BD3D2MK3D v1.17: Convert 3D BDs or MKV to 3D SBS, T&B or Frame-sequential MKV

[macrea]

Can this software be used to output losslessly to ISO?

The problem with makemkv is it doesn't properly support 3D planes for 3D subtitle depth. And I use the Mede8er external player, and it also doesn't seem to properly respect plane settings in mkv files - according to their forums it must be a 3D ISO for the Mede8er player to properly display the 3D subtitles according to the plane data. TSMuxer also seems to not properly read/handle the plane setting. So this software seems to be the only answer for handling the 3D subtitle depth settings properly. But by default it encodes to half-sbs. I'd like to be able to output to frame-packed ISO in order to keep the quality lossless as well as being compliant.

If this is not possible, is there a way to use this software to at least help with the 3D plane issues with TSMuxer? Can I use this software to get the correct plane info, and then use that plane info in TSMuxer? Will TSMuxer handle the plane properly as long as I put the proper plane setting in?

[r0lZ]

Welcome to the Doom9 forums, macrea !

I'm not sure I understand exactly what you want to do. It seems that you want "to output losslessly to ISO". That is easy to do and there are several free or commercial programs able to extract the video, audio and subtitle streams (including the MVC stream with the 3D-Planes) from an original 3DBD and write them unchanged to a new ISO, It's just a copy, and the 3D-Planes should not be lost. You have just to verify thet they are correctly assigned to your subtitle streams during the remux. I think that TsMuxeR can do that perfectly, and you can easily see the original 3D-Planes assignments and assign them to your subtitle streams with its GUI. Is it what you want? If it's the case, you don't need BD3D2MK3D at all, and the copy is really lossless.

You wrote also "I'd like to be able to output to frame-packed ISO in order to keep the quality lossless as well as being compliant." The question is, what frame-packed format do you want? AVC+MVC like in the original BD3D? That's exactly what I have explained in the first paragraph. Or do you want to re-encode to AVC+MVC with the possibility to hardcode the subtitles? In that case, I don't think that there is a complete solution. Or do you just want to output as a single interleaved AVC stream (aka "Frame Sequential") and hardcode the subtitles? In that case, you can use BD3D2NK3D to generate the right frame sequential video stream, and use TsMuxeR to build the ISO. The 3D-Planes cannot be used with that kind of output, but since the subtitles are hardcoded, you don't need them any more. Anyway, only the first case is really lossless.

BD3D2MK3D is not designed to re-encode in MVC, or to output to an ISO. It can only re-encode to SBS, T&B or Frame Sequential, and that 3 formats require only AVC encoding. That means that BD3D2MK3D doesn't have the MVC encoder to encode the right video streams for a 3DBD. So, if you want to re-create a real 3DBD with the AVC and MVC video streams, you need another encoder. And currently, the only free MVC encoder is the Intel encoder, used for example by FRIM.

I can't help much more without knowing exactly what you want to do.

[macrea]

Originally Posted by r0lZ

Welcome to the Doom9 forums, macrea !

I'm not sure I understand exactly what you want to do. It seems that you want "to output losslessly to ISO". That is easy to do and there are several free or commercial programs able to extract the video, audio and subtitle streams (including the MVC stream with the 3D-Planes) from an original 3DBD and write them unchanged to a new ISO, It's just a copy, and the 3D-Planes should not be lost. You have just to verify thet they are correctly assigned to your subtitle streams during the remux. I think that TsMuxeR can do that perfectly, and you can easily see the original 3D-Planes assignments and assign them to your subtitle streams with its GUI. Is it what you want? If it's the case, you don't need BD3D2MK3D at all, and the copy is really lossless.

You wrote also "I'd like to be able to output to frame-packed ISO in order to keep the quality lossless as well as being compliant." The question is, what frame-packed format do you want? AVC+MVC like in the original BD3D? That's exactly what I have explained in the first paragraph. Or do you want to re-encode to AVC+MVC with the possibility to hardcode the subtitles? In that case, I don't think that there is a complete solution. Or do you just want to output as a single interleaved AVC stream (aka "Frame Sequential") and hardcode the subtitles? In that case, you can use BD3D2NK3D to generate the right frame sequential video stream, and use TsMuxeR to build the ISO. The 3D-Planes cannot be used with that kind of output, but since the subtitles are hardcoded, you don't need them any more. Anyway, only the first case is really lossless.

BD3D2MK3D is not designed to re-encode in MVC, or to output to an ISO. It can only re-encode to SBS, T&B or Frame Sequential, and that 3 formats require only AVC encoding. That means that BD3D2MK3D doesn't have the MVC encoder to encode the right video streams for a 3DBD. So, if you want to re-create a real 3DBD with the AVC and MVC video streams, you need another encoder. And currently, the only free MVC encoder is the Intel encoder, used for example by FRIM.

I can't help much more without knowing exactly what you want to do.

Thanks for the warm welcome!

As was described in your first paragraph, I want to remux to ISO without any re-encoding, keeping only the titles and subtitles I need, while keeping it compliant for burning if I want to.

I have read in a couple places that TSMuxer has bugs/issues with handling planes correctly. From my understanding, TSMuxer won't show you the original planes. It just lets you select the plane you want to use. Is that incorrect? If you use the wrong plane for the subtltle (a different plane than originally on the disc), then the results will not work correctly. This is why I was wondering if BD3D2MK3D would be useful for finding which plane to use in TSMuxer.

I did try using TSMuxer a while back, and it was a foreign animated 3D blu-ray with English subtitles. They must have messed up the planes on the disc because the subs are flat on the screen (plane zero?), cutting through lots of 3D objects and ruing the experience. After using TSMuxer, the subtitles still had the same problem.

I'm new to this 3D planes thing, but am I right that the higher the number in TSMuxer, the farther out of the screen the subtitles are? I'd like to place them far enough out that they won't cut through objects. Any advice would be appreciated.

I also read that some 3D films can have dynamic planes, which place the subs in different planes based on individual dialog, so one line might be on a different plane than another line, depending on the action on-screen. Can anybody suggest a better software solution than TSMuxer for this, or is TSMuxer recommended?

[r0lZ]

Originally Posted by macrea

From my understanding, TSMuxer won't show you the original planes. It just lets you select the plane you want to use. Is that incorrect?

Well, it's partially incorrect. TSMuxeR shows you the 3D-Plane number, but it is right that it can have some bugs. The problem is related to the structure of the MPLS. A MPLS can reference some subtitle streams but not necessarily all physical streams really present in the M2TS/SSIF. I call the unreferenced streams "phantom streams". They are present, but normally you cannot select them during the playback. (The video, audio and subtitle streams for the PiP video are also additional streams, referenced in an extension of the MPLS but not related to the real movie. They are therefore similar to the phantom streams.) In a 3DBD, the 3D-Planes are assigned only to the streams referenced in the MPLS, in the order of the MPLS. Most of the time, all streams physically present in the M2TS/SSIF files are referenced in the MPLS, in the same order, and in that case the 3D-Planes shown by TSMuxeR should be correct. However, when a phantom stream is present before a referenced stream, or when the streams are not in the same order than in the M2TS, TSMuseR assigns the 3D-Planes sequentially to the wrong streams. That's a bug, and it's one of the major reasons that have motived me to write my own MPLS parser. BD3D2MK3D shows you only the streams really referenced in the MPLS (without the PiP), with the correct 3D-Planes assignments.

So, yes, it is a good idea to use BD3D2MK3D to verify the 3D-Planes assignments shown by TSMuseR, even if most of the times there are no differences.

Originally Posted by macrea

If you use the wrong plane for the subtltle (a different plane than originally on the disc), then the results will not work correctly.

Correct, although most of the times, all 3D-Planes are similar. It's why BD3D2MK3D has some tools to convert an external 2D subtitle stream to 3D using the most appropriate 3D-Plane, even if no 3D-Plane exist in the BD for that specific stream or language. The results, although not perfect, are usually very good.

Originally Posted by macrea

I did try using TSMuxer a while back, and it was a foreign animated 3D blu-ray with English subtitles. They must have messed up the planes on the disc because the subs are flat on the screen (plane zero?), cutting through lots of 3D objects and ruing the experience. After using TSMuxer, the subtitles still had the same problem.

Some cheap 3DBDs have no 3D-Planes or they have a constant depth. (It's usually the case of Asian movies, some documentaries, cheap BDs for kids, and so on...) It's also the case of many ISOs badly compressed to fit on a BD25 and found on the internet (because the 3D-Planes information is in the MVC video stream and is lost when you re-encode it.)

Of course TSMuxeR cannot create new 3D-Planes automatically for that bad BDs. If the original subtitles are flat, it cannot fix the problem. (It should be possible to give a constant depth to unstick all subtitles from the surface of the stream, but afaik it's not possible currently.)

Anyway, in your case, since you don't want to re-encode the video, the MVC stream will stay untouched, and if you use the correct 3D-Plane number, you should obtain exactly the same depths than in the original BD.

Originally Posted by macrea

I'm new to this 3D planes thing, but am I right that the higher the number in TSMuxer, the farther out of the screen the subtitles are? I'd like to place them far enough out that they won't cut through objects. Any advice would be appreciated.

No! TSMuxeR shows you the assignments ONLY! In a single MVC stream, there can be up to 32 different 3D-Planes. In the MPLS, each referenced subtitle stream is defined. The language of the stream, for example, is defined in the MPLS. The number of the 3D-Plane to use is also defined for the subtitle stream (in the 3D extension of the MPLS). The 3D-Plane number is therefore not related at all to the depth of the subtitles (or only very indirectly).

However, the depth values stored in the 3D-Plane itself represent the position along the Z axis of the subtitles. 0 means "on the surface of the screen", < 0 means beneath the screen, and of course, positive values mean toward the spectator. There is normally one depth value per frame in each 3D-Plane, but some depths may be undefined (hex 0x80) if there is no subtitle at that frame. Usually, the depths values range is around -10 to 25. The full range is -127 to 127. (Note also that in BD3D2MK3D, all depth values are multiplied by 2, for technical reasons and because that permits a better precision.)

Unfortunately for you, you cannot create your own 3D-Planes easily, or modify an existing one. They must be attached to the MVC stream before the mux, and afaik there is no tool able to do that. You will therefore have to use a plane present in the original MVC stream, even if it is not perfect.

BD3D2MK3D has some tools to analyse the content of a 3D-Plane and display some statistics (like the min, max and average depths or the number of undefined depths), but unfortunately for you, it can only analyse the 3D-Planes files extracted from the MVC stream, itself demuxed from the SSIF, so using that tools directly on the BD is impossible.

Originally Posted by macrea

I also read that some 3D films can have dynamic planes, which place the subs in different planes based on individual dialog, so one line might be on a different plane than another line, depending on the action on-screen. Can anybody suggest a better software solution than TSMuxer for this, or is TSMuxer recommended?

Correct. In fact, all "good" 3D-planes are dynamic, because it is very painful to have to adapt constantly the focus of your eyes to see the objects in the movie and to read the subtitles. The subtitles must therefore be as close as possible to the objects that the spectator is supposed to look at.

As you should have understood now, TSMuxeR is not responsible of the quality of the 3D-Planes. It has just to insert the correct 3D-Planes number(s) in the MPLS so that they correspond to the physical subtitle streams. Dot. Therefore, TSMuxeR can perfectly be used to assign the 3D planes (but as explained above, not to be sure of the 3D-Plane number to use). The rest depends of the 3D-Planes present in the MPLS stream. And authoring them yourself is another story, currently impossible or very difficult with free tools and without authoring the 3DBD yourself. (I hope that TSMuxeR doesn't have the same bug when it muxes than when it analyses a MPLS, but I can't be sure because I don't use it for that job. Anyway, since you remux just to regain some space, I suppose that you will not keep the useless phantom streams, and the 3D-Planes assignments should be straightforward.)

Final note: I have adopted the terminology of TSMuxeR when I began to write BD3D2MK3D, but "3D-Plane" is not the official name. It is probably better to use "Offset Sequence" (hence the ".ofs" extension of the 3D-Plane files.)

[macrea]

Thanks very much for all of this information. Very helpful indeed, though a bit confusing. I guess the bottom line is for my current situation, if the subtitles are flat on the screen already (cutting through objects), there's no current way of getting them off the screen and in front of the action, correct? That's unfortunate, but at least I know not to spend hours randomly trying different planes hoping it will work. I guess I'm stuck watching it without subtitles. At least I can enjoy the visuals. The subtitles wreck the enjoyment completely when they are flat on the screen.

[r0lZ]

Yep, it's a good conclusion. Me too, my brain can't support the flat subtitles, and I would like to find a way to replace the bad 3D-Planes in the MVC, but as far as I know, currently it's impossible without re-encoding completely the video streams, and using professional or semi-pro authoring software. But note that I wrote "as far as I know". Personally, I'm not interested in keeping the original streams, and I wrote BD3D2MK3D to do just the opposite: to re-encode the oringnal 3DBD in a totally different and lighter 3D format. For that reason, I don't know exactly the possibilities of the tools used to re-create a BD from M2TS files or elementary streams. Perhaps it is already possible to attach the new or modified 3D-Planes to the MVC stream before re-muxing it, or during the remux process. Perhaps with Scenarist? Honestly, I don't think so, but I'm not sure. If you find a way to do it, please let us know.

Good luck anyway!

[geheim]

If remuxing 3DBDs with Scenarist you could at least set a constant depth to the subtitles. Using a value of -7 worked for me so far, because the subtitles are then displayed way in front of the Screen and I've never seen a movie in which the subtitles cut through objects in this case.
Note that this does only work with original stream files. Reencoding with FRIM or MVCEnc corrupts the sei message inside the mvc stream and therefore makes it impossible to set any depth values...

[r0lZ]

Thanks for the precisions.

Originally Posted by geheim

Using a value of -7 worked for me so far, because the subtitles are then displayed way in front of the Screen and I've never seen a movie in which the subtitles cut through objects in this case.

I'm not familiar with Scenarist, but the -7 value seems strange. It seems that Scenarist has adopted the inverse of what is effectively stored in the offset sequence of the final BD, where a negative value means beneath the screen. And a depth of 7 seems pretty small for many BDs. As I wrote above, some 3D-Planes of commercial BDs have some depth values of 40 or even more. But indeed, 7 may be a good starting point.

I remember I've read somewhere that Scenarist can accept .ofs files (with dynamic depths) as well. It's why I've changed the old BD3D2MK3D 3D-Planes file format from .3dp to .ofs (with just an additional header). I've never tried, but the new .ofs files should be compatible with Scenarist and/or other authoring programs or muxers.

Originally Posted by geheim

Note that this does only work with original stream files. Reencoding with FRIM or MVCEnc corrupts the sei message inside the mvc stream and therefore makes it impossible to set any depth values...

BTW, I wonder if it is possible to write a little exe that replaces the original values of one or all 3D-Plane(s) in an original MVC stream with modified values. Finding the right SEI messages and replacing the values is certainly possible, but I suppose that some checksums must be modified as well, and that's probably much more difficult. And that doesn't solve the problem of the missing SEI messages in re-encoded streams.

[geheim]

Originally Posted by r0lZ

Thanks for the precisions.
I'm not familiar with Scenarist, but the -7 value seems strange. It seems that Scenarist has adopted the inverse of what is effectively stored in the offset sequence of the final BD, where a negative value means beneath the screen. And a depth of 7 seems pretty small for many BDs. As I wrote above, some 3D-Planes of commercial BDs have some depth values of 40 or even more. But indeed, 7 may be a good starting point.

Negative values in Scenarist result in objects appearing closer to you (in front of the Screen), positive values appear farer away (inside the Screen). I don't know if this is the inverse of what is stored inside the final output...

The value of -7 is just my personal experience. I did quite a few remuxes of 3D Blurays with their according subtitles and a value of -7 was never distracting when watching the movies. Also I noticed that higher values result in more Ghosting effects on some TVs, because of the higher discrepancy between left and right... Ghosting appears often if White objects are on black Background, and this is exactly how subtitles are often displayed.
So, I think you could start testing a bit using -7. I wouldn't take less, but of Course a bit more couldn't be that bad either

Originally Posted by r0lZ

I remember I've read somewhere that Scenarist can accept .ofs files (with dynamic depths) as well. It's why I've changed the old BD3D2MK3D 3D-Planes file format from .3dp to .ofs (with just an additional header). I've never tried, but the new .ofs files should be compatible with Scenarist and/or other authoring programs or muxers.

Yes Scenarist accepts .ofs files in theory, although I never got it working unfortunately... I don't know why, but if I used an .ofs file for the depth I just got flat Subs all the time, which means not a single depth Setting is applied correctly. I don't know if there is an error in the .ofs from BD3D2MK3D or in Scenarist itself...

Originally Posted by r0lZ

BTW, I wonder if it is possible to write a little exe that replaces the original values of one or all 3D-Plane(s) in an original MVC stream with modified values. Finding the right SEI messages and replacing the values is certainly possible, but I suppose that some checksums must be modified as well, and that's probably much more difficult. And that doesn't solve the problem of the missing SEI messages in re-encoded streams.

This would be quite interesting! Do you think it is possible to replace the SEI Messages without reencoding?? I always thought this could only be done with reencoding, and using professional Encoders only.
Of Course, if some checksums are applied it wouldn't work that easily, but it certainly would be worth investigating I assume.
Perhaps if we knew how the SEI message Needs to be inserted inside the stream, we could also just add it to FRIM-encoded streams after encoding?!?

[r0lZ]

Originally Posted by geheim

Negative values in Scenarist result in objects appearing closer to you (in front of the Screen), positive values appear farer away (inside the Screen). I don't know if this is the inverse of what is stored inside the final output...

Yes, it's the inverse of the content of the "real" 3D-Planes and the content of the .OFS files. It's also the inverse of the convention widely used in the 3D infographic world, where the Z axis is always directed toward the spectator.

For the 7 (or -7) value, I fully agree that it's a good starting point. At least if the values in Scenarist are equal to the values in the .ofs files (except the sign). Usually, for a constant depth, I try with something between 6 and 10 depending of the movie, but there are usually at least 10 or 20 subtitles that need manual adjustments. A constant depth of 20, for example, will certainly require less adjustments, but the subtitles are so far from the screen that it's certainly not a value to recommend.

Note also that BD3D2MK3D offers also another way to be sure that the subtitles do not enter in the objects. When a movie is shot in Cinemascope format, it has large horizontal black borders. In the last tab, you can move the picture up in the screen, and if the bottom border is large enough, the subtitles will appear in that border, beneath the picture. That's not perfect, but it's less unpleasant than subtitles entering the objects. Anyway, it's not a solution when the video is not re-encoded.

Originally Posted by geheim

Yes Scenarist accepts .ofs files in theory, although I never got it working unfortunately... I don't know why, but if I used an .ofs file for the depth I just got flat Subs all the time, which means not a single depth Setting is applied correctly. I don't know if there is an error in the .ofs from BD3D2MK3D or in Scenarist itself...

Hum, strange. Are you sure that the offset sequences are correctly referenced in the MPLS files? It is not sufficient to attach them to the MVC stream. It is also necessary to link the subtitle stream and the OFS together. You can verify if the links are correct with BD3D2MK3D, or with TSMuxeR (at least when it doesn't have the bug described in a previous post).

Originally Posted by geheim

This would be quite interesting! Do you think it is possible to replace the SEI Messages without reencoding?? I always thought this could only be done with reencoding, and using professional Encoders only.
Of Course, if some checksums are applied it wouldn't work that easily, but it certainly would be worth investigating I assume.
Perhaps if we knew how the SEI message Needs to be inserted inside the stream, we could also just add it to FRIM-encoded streams after encoding?!?

Well, currently, BD3D2MK3D can retrieve the 3D-Planes from the previously demuxed MVC stream (with MVCPlanes2OFS.exe, written by Nico8583). Since the 3D-Planes are simply collections of depth values (one byte per frame and per 3D-Plane), it is certainly possible to do the opposite, and overwrite the original depth values with edited or new values. Furthermore, many (but not all) 3DBD have the maximum number of 3D-Planes (32), even if only a couple of them are really used and contain meaningful depth values. That leaves much place for experimenting. Of course, the MVC stream must then be remuxed and the 3D-Planes correctly assigned to the subtitle streams, but that can be done with TSMuxeR.
As I wrote, it might be difficult to do it due to checksums or other difficulties. My knowledge of the structure of the MVC stream is not sufficient to be sure that it's possible, but I can do some little tests. But is it really interesting? What will be the benefit of replacing a 3D-Plane in an original MVC stream (supposed to contain already good 3D-Planes) with a constant depth? Without a full 3D-Subtitles editor, that doesn't make much sense.
Adding totally new SEI messages in the MVC stream is also a big challenge. I don't even know if it's the job of the MVC encoder, of the muxer or even of a dedicated application.

Finally, I'm not sure I'm the right person to develop a program to generate or replace 3D-Planes. BD3D2MK3D is not at all dedicated to do that. It does exactly the opposite and uses the original 3D-Planes only to create "3D Subtitle" streams for SBS or T&B format. I have no intention to write something to modify the existing 3DBD and recreate an ISO. However, I have some free time right now, and I will try to modify manually the 3D-Planes of an original MVC, and see if it is still accepted by the muxer and the players. If it's the case, it might be interesting to investigate further...

[geheim]

Originally Posted by r0lZ

Note also that BD3D2MK3D offers also another way to be sure that the subtitles do not enter in the objects. When a movie is shot in Cinemascope format, it has large horizontal black borders. In the last tab, you can move the picture up in the screen, and if the bottom border is large enough, the subtitles will appear in that border, beneath the picture. That's not perfect, but it's less unpleasant than subtitles entering the objects. Anyway, it's not a solution when the video is not re-encoded.

I didn't know that, thanks for the info! Could be useful sometimes, many subtitles will be much nicer on the black bars!

Originally Posted by r0lZ

Hum, strange. Are you sure that the offset sequences are correctly referenced in the MPLS files? It is not sufficient to attach them to the MVC stream. It is also necessary to link the subtitle stream and the OFS together. You can verify if the links are correct with BD3D2MK3D, or with TSMuxeR (at least when it doesn't have the bug described in a previous post).

I can try that again in the next time. It was some time ago that I last tried .ofs with Scenarist and can't really remember if perhaps I did something wrong. I'll Report back once I could look into it again!

Originally Posted by r0lZ

But is it really interesting? What will be the benefit of replacing a 3D-Plane in an original MVC stream (supposed to contain already good 3D-Planes) with a constant depth? Without a full 3D-Subtitles editor, that doesn't make much sense.
Adding totally new SEI messages in the MVC stream is also a big challenge. I don't even know if it's the job of the MVC encoder, of the muxer or even of a dedicated application.

Well if we succeed in replacing SEI Messages we would first of all know if there are in deed some checksums applied etc. If just replacing the values works there are None This means we could insert constant depth values in movies which come without subtitle depth.
And then we could also look into inserting the SEI Messages to FRIM Encodes, which could be very useful, because every re-encode now has the Problem of missing depth for the subtitles...
So I think we could learn a bit from this.

[r0lZ]

Originally Posted by geheim

So I think we could learn a bit from this.

I agree, and I did the test.

I've just replaced all depth values in a short clip with constant values. The original BD has 32-planes, all of them being undefined (containing the value 0x80, meaning "not defined" for all frames of all 3D-Planes). I've replaced plane #0 with constant depth 1, plane #1 with depth 2, and so on up to depth 32. Then I've remuxed the BD with TsMuxeR and assigned planes #5 and #31 to the two subtitle streams. The final ISO can be read without problem with any software player, but that's not surprising, since they don't use the MVC stream. So, I burned the ISO, and my Samsung 3D BD player has played the movie in 3D without problem, and the two subtitle streams are at the right depth. :-)

So, it seems that it is at least possible to replace the existing depth values with other ones without problem. Adding new 3D-Planes to a remuxed MVC is another problem, and I can't and don't want to do that. Perhaps Videofan3D for FRIM? Or Roman if he decides to continue to develop TsMuxeR? Anyway, it's not something to integrate in BD3D2MK3D, that does just the opposite.

[geheim]

Originally Posted by r0lZ

I agree, and I did the test.

I've just replaced all depth values in a short clip with constant values. The original BD has 32-planes, all of them being undefined (containing the value 0x80, meaning "not defined" for all frames of all 3D-Planes). I've replaced plane #0 with constant depth 1, plane #1 with depth 2, and so on up to depth 32. Then I've remuxed the BD with TsMuxeR and assigned planes #5 and #31 to the two subtitle streams. The final ISO can be read without problem with any software player, but that's not surprising, since they don't use the MVC stream. So, I burned the ISO, and my Samsung 3D BD player has played the movie in 3D without problem, and the two subtitle streams are at the right depth. :-)


So, it seems that it is at least possible to replace the existing depth values with other ones without problem. Adding new 3D-Planes to a remuxed MVC is another problem, and I can't and don't want to do that. Perhaps Videofan3D for FRIM? Or Roman if he decides to continue to develop TsMuxeR? Anyway, it's not something to integrate in BD3D2MK3D, that does just the opposite.

Awesome that you got it working! So how did you do it?? Was it enough to just replace the depth values?? Or was there any checksums etc. which you needed to modify as well??

So, we can definitely add depth to original mvc encoded files, if they have plain subtitles but the correct sei Header, that's something!
Regarding frim encodes: Is the SEI message always stored at the same Offset inside the mvc stream?? Perhaps we could just copy the Header and SEI info from another original mvc file and inject it into a frim-encoded mvc file??

Anyways, I understand that you don't want to look into that issue. Perhaps @videofan3D could take a look into it as we now know that modifying sei message values is definitely possible?? It should be possible to let FRIM insert them correctly as well (or Keep the original depth values intact)! This would be awesome, because it's really the last Thing we cannot do with free Tools regarding 3D Encoding or backups.

Thanks r0lZ for your tests!!

[r0lZ]

I've just replaced the depth values, without touching anything else. I have no idea of what should be changed to add new 3D-Planes instead of simply overwriting existing planes, but I know that there must be one SEI message with the 3D-Planes per GOP (hence the different number of frames in many message). IMO, the difficulty is not the SEI message itself or its header (and the content of the 3D-Plane header within the SEI message is more or less known). It is certainly possible to build new messages from scratch, but IMO it is more difficult to know where they have to be inserted in the original MVC stream, and how the MVC stream must be modified if necessary. And that's beyond my knowledge.

Unfortunately, it is impossible to keep the original depth values intact, as you suggest, because the MVC stream is re-encoded by the Intel encoder, and it doesn't have an option to add or copy the 3D-Planes, If it's possible, FRIM will have to analyse the bitstream it receives from the Intel encoder, and add the messages when appropriate. Or just do a second pass to add them afterwards. I really don't know.

Anyway, I did that test just out of curiosity, and in the hope that someone else will be interested in developing something really usable, but as I wrote above, it's not useful for BD3D2MK3D, so that will not be me.

BTW, normally, Scenarist should be able to build a BD with the 3D-Planes. I don't know if it does it correctly, and you wrote that the OFS files saved by BD3D2MK3D are not taken into account, but Scenarist may perhaps be used to add the 3D-Planes to the MVC stream only, and tsMuxeR may still be used for the mux and to build the ISO. That should work. Anyway, currently, it's probably the only solution available to add the 3D-Planes to a re-encoded MVC.

Hi,

i have not used your program for a while and now i have used it again but the image is too narrow or squeezed. The movie has not the full height, no matter what player i use (Infuse, MrMC or Plex on my AppleTV 4). I don't know what it is or where the problem is. I tried the Fullsize-Option instead of Halfsize-Option but then the image/video is even narrower.

[r0lZ]

Hum, I really don't know what could be the cause of the problem, but for Full-SBS or T&B, you should try to play with Settings -> Full-SBS/T&B aspect ratio. However, that options only affect the aspect ratio in "full" mode and should have no impact when using half-SBS or half-T&B. But try it anyway, as it is well known that the correct aspect ratio settings to use are not clearly defined for SBS or T&B and the selected aspect ratio may not be correctly supported by your player or hardware.

For Half-SBS/T&B, the aspect ratio cannot be changed via the GUI because, until now, the settings used by BD3D2MK3D have always worked perfectly with all players and hardware. But you can try to change them manually in the project files before launching the encoding. The following settings may have an impact on the final aspect ratio:

In __ENCODE_3D.cmd:

--sar 1:1

Try with 2:1 or 1:2 for Half-SBS or T&B. You can also try to simply remove this setting from the __ENCODE_3D.cmd file. Without the explicit sample aspect ratio, maybe your player will assume the correct value automatically.
(This setting affects the h264 elementary video stream. That means that you have to re-encode the whole movie if you want to test another value. I suggest to do your tests with a short clip.)

In __MUX_3D_OPTIONS.txt:

--aspect-ratio
0:16/9

IMO, this one should not be changed, but who knows? Try 0:32/9 and 0:16/18.
(This setting is only stored in the MKV header, and therefore you can simply launch __MUX_3D.cmd after having modified it to regenerate the final MKV without having to re-encode the movie. It is also possible to modify that value directly in the MKV with mkvtoolnix.)

If you can find a setting that works fine for you, please let me know and I'll add an option to control the required settings in the GUI.

What is the option you have selected for the 3D format? Half-SBS or half-T&B? And can you confirm that the image is squashed by a factor of two (in other words, can you confirm that the image is twice as high or large than it should be? If it's the case, that may mean that indeed, one of the settings above must be changed, although IMO it is the responsibility of the player to handle correctly the aspect ratio of the 3D movies. (It's also why a 3D movie MUST ALWAYS be encoded in full 16:9, without cropping the black borders, as many TVs assume that a 3D movie must always be played full-screen, regardless of the aspect ratios stored in the file. It seems that it's not the case of your AppleTV.)

I tried to watch the 3D Movie (the mkv, not the Bluray) on my Panasonic 4K UHD Player and there the Movie looks normal. Under the Player MrMC in my Apple TV i can change the Pixel Ratio in the options from 1.00 to 0.50 and then the Movie Looks normal. Sorry i'm no Profi and i don't know what to do.

[r0lZ]

So, you have a solution for your Apple TV if you use the MrMC player, and you don't need a modification of BD3D2MK3D. Right?

The problem is that there is no established standard for the aspect ratios of the SBS and T&B frame packings. It is possible to consider that the specified aspect ratio gives the display aspect ratio (DAR) of the original image or the DAR of the target image, and it's very different. In Full-SBS, for example, the original DAR is 32:9, because there are 2 images side by side (3840x1080 pixels), but when the movie is played, the original image is split in two 16:9 views (1920x1080 pixels each). In Full-SBS, the sample aspect ratio (SAR) is 1:1 for the original and target images. In the other hand, for the Half-SBS mode, the DAR of the original and target images are 16:9, but it's different for the SAR, since the image must be stretched horizontally. Unfortunately, due to the lack of a well established standard, the player is free to consider that the DAR and/or SAR are specified for the original or target image, and there is no good solution for BD3D2MK3D. It's why there is an option in BD3D2MK3D, but currently only for the two Full modes because I have never needed to specify different aspect ratios in Half-SBS or Half-T&B. Since your MrMC player allows you to overwrite the SAR manually with a pixel aspect ratio (PAR), it is open to the two solutions, but you should encode the best SAR and DAR anyway. But take care! As you know now, it's not because a specific combination of SAR and DAR values works fine with a specific player that it will work correctly with all players.

BTW, I forgot to explain that you can also remove completely the "--sar 1:1" option in __ENCODE_3D.cmd. If I remember correctly, old versions of BD3D2MK3D did not specify that parameter at all, and that may be what you need to let the player deduce the SAR from the specified PAR in the MKV header. If the problem of the wrong aspect ratio has appeared recently and is not due to a change in your hardware or software, that may be the best solution. Try it! But I don't know if the SAR is forced by x264 or x265 to 1:1 anyway when it is not specified explicitly, and therefore I don't know if removing that argument will have a real effect.

Note also that most players will take only one of the two specified aspect ratios into account. If, say, the 1:1 SAR works fine with a specific player, you may have to check the different possibilities of the DAR with the other players. You have to experiment to find the best solution for your player(s). And remember that I can modify BD3D2MK3D if you need different parameters for the SAR and/or DAR in Half-SBS or Half-T&B modes.

Between the first use of your software an today, i changed the TV from Sony to Panasonic. Perhaps thats the "Problem"?

[r0lZ]

Perhaps, indeed. I don't know if the Panasonic TVs handle the aspect ratios of the 3D movies differently than the vast majority of the players, but that may be the case. Or is it a setting to change that behaviour in the Panasonic TV?