comparison DOCS/xml/en/encoding-guide.xml @ 21596:f551403d82a9

replace " with ", better readability

21595:5815f5c6d370

<!-- $Revision$ -->
<chapter id="encoding-guide">
<title>Encoding with <application>MEncoder</application></title>

<sect1 id="menc-feat-dvd-mpeg4">
<title>Making a high quality MPEG-4 (&quot;DivX&quot;)
  rip of a DVD movie</title>

<para>
One frequently asked question is &quot;How do I make the highest quality rip
for a given size?&quot;. Another question is &quot;How do I make the highest
quality DVD rip possible? I do not care about file size, I just want the best
quality.&quot;
</para>

<para>
The latter question is perhaps at least somewhat wrongly posed. After all, if
you do not care about file size, why not simply copy the entire MPEG-2 video

soon as the movie begins to play:
<screen>
demux_mpg: 24000/1001 fps progressive NTSC content detected, switching framerate.
</screen>
From this point forward, demux_mpg should never say it finds
&quot;30000/1001 fps NTSC content.&quot;
</para>

<para>
When you watch progressive video, you should never see any
interlacing. Beware, however, because sometimes there is a tiny bit

occurred.
</para>

<para>
Sometimes progressive video on DVDs is referred to as
&quot;soft-telecine&quot; because it is intended to
be telecined by the DVD player.
</para>
</sect3>

framerate changes when it plays telecined video.
</para>

<para>
Watching a telecined video, you will see interlacing artifacts that
seem to &quot;blink&quot;: they repeatedly appear and disappear.
You can look closely at this by
<orderedlist>
<listitem><screen>mplayer dvd://1</screen></listitem>
<listitem><para>
  Seek to a part with motion.

</orderedlist>
</para>

<para>
Sometimes telecined video on DVDs is referred to as
&quot;hard-telecine&quot;. Since hard-telecine is already 60000/1001 fields
per second, the DVD player plays the video without any manipulation.
</para>

<para>
Another way to tell if your source is telecined or not is to play

<title>Interlaced</title>

<para>
Interlaced video was originally filmed at 60000/1001 fields per second,
and stored on the DVD as 30000/1001 frames per second. The interlacing effect
(often called &quot;combing&quot;) is a result of combining pairs of
fields into frames. Each field is supposed to be 1/(60000/1001) seconds apart,
and when they are displayed simultaneously the difference is apparent.
</para>

<para>

<sect3 id="menc-feat-telecine-ident-mixedpt">
<title>Mixed progressive and telecine</title>

<para>
All of a &quot;mixed progressive and telecine&quot; video was originally
24000/1001 frames per second, but some parts of it ended up being telecined.
</para>

<para>
When <application>MPlayer</application> plays this category, it will
(often repeatedly) switch back and forth between &quot;30000/1001 fps NTSC&quot;
and &quot;24000/1001 fps progressive NTSC&quot;. Watch the bottom of
<application>MPlayer</application>'s output to see these messages.
</para>

<para>
You should check the &quot;30000/1001 fps NTSC&quot; sections to make sure
they are actually telecine, and not just interlaced.
</para>
</sect3>


<sect3 id="menc-feat-telecine-ident-mixedpi">
<title>Mixed progressive and interlaced</title>

<para>
In &quot;mixed progressive and interlaced&quot; content, progressive
and interlaced video have been spliced together.
</para>

<para>
This category looks just like &quot;mixed progressive and telecine&quot;,
until you examine the 30000/1001 fps sections and see that they do not have the
telecine pattern.
</para>
</sect3>
</sect2>

<para>
For most practical cases it is not possible to retrieve a complete
progressive video from interlaced content. The only way to do so
without losing half of the vertical resolution is to double the
framerate and try to &quot;guess&quot; what ought to make up the
corresponding lines for each field (this has drawbacks - see method 3).
</para>

<orderedlist>
<listitem><para>

<listitem><para>
  Use a deinterlacing filter before encoding. There are several of
  these filters available to choose from, each with its own advantages
  and disadvantages. Consult <option>mplayer -pphelp</option> and
  <option>mplayer -vf help</option> to see what is available
  (grep for &quot;deint&quot;), read Michael's Niedermayer
  <ulink url="http://guru.multimedia.cx/deinterlacing-filters/">Deinterlacing filters comparison</ulink>,
  and search the
  <ulink url="http://www.mplayerhq.hu/design7/mailing_lists.html">
  MPlayer mailing lists</ulink> to find many discussions about the
  various filters.

  work properly, <option>pullup</option> <emphasis role="bold">must</emphasis>
  be followed by the <option>softskip</option> filter or
  else <application>MEncoder</application> will crash.
  <option>pullup</option> is, however, the cleanest and most
  accurate method available for encoding both telecine and
  &quot;mixed progressive and telecine&quot;.
  <screen>
mencoder dvd://1 -oac copy -vf pullup,softskip 
    -ovc lavc -ofps 24000/1001<!--
  --></screen>
</para></listitem>

  display the video on an interlaced device (with a TV card, for
  example). If you have interlaced frames in a 24000/1001 frames per
  second video, they will be telecined along with the progressive
  frames. Half of the interlaced "frames" will be displayed for three
  fields' duration (3/(60000/1001) seconds), resulting in a flicking
  "jump back in time" effect that looks quite bad. If you
  even attempt this, you <emphasis role="bold">must</emphasis> use a
  deinterlacing filter like <option>lb</option> or
  <option>l5</option>.
  </para>

<listitem>
  <formalpara>
  <title>About cropping:</title>
  <para>
  Video data on DVDs are stored in a format called YUV 4:2:0. In YUV
  video, luma (&quot;brightness&quot;) and chroma (&quot;color&quot;)
  are stored separately. Because the human eye is somewhat less
  sensitive to color than it is to brightness, in a YUV 4:2:0 picture
  there is only one chroma pixel for every four luma pixels. In a
  progressive picture, each square of four luma pixels (two on each
  side) has one common chroma pixel. You must crop progressive YUV

A typical usage of this feature is to set the matrices preferred by the
<ulink url="http://www.kvcd.net/">KVCD</ulink> specifications.
</para>

<para>
The <emphasis role="bold">KVCD &quot;Notch&quot; Quantization Matrix:</emphasis>
</para>

<para>
Intra:
<screen>

Ultimately, only you can decide which options are best for your
purposes. The decision for the first class of options is the simplest:
you only have to decide whether you think the quality differences
justify the speed differences. For the second class of options,
preferences may be far more subjective, and more factors may be
involved. Note that some of the "personal preferences and special
requirements" options can still have large impacts on speed or quality,
but that is not what they are primarily useful for. A couple of the
"personal preference" options may even cause changes that look better
to some people, but look worse to others.
</para>

<para>
Before continuing, you need to understand that this guide uses only one

21596:f551403d82a9

<!-- $Revision$ -->
<chapter id="encoding-guide">
<title>Encoding with <application>MEncoder</application></title>

<sect1 id="menc-feat-dvd-mpeg4">
<title>Making a high quality MPEG-4 ("DivX")
  rip of a DVD movie</title>

<para>
One frequently asked question is "How do I make the highest quality rip
for a given size?". Another question is "How do I make the highest
quality DVD rip possible? I do not care about file size, I just want the best
quality."
</para>

<para>
The latter question is perhaps at least somewhat wrongly posed. After all, if
you do not care about file size, why not simply copy the entire MPEG-2 video

soon as the movie begins to play:
<screen>
demux_mpg: 24000/1001 fps progressive NTSC content detected, switching framerate.
</screen>
From this point forward, demux_mpg should never say it finds
"30000/1001 fps NTSC content."
</para>

<para>
When you watch progressive video, you should never see any
interlacing. Beware, however, because sometimes there is a tiny bit

occurred.
</para>

<para>
Sometimes progressive video on DVDs is referred to as
"soft-telecine" because it is intended to
be telecined by the DVD player.
</para>
</sect3>

framerate changes when it plays telecined video.
</para>

<para>
Watching a telecined video, you will see interlacing artifacts that
seem to "blink": they repeatedly appear and disappear.
You can look closely at this by
<orderedlist>
<listitem><screen>mplayer dvd://1</screen></listitem>
<listitem><para>
  Seek to a part with motion.

</orderedlist>
</para>

<para>
Sometimes telecined video on DVDs is referred to as
"hard-telecine". Since hard-telecine is already 60000/1001 fields
per second, the DVD player plays the video without any manipulation.
</para>

<para>
Another way to tell if your source is telecined or not is to play

<title>Interlaced</title>

<para>
Interlaced video was originally filmed at 60000/1001 fields per second,
and stored on the DVD as 30000/1001 frames per second. The interlacing effect
(often called "combing") is a result of combining pairs of
fields into frames. Each field is supposed to be 1/(60000/1001) seconds apart,
and when they are displayed simultaneously the difference is apparent.
</para>

<para>

<sect3 id="menc-feat-telecine-ident-mixedpt">
<title>Mixed progressive and telecine</title>

<para>
All of a "mixed progressive and telecine" video was originally
24000/1001 frames per second, but some parts of it ended up being telecined.
</para>

<para>
When <application>MPlayer</application> plays this category, it will
(often repeatedly) switch back and forth between "30000/1001 fps NTSC"
and "24000/1001 fps progressive NTSC". Watch the bottom of
<application>MPlayer</application>'s output to see these messages.
</para>

<para>
You should check the "30000/1001 fps NTSC" sections to make sure
they are actually telecine, and not just interlaced.
</para>
</sect3>


<sect3 id="menc-feat-telecine-ident-mixedpi">
<title>Mixed progressive and interlaced</title>

<para>
In "mixed progressive and interlaced" content, progressive
and interlaced video have been spliced together.
</para>

<para>
This category looks just like "mixed progressive and telecine",
until you examine the 30000/1001 fps sections and see that they do not have the
telecine pattern.
</para>
</sect3>
</sect2>

<para>
For most practical cases it is not possible to retrieve a complete
progressive video from interlaced content. The only way to do so
without losing half of the vertical resolution is to double the
framerate and try to "guess" what ought to make up the
corresponding lines for each field (this has drawbacks - see method 3).
</para>

<orderedlist>
<listitem><para>

<listitem><para>
  Use a deinterlacing filter before encoding. There are several of
  these filters available to choose from, each with its own advantages
  and disadvantages. Consult <option>mplayer -pphelp</option> and
  <option>mplayer -vf help</option> to see what is available
  (grep for "deint"), read Michael's Niedermayer
  <ulink url="http://guru.multimedia.cx/deinterlacing-filters/">Deinterlacing filters comparison</ulink>,
  and search the
  <ulink url="http://www.mplayerhq.hu/design7/mailing_lists.html">
  MPlayer mailing lists</ulink> to find many discussions about the
  various filters.

  work properly, <option>pullup</option> <emphasis role="bold">must</emphasis>
  be followed by the <option>softskip</option> filter or
  else <application>MEncoder</application> will crash.
  <option>pullup</option> is, however, the cleanest and most
  accurate method available for encoding both telecine and
  "mixed progressive and telecine".
  <screen>
mencoder dvd://1 -oac copy -vf pullup,softskip 
    -ovc lavc -ofps 24000/1001<!--
  --></screen>
</para></listitem>

  display the video on an interlaced device (with a TV card, for
  example). If you have interlaced frames in a 24000/1001 frames per
  second video, they will be telecined along with the progressive
  frames. Half of the interlaced "frames" will be displayed for three
  fields' duration (3/(60000/1001) seconds), resulting in a flicking
  "jump back in time" effect that looks quite bad. If you
  even attempt this, you <emphasis role="bold">must</emphasis> use a
  deinterlacing filter like <option>lb</option> or
  <option>l5</option>.
  </para>

<listitem>
  <formalpara>
  <title>About cropping:</title>
  <para>
  Video data on DVDs are stored in a format called YUV 4:2:0. In YUV
  video, luma ("brightness") and chroma ("color")
  are stored separately. Because the human eye is somewhat less
  sensitive to color than it is to brightness, in a YUV 4:2:0 picture
  there is only one chroma pixel for every four luma pixels. In a
  progressive picture, each square of four luma pixels (two on each
  side) has one common chroma pixel. You must crop progressive YUV

A typical usage of this feature is to set the matrices preferred by the
<ulink url="http://www.kvcd.net/">KVCD</ulink> specifications.
</para>

<para>
The <emphasis role="bold">KVCD "Notch" Quantization Matrix:</emphasis>
</para>

<para>
Intra:
<screen>

Ultimately, only you can decide which options are best for your
purposes. The decision for the first class of options is the simplest:
you only have to decide whether you think the quality differences
justify the speed differences. For the second class of options,
preferences may be far more subjective, and more factors may be
involved. Note that some of the "personal preferences and special
requirements" options can still have large impacts on speed or quality,
but that is not what they are primarily useful for. A couple of the
"personal preference" options may even cause changes that look better
to some people, but look worse to others.
</para>

<para>
Before continuing, you need to understand that this guide uses only one