mp4UI 1.0 Beta 3 available on Sourceforge

[bond]

http://sourceforge.net/projects/mp4ui/

it seems to include the following changes:
- updated to mpeg4ip 1.1
- displays private (non-mpeg) streams (eg vobsubs)
- fixed profile/level display
- fixed 1 frame too much bug when exporting the video to .avi

- introduced the new "first keyframe is only black" bug when exporting to .avi

note that importing mpeg-4 video from .avi (especially when using packed bitstream b-frames) will most likely not create a spec compliant .mp4 file!
therefore dont use mp4ui for importing/exporting video, but only for displaying overall information about a mp4 file, setting of tags, demuxing audio aso...

[SeeMoreDigital]

Thanks mate :D

EDIT: Seems to work slightly better with the QuickTime player. No more warnings appear!

That said, it maybe because 3ivX is installed....


Cheers

[KpeX]

Will MP4ui create MPEG-4 compliant streams when importing avi video without packed bitstream (but with b-frames)?

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by KpeX
Will MP4ui create MPEG-4 compliant streams when importing avi video without packed bitstream (but with b-frames)? I guess that depends on your interpretation of the word 'compliance' is! The QuickTime player does not like anything muxed by MP4UI (although I've not properly tested Beta3 files without having 3ivX installed).

That said, the encodes I've generated certainly do work via hardware and software players.


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by KpeX
Will MP4ui create MPEG-4 compliant streams when importing avi video without packed bitstream (but with b-frames)?yes it should, the only issue i know about is that mp4ui/mp4creator doesnt remove the VOL, which is placed on every i-frame when placing mpeg-4 in avi (yet another mpeg4-in-avi hack)
still this shouldnt be a big issue as bill may and some others stated

so it should work, unless some other bug breaks something

edit: quicktime is definitely not the player to test this, as it doesnt handle b-frames on its own (only mpeg-4 sp, which excludes b-frames)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Tell you what. I'll encode a file with the settings you want and post it for you!


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Tell you what. I'll encode a file with the settings you want and post it for you!hm dunno what player would be the best to check whether mp4ui creates correct .mp4 files from .avi, maybe your xcard is the best or enviviotv for that purpose, as i assume that they are rather strict on what files to play

b-frames (not packed) would be definitely a must for such a test :)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
b-frames (not packed) would be definitely a must for such a test :) How many b-frames and with or without closed GOV?

The Xcard can usually 'play' just about anything... how well it does it is another thing :D

Seriously though, the Xcard still does not like multipal b-frames (whether they are in AVI or MP4). I've been speaking to Sigma regarding fine tuning the playback of MP4 files, hopefully we'll get to the bottom of the multipal b-frame issue also!


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
How many b-frames and with or without closed GOV?shouldnt matter

The Xcard can usually 'play' just about anything... how well it does it is another thing :Dhm than maybe enviviotv is better for testing mp4ui .mp4 files :)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Okay,

Here's an XviD encode with 1B-VOP and with closed GOV (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/XviD_1B-VOP_with.zip)

and

Here's an XviD encode with 1B-VOP and without closed GOV (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/XviD_1B-VOP_without.zip)

Both are 'video only' 720x576 anamorphic @ 2000kbps 2pass VBR.

I can confirm already that both encodes appear to function properly via WinMedia player, using the 3ivX DSdec filter. And via Nero's ShowTime player. The anamorphic signalling functions correctly too in both players.


Cheers

[SeeMoreDigital]

I was looking at MP4UI importing list today,

http://82.2.167.24/Uploaded_Files/Doom9_Forum_files/MP4UI.GIF

and have to ask, has anybody had any luck importing .mpg or .mpeg streams into the application?

Also, what are CMP files, and do they work?


Cheers

[springl]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital

Also, what are CMP files, and do they work?



I think it is pure mpeg4 video stream like m4v
go here http://gpac.sourceforge.net/auth_mp4box.php and search
for "-raw"

greetings,
springl

[SeeMoreDigital]

Oh well, I thought it might be too good to be true!

I've generated some 'simple profile' test encodes and the new version of MP4UI can't mux them in a way the QuickTime player likes.

So it looks like we've still got to use GraphEdit and 3ivX tools for a while longer.


Cheers

[Soulhunter]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Also, what are CMP files, and do they work?
IIRC, its a pictures compression format !!!


Bye

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by Soulhunter
IIRC, its a pictures compression format !!!


Bye Yes, I think you're right. I Googled and found this: -

http://users.erols.com/sanddllr/CMPFiles.html


Cheers

[Soulhunter]

Hmm, but why no JPEG or PNG then... :confused:


Bye

[SeeMoreDigital]

Well the good news is you can create them in HyperSnap-DX. So it ain't all bad...

You might be interested in this. Today I went out and bought a new 8x DVD+/- burner at the amazing price of £59.00!!!

It's a BTC DRW1008IM and comes bundled with Nero6 (inc Recode2) and some CyberLink software.

Another useful feature is that when you shove a blank 800MB CD~R in the tray, Windows explorer correctly identifies the media as being 799MB and not 702MB. So you don't have to use any over-burning tools....

.....excellent!


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
and have to ask, has anybody had any luck importing .mpg or .mpeg streams into the application?yep :)

Also, what are CMP files, and do they work?
IIRC, its a pictures compression format !!!springl is right, in this context cmp means raw mpeg-4 video stream (aka .mp4v, .m4v, .divx, .xvid)

maybe some pic format uses the same name, the allowed pic formats in .mp4 are jpg and png

[Soulhunter]

Originally posted by bond
Maybe some pic format uses the same name...
Yeah, I did some research (http://filext.com/detaillist.php?extdetail=CMP) !!!

Seems that the CMP extension is very popular... :D


Bye

[bond]

Originally posted by Soulhunter
Seems that the CMP extension is very popular...damn i want to mux Chord Pro Song Format into .mp4! the standard allows it, why doesnt it work :D

[adoniscik]

A particular 24.975 fps AVI file (NTSC to PAL IVTC) is incorrectly detected as being 24.979 fps. Manually setting the TimeScale property fixed the problem.

[bond]

Originally posted by adoniscik
A particular 24.975 fps AVI file (NTSC to PAL IVTC) is incorrectly detected as being 24.979 fps. Manually setting the TimeScale property fixed the problem. hm i never had a problem with the fps
beaware the mp4box and 3ivx muxer by default remove N-vops and create a variable framerate stream instead, saving bits. now if you used these two muxers and your stream had n-vops it can very well be that the framerate changed a little bit (without hurting the sync of course)
you can still create a constant framerate mp4 if you disable the "compress n-vops" option in 3ivx or use "-nodrops" in mp4box

[pogo stick]

Is there disadvantages in removing N-vops?
Will there be any problems when muxing video with N-vops removed from mp4 to any other container?

[bond]

Originally posted by pogo stick
Is there disadvantages in removing N-vops?no, it will not hurt the quality or the sync with audio in any way

Will there be any problems when muxing video with N-vops removed from mp4 to any other container? not if you use smart containers, which are able to handle variable framerates ;)

[pogo stick]

So using avi for that will create problems?
What kind of problems?

[bond]

Originally posted by pogo stick
So using avi for that will create problems?is avi a smart container? yep, it will cause problems in avi, as avi is not able to handle variable framerates ;)

What kind of problems? variable framerate means that the frames have different lengths. with constant framerate, for example PAL (25fps) each frame has the length of 40ms
now if there are two frames for example which are exactly the same (or very similar) a smart encoder (like 3ivx, XviD, ffmpeg or nerodigital are already) could drop one frame and give the other frame the double length instead (-> 80ms), without loosing the sync with the audio of course, but saving bits and therefore bringing more quality

now when you demux to a container not able to handle vfr (like avi), the frame, which had 80ms length, will get 40ms again and therefore sync issues can be caused as 1 frame is missing

[stephanV]

Originally posted by adoniscik
A particular 24.975 fps AVI file (NTSC to PAL IVTC) is incorrectly detected as being 24.979 fps. Manually setting the TimeScale property fixed the problem.

Originally posted by bond
beaware the mp4box and 3ivx muxer by default remove N-vops and create a variable framerate stream instead, saving bits. now if you used these two muxers and your stream had n-vops it can very well be that the framerate changed a little bit (without hurting the sync of course)

at first glance this doesn't seem to make sense... if n-VOPS were removed then shouldnt the (average) framerate turn out to be lower?

consider a file of 10 seconds with 100 frames with say 10 n-VOPS:
in avi the file would be 100 frames/10 seconds = 10 fps
after muxed with 3ivx it would be (100-10)/10 = 9 fps

so its something else or framerate detection is screwed up when muxing with MP4UI

(and still, containers are NOT smart :p)

[SeeMoreDigital]

My own tests with VFR in MP4 prooved quite sucessful, but I did not use any b-frames (meaning no packed bit-stream either).

I've been meaning to generate another test using a better source but have not got round to it yet.

Also, I've just noticed that MP3 muxing works better with this version. Shame de-muxing is still b0rked!


Cheers


EDIT: Typo changed VBR to VFR.
To confirm. My original 40 second, 1000 frame @ 25fps source, became a 40 second 952 frame @ 23.8fps.

[pogo stick]

Originally posted by bond
now if there are two frames for example which are exactly the same (or very similar) a smart encoder (like 3ivx, XviD, ffmpeg or nerodigital are already) could drop one frame and give the other frame the double length instead (-> 80ms), without loosing the sync with the audio of course, but saving bits and therefore bringing more quality
So XviD doing that 'by default'?
People who are 'unpacking' bitstream to watch avis on hardware players should be aware of that.
So if someone will need to create mp4 file and still be able to edit it after all (by demuxing to other container) he should:
1) not remove N-vops (in case of using avi)
2) remux to matroska and use AVI-Mux GUI (not virtualdubmod) to edit.
From 'Matroska FAQ':
5) After appending/joining two matroska files in virtualdubmod, the output seems to have some failures?
this is a known issue in virtualdubmod. Use AVI-Mux GUI for appending/joining matroska files!
Am I right?
Someone really should make MP4 (ASP) encoding and editing program! :(

[bond]

Originally posted by stephanV
at first glance this doesn't seem to make sense... if n-VOPS were removed then shouldnt the (average) framerate turn out to be lower?right

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
My own tests with VBR in MP4 prooved quite sucessful, but I did not use any b-frames (meaning no packed bit-stream either).hm b-frames (and packed bitstream) has nothing to do with variable framerate (btw its VFR! VBR is variable bitrate, which itself has again nothing do to with vfr) :)

Also, I've just noticed that MP3 muxing works better with this version. Shame de-muxing is still b0rked!mp3 demuxing does not work correctly in mp4ui? :(

Originally posted by pogo stick
People who are 'unpacking' bitstream to watch avis on hardware players should be aware of that. theoretically yes, but practically no, as at the moment no encoder exists, which is able to create N-vops + packed bitstream at the same time!
xvid will not write n-vops if b-frames (including packed bitstream) is enabled! so to make it short you dont have to worry about this

2) remux to matroska and use AVI-Mux GUI (not virtualdubmod) to edit. not possible atm, as there currently is no MP4 -> MKV transmuxer available

Someone really should make MP4 (ASP) encoding and editing program!well you can already edit MP4 files in quicktime, but its limited to MPEG-4 Simple Profile streams (so no b-frames, qpel or gmc)
but yes, it would be great if someone could add MP4 capabilities to vdm, but still this would not enable VFR support, as video for windows (as used in vd atm) is not able to handle variable framerates too (the same goes for vfr in matroska too of course)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
mp3 demuxing does not work correctly in mp4ui? :( Nope. Strange that the older versions would work!

BTW, I've changed the typo in my previous post.


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Nope. Strange that the older versions would work!yep, seems that starting with mp4ui 1.0 mp3 demuxing didnt work anymore

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
yep, seems that starting with mp4ui 1.0 mp3 demuxing didnt work anymore Nor does AAC de-muxing, since the launch of the MP4UI v1.0 betas.

That said, the older versions could not de-mux Nero AAC streams either!

I suppose Marcus will sort it out in the end.


Cheers

[pogo stick]

Originally posted by bond
not possible atm, as there currently is no MP4 -> MKV transmuxer available
GraphEdit can do that with 3ivx D4 Media Splitter, Matroska Muxer and File Writer.

[stephanV]

im not sure... i dont think the matroska muxer will accept the mp4 stream as such (at least not yet) and therefor graphedit will put a decoder filter between them... at least thats what happened in my case anyway. (but it wouldn't be the first time i screwed things up :) )

[pogo stick]

I just retested it. Works. :)

[bond]

Originally posted by pogo stick
I just retested it. Works. :) hm the question isnt really whether it works or not, the question is whether it works correctly, i mean we talked about variable framerate files
so if you remux a variable framerate stream from mp4 to matroska using the dshow muxer, will the stream still be vfr in mkv?

[stephanV]

bah, where did you get your matroska muxer (or 3ivx splitter :p)? i cant get this to work :(

pins dont connect without a decoder...

[EDIT]my bad, just had to alter the 3ivx-filter settings :rolleyes: (told you i screw up sometimes :D )

[pogo stick]

Originally posted by bond
so if you remux a variable framerate stream from mp4 to matroska using the dshow muxer, will the stream still be vfr in mkv?
I made small XviD file with the settings I posted in 'MP4 XviD playback' thread and without 'packed bitstream'.
Muxed avi to mp4 with 3vix muxer and 'compress n-vops'.
Muxed mp4 to mkv and avi.
Now it should be vfr without n-vops.
But it shows 25fps and number of frames didn't change.(Edit: in VirtualDubMod)
How to determine that n-vops was removed in mp4 and the stream is vfr?
Originally posted by stephanV
where did you get your matroska muxer
Gabest's Matroska Muxer 1.0.0.8

[malkion]

will mp4ui mux a 3.9gb avi video stream with a 380gb lc-aac audio stream?

i let it sit for an hour preparing the mux, but got tired of waiting.

i suppose the question above applies to any mp4 muxer, such as mp4box.

[bond]

Originally posted by pogo stick
[B]I made small XviD file with the settings I posted in 'MP4 XviD playback' thread and without 'packed bitstream'.
Muxed avi to mp4 with 3vix muxer and 'compress n-vops'.
Muxed mp4 to mkv and avi.
Now it should be vfr without n-vops.
But it shows 25fps and number of frames didn't change.(Edit: in VirtualDubMod)
How to determine that n-vops was removed in mp4 and the stream is vfr?as i said before, xvid will not create n-vops if b-frames are enabled!!!
also of course the question whether n-vops get written heavily depends on the content you want to encode: if there simply are no similar frames, no n-vops will get written (which hardly ever happens tough)

to check out whether a mp4 is vfr, you can open it in mp4ui and check out the reported framerate. if the shown value is different than the framerate of the input n-vops got dropped (i never had the problems reported by adoniscik)

Originally posted by malkion
will mp4ui mux a 3.9gb avi video stream with a 380gb lc-aac audio stream?lol, how can someone produce a 380gb aac audio stream? or did you mean "mb"?
i assume every mp4 muxer should handle big a/v streams, but of course the longer the stream, the longer the muxing time

[malkion]

@ bond, yep, u're right, 380mb.

however, the gui simply sits there preparing the mux, if u recall, after it does that, it presents a progress bar with a timer. it never gets that far. it prepares and prepares and prepares. after 1 hr of no new indication of how much longer it's going to prepare, as of now, i've concluded that mp4 is sorta useless for dvd sized videos. it's only muxing, not encoding. any new ideas?

(yeah, it's a full hdtv sized avi @ 1280x720 and a nice aac sound trac just sitting here doing no good, haha)

course, it works fine if u want to test encode a chapter, a few seconds to prepare, maybe half a minute to mux, all done, but it doesnt seem to handle big files or a really big dvd-r sized encode.

question, has anyone succeeded in muxing anything bigger than a) 1 gig? b) 2 gigs?

[pogo stick]

Originally posted by bond
as i said before, xvid will not create n-vops if b-frames are enabled!!!
Oh, sorry. I misunderstood you.
I thought for n-vops removing b-frames should be enabled and packed bitstream disabled.
Then I don't worry about it. I always use b-frames.
But I will still try if without b-frames.

To Malkion:
I don't know what the problem is, but:
If your video have packed b-frames then only 3ivx mp4 muxer can help you.
mp4box is buggy with big files.
Is your drive NTSC? FAT can not handle 4,27GB file.

[SeeMoreDigital]

The new XviD builds still generate great looking encodes, even without B-VOP's.

In many cases they look better than DivX encodes with them!

When was the last time you generated a good lengthed movie (over 2passes) without them?


Cheers

[stephanV]

Originally posted by pogo stick
Is your drive NTSC? FAT can not handle 4,27GB file.

its NTFS... NTSC is TV-standard :D

[malkion]

thanks pogo. i never use packed b-frames, matter of fact, since i was intending to use the mp4 container, i stopped using b-frames period for these vids. thanks for letting me know mp4box is buggy on BIG files.

hazard to guess that mp4ui has the same BIG deficiency. lol

(remember, i sampled a chapter and it muxed fine, but the whole finished vid with aac sound is now over 4 gigs, and my drives are definitely not fat-formatted. heh)

i suppose i can just reformat my computer once every 30 days when 3ivx expires, huh?

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by malkion
...hazard to guess that mp4ui has the same BIG deficiency. lol I used MP4UI to mux an 4.36GB version of T2 Extreame together (anamorphic 720x480 XviD + 2Ch AAC-HE CBR + 6Ch AAC-HE VBR). It came out perfectly!


Cheers

[malkion]

hmm. can u tell me if u experienced a very long preparation period before mp4ui began to operate and started muxing those files? and about how long did this take? once its muxing there is a time indicator, but just preparing the mux i gave up after 1 hr.

[SeeMoreDigital]

There's no denying it can take quite a while. But not much longer than other muxers I think!

It's a two stage process.

The first stage, 'imports' the stream(s) - which can take a while, but you get a nice GUI to show you what's going on!

The second stage, does the 'optimizing' (the muxing bit) - which can take a very long time!

I too was a little concerned that nothing was going on during this stage but there is a way to check that a file is being written (and not froze).

During the 'optimizing' process a 'temp' file is created. All you have to do is monitor the size of this temp file. If the file size keeps increasing everything is OK.

Now, because a 'temp' file is being written, this suggests that quite a large amount of HD space is being consumed during the muxing process (twice the individual stream sizes) - so make sure you have the space!

Anyway, I made a quick 'How to... Use MP4UI' (http://SeeMoreDigital.net/05_How_to..._Files/How_to..._Use_MP4UI/MP4UI.html) guide, which can be found on my web site.


Cheers

[bond]

a new version of mp4UI has been released!
read more here (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=77577)