's colordepth was in 16bits...turn it in 32bits have solve my problems .... thanks a lot, i must have never think to thing like that ^^;


ahah, i can play with xvid now, thanks a lot =)

(nota : strange, the post-processing is the same in both Bsplayer/WMP now, but it's different from the BSplayer before...and my overlay problem was gone too.)

[rui]

Well, i wasn't anywhere near the right cause of the problem.
Sorry to horny_german for not giving him good advice with my previous posts. :o

[horny_german]

:D Yeahhh !!! :D

That really was the solution !
Really strange :confused:

Thanks to all for the help

hg

[avih]

Originally posted by horny_german
That really was the solution !
Really strange :confused:


:)
it's not THAT strange. many display chipsets (or direct draw drivers for that matter) handle overlay and resizing differently for different colordepths/resolutions because it's 'easyer' for them to do it one way than another (especially for direct draw drivers).

on my voodoo3 2000 (amigamerlin 2.1 drivers) it handles overlay and resize very well at any resolution or colordepth. yet, some chipsets drivers might have trouble with some setsings, while others (like old cards and some laptop chips) don't have overlay/filtering at all...

many windows based players use directshow filters, and usually these filters let the hardware do the resizing, and the hardware usually apply the 'filtering' while resizing. so if the drivers/chipset don't do well for specific resolution/colordepth, the resizing will look like crap. if, however the player doesn't use standard dshow filter chain (as is probably the case with bsplayer), it may resize in software and apply any filters it has. that usually takes a bit more cpu though.

anyway, i'm glad it worked ;)
cheers
avi

[Teegedeck]

Just wanted to say, I enjoyed reading this thread - it's like an ideal of how the forum should work! You're all great! Especially rui and avih.

Your fan,

Teegedeck

[rui]

Teegedeck, thanks for the kind words :) ,in spite Avih is the real credits deserver.
These moments really make my pround of belonging to this little community. :cool:

[avih]

nahhh, i just happened to see this before. don't make me blush ... ;)

avi

ps.
here's a funny thing. i found an old asus v3800 (TNT2, 32M, Chrontel 7003 tv out, NO tv-in), and installed it because i wanted to use tv-out (i've never used tv-out before). i managed somehow (not completely satisfactory) to enable the tv out (and i know about tv-tool). but my problem (in desktop mode) is that i just CAN'T use filtered overlay like you guys did eventually :). i tried default windows driver (XP-Pro), detonator 28.32, detonator 23.11, Asus drivers (win2k). changed resolutions, color depth, tweaked the driver..... without success .... see? no one's perfect lol. i'm gonna keep trying though. i wonder about nvidia though. didn't they learn how to make good drivers after they bought 3dfx?? :) and why can't they make proper settings for their tv-out??? i thought that since they wanna keep their leadership in this market, they should do more for their customers.

oh well..... ;)