[MPlayer-users] Encoding with libx264

Discussion:

bugzzzz

2017-10-16 21:15:23 UTC

Hello,

I am new to this mailing list.
And as there is no forum or other place to look for issues already posted, here is my problem :

I have just compiled mplayer-checkout-2017-10-17 to test libx264 codec.
http://www.mplayerhq.hu/DOCS/HTML/en/MPlayer.html#menc-feat-x264 recommend for example the following options for high quality encoding :
subq=5:8x8dct:frameref=2:bframes=3:b_pyramid=normal:weight_b

But when I run the 1st pass encoding process, I get the following result :
/usr/local/mplayer-checkout-2017-10-17/bin/mencoder //home/azor/tmp/t1c1 -nosound -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=libx264:vbitrate=1000:subq=5:8x8dct:frameref=2:bframes=3:b_pyramid=normal:weight_b:turbo:vpass=1 -vf pp=,scale=-1 -o /dev/null

MEncoder UNKNOWN-4.9.2 (C) 2000-2017 MPlayer Team
Option lavcopts: Unknown suboption 8x8dct
Error parsing option on the command line: -lavcopts

Exiting... (error parsing command line)

It seems that "8x8dct" option is not recognized by mencoder whereas it is documented in http://www.mplayerhq.hu and mplayer/mencoder man pages.

Could you tell me more about this option ?

Thanks a lot.

bugzzzz

2017-10-18 16:18:31 UTC

Permalink

I tried a lot of options with mencoder and H.264 codec (libx264 from lavc and x264enc) and nothing works.
It seems that mencoder does not support H.264 codec any more as runtime messages display "broken ffmpeg default settings detected" and propose options not supported by mencoder. So the mencoder man pages are outdated !
So, could you confirm that mencoder does not support encoding with H.264 codec family ?
Thank you.

Post by bugzzzz
Hello,
I am new to this mailing list.
I have just compiled mplayer-checkout-2017-10-17 to test libx264 codec.
subq=5:8x8dct:frameref=2:bframes=3:b_pyramid=normal:weight_b
/usr/local/mplayer-checkout-2017-10-17/bin/mencoder //home/azor/tmp/t1c1 -nosound -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=libx264:vbitrate=1000:subq=5:8x8dct:frameref=2:bframes=3:b_pyramid=normal:weight_b:turbo:vpass=1 -vf pp=,scale=-1 -o /dev/null
MEncoder UNKNOWN-4.9.2 (C) 2000-2017 MPlayer Team
Option lavcopts: Unknown suboption 8x8dct
Error parsing option on the command line: -lavcopts
Exiting... (error parsing command line)
It seems that "8x8dct" option is not recognized by mencoder whereas it is documented in http://www.mplayerhq.hu and mplayer/mencoder man pages.
Could you tell me more about this option ?
Thanks a lot.
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Mike Hodson

2017-10-18 16:25:22 UTC

Permalink

I think the generally accepted consensus is to not use mencoder, and
instead use ffmpeg directly..
At least that's the only thing that's worked for me in the past 10
years.......

Mike

bugzzzz

2017-10-18 17:01:44 UTC

Permalink

Thank you Mike

I've been using mencoder for many years with mpeg4 codec without problem and wanted to upgrade myself with better codecs.
So I understand I have taken 10 years more !!
That's life.
And what is the future of mplayer/mencoder and what is its position beside ffmpeg ?

Christian

Post by Mike Hodson
I think the generally accepted consensus is to not use mencoder, and
instead use ffmpeg directly..
At least that's the only thing that's worked for me in the past 10
years.......
Mike
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MPlayer-users mailing list
https://lists.mplayerhq.hu/mailman/listinfo/mplayer-users

Alexander Strasser

2017-10-22 10:32:06 UTC

Permalink

Hi Christian,

Post by bugzzzz
Thank you Mike
I've been using mencoder for many years with mpeg4 codec without problem and wanted to upgrade myself with better codecs.
So I understand I have taken 10 years more !!
That's life.
And what is the future of mplayer/mencoder and what is its position beside ffmpeg ?

not much work has been done to maintain and improve mencoder in the
last 10 years. But it is working quite stable for some particular
use cases for even more than 10 years now.

Should there be specific problems, reporting them on our bug tracker
might be a good way to get them fixed eventually.

Using ffmpeg instead of mencoder can be a good and fun idea, depending
on how well ffmpeg supports your use case at hand. Using both to solve
a particular task is fine as well. Also tools like ffprobe from FFmpeg
might come in handy to expect the intermediate and end results.

Now to the bad news for today :(

Build for mplayer and mencoder is currently broken and I am busy fixing
that.

Building MPlayer with internal FFmpeg only works up to FFmpeg commit 4c0a8ff061

After that is out of the way, I am happy to look at your original
problem. From the first reading of your initial mail it's likely a
usage and/or documentation problem.

Alexander

Post by bugzzzz

Alexander Strasser

2017-11-05 13:59:24 UTC

Permalink

Hi!

Post by bugzzzz
I tried a lot of options with mencoder and H.264 codec (libx264 from lavc and x264enc) and nothing works.
It seems that mencoder does not support H.264 codec any more as runtime messages display "broken ffmpeg default settings detected" and propose options not supported by mencoder. So the mencoder man pages are outdated !
So, could you confirm that mencoder does not support encoding with H.264 codec family ?
Thank you.

It's important to not mix up option names between ve lavc and ve x264.

This is your original command changed to ve x264 (-ovc x264 and -x264encopts):

mencoder //home/azor/tmp/t1c1 -nosound -ovc x264 -x264encopts bitrate=1000:subq=5:8x8dct:frameref=2:bframes=3:b_pyramid=normal:weight_b:pass=1 -vf pp=,scale=-1 -o /dev/null

I didn't check if those encoding settings make sense. Also I don't know
if you really need and want to do multi-pass encoding.

BTW there is still an mencoder ML which might spawn better answers to
your mencoder questions:

https://mplayerhq.hu/design7/mailing_lists.html
-> MEncoder-users: general support mailing list for MEncoder-related questions.

Best regards,
Alexander

Post by bugzzzz

bugzzzz

2017-11-07 21:38:39 UTC

Permalink

Thank you for your answer.

Post by Alexander Strasser
Hi!

It's important to not mix up option names between ve lavc and ve x264.
mencoder //home/azor/tmp/t1c1 -nosound -ovc x264 -x264encopts bitrate=1000:subq=5:8x8dct:frameref=2:bframes=3:b_pyramid=normal:weight_b:pass=1 -vf pp=,scale=-1 -o /dev/null

I tried these parameters and it seems to be OK.

Post by Alexander Strasser
I didn't check if those encoding settings make sense. Also I don't know
if you really need and want to do multi-pass encoding.
BTW there is still an mencoder ML which might spawn better answers to
https://mplayerhq.hu/design7/mailing_lists.html
-> MEncoder-users: general support mailing list for MEncoder-related questions.
Best regards,
Alexander

But what I don't understand is the difference between H.264 codecs from mencoder :
-ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=libx264
-ovc x264 -x264encopts
and from ffmpeg :
-c:v libx264

As ffmpeg is downloaded an built when building mplayer-checkout-snapshot.*, are these codecs different ?
And if they are, what is the most reliable ?

I tried ffmpeg and got a better result in term of aspect ratio in smplayer with ffmpeg (-c:v libx264) than with mencoder but the -pre options in ffmpeg are outdated in the provided package.

Post by Alexander Strasser
Using ffmpeg instead of mencoder can be a good and fun idea, depending
on how well ffmpeg supports your use case at hand. Using both to solve
a particular task is fine as well. Also tools like ffprobe from FFmpeg
might come in handy to expect the intermediate and end results.

Unfortunately, ffprobe is very poor at identifying the different parts (titles, chapters, ...) of a dvd so I'm trying to mix mplayer and ffmpeg.

Thank you for your advices.

Christian