1 Topic by Mystery (edited by Mystery 24-06-2015 05:46:55)

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Topic: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

I finally released the software I was working on, the Natural Grounding Player,

available on Source Forge
.

EDIT: it is now instead re-deployed on GitHub. Screw Source Forge who deleted the project and never replied back.

It includes a Media Encoder that allows you to convert your videos to 60fps in just a few clicks.

This is MUCH simpler than following SubJunk's guide! Yet, I wouldn't have achieved this without first having those instructions.

Not only does this Media Encoder increase your videos to 60fps, but you can also greatly increase the resolution and image quality.

Here's a sample video before and after.

Also, it contains a SVP Setup Wizard that makes it easy to anyone to configure SVP and madVR to their optimal settings.

Enjoy!

2 Reply by Nintendo Maniac 64 (edited by Nintendo Maniac 64 18-06-2015 07:21:14)

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Big problem I found right away - it doesn't support a portable non-installed copy of MPC-HC.  Without this it won't even let me run the SVP setup wizard (which I'm assuming is what would let me tweak SVP's video settings?).  But even then, I'm honestly not really sure why it'd actually need MPC-HC to change any SVP settings...I mean, they're completely separate programs.

Also you may want to make it clear that encoding SVP and/or MadVR videos is not the main purpose of this program - this initially confused me greatly (and I'm even familiar with the program's subject matter!).


EDIT: And only 15 minutes after I downloaded the program installer, the project's page has going missing in action.  I haz a confused...


EDIT 2: Unless it's looking for the MPC-HC that comes with SVP?  Since I use stand-alone newer versions, I actually deleted the "mpc-hc" folder in the SVP program directory...


EDIT 3: I copied the "MPC-HC" folder from a fresh installation of SVP 3.1.6 (ran inside Sandboxie) into my normal SVP folder and even then the program says "MPC-HC not found".


EDIT 4: I have "Max Download Quality" set to 'Max', so why, for YouTube, is it downloading videos in h.264 format and not in VP9 format?  I mean, the video is just going to be re-encoded anyway so we don't really have to worry about VP9 player compatibility...


EDIT 5: Also downloading user videos (not the ones available by default through the program) to the program folder seems a bit odd... I would have expected them to be in either "%userprofile%\Downloads" or even something like "%userprofile%\Documents\Natural Grounding Player"

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

The whole project page disappeared from Source Forge !? I got no clue what happened there. I'll have to contact Source Forge.

This program uses MPC-HC because I need to be able to have control over the application. It is programmed specifically for it. It detects it in 2 ways: first, it looks for a registry key that MPC-HC should fill when it runs. If that registry key is not found, I look under the SVP folder. If you want to update MPC-HC, the best way is to simply replace the files in SVP's MPC-HC folder.

For downloading videos, I'm using this code. If you're having issues with it, can you give me a specific URL you're trying to download?
https://github.com/flagbug/YoutubeExtractor

I know there are issues with some downloads. I tried downloading only 480p videos and it was giving me corrupt files somehow, but didn't have time to investigate that.

4 Reply by Nintendo Maniac 64 (edited by Nintendo Maniac 64 18-06-2015 07:30:34)

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Mystery wrote:

The whole project page disappeared from Source Forge !? I got no clue what happened there. I'll have to contact Source Forge.

Considering the subject matter of your program... [insert conspiracy theory of choice here]

Mystery wrote:

If that registry key is not found, I look under the SVP folder.

Refer to "EDIT 3"

Mystery wrote:

If you're having issues with it, can you give me a specific URL you're trying to download?

Well I'm not having issues, it's just that VP9 would be the max quality available and yet it still gives me h.264 no matter the YouTube video...

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

They have made a lot of changes to their video formats lately. Do they offer VP9 only for 2k and 4k videos? Do they offer both H264 and VP9 for these? If both formats are available, then perhaps I'm only taking the highest resolution available and ignoring the format if there are 2 available.

As for what the software is truly about, that would be a more complex topic. I'm currently writing two books to explain that that will be published on Amazon.

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Even after running MPC-HC, it still doesn't detect it? It is supposed to be creating a registry key indicating its location... what version are you using?

7 Reply by Nintendo Maniac 64 (edited by Nintendo Maniac 64 18-06-2015 07:46:21)

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Mystery wrote:

They have made a lot of changes to their video formats lately. Do they offer VP9 only for 2k and 4k videos? Do they offer both H264 and VP9 for these? If both formats are available, then perhaps I'm only taking the highest resolution available and ignoring the format if there are 2 available.

VP9 is available for all resolutions that h.264 is available for.  Consider that it's YouTube's default format and has been for over a year now... in fact the new 60fps 1440p format is only available in VP9.

Here's a lengthy and quite in-depth thread on the subject:
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=170682


EDIT: Important thing to note though - not all videos (particularly older ones, especially old videos with low view counts) have VP9 encodings.  However, all videos should have h.264 encodings.


Mystery wrote:

Even after running MPC-HC, it still doesn't detect it? It is supposed to be creating a registry key indicating its location... what version are you using?

Using the newest (v1.7.9) but with it set to store the settings in a .ini file.  Also I did not run the MPC-HC that I copied from a fresh installation of SVP.

EDIT 2: I launched SVP's own MPC-HC (v1.7.3) one time and it still didn't work.  I went into the settings and disabled "save settings to .ini", clicked OK, changed a couple other options to make sure, and even then the program did not work.

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

To find MPC-HC, first I look at this registry key. What do you have there?
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\MPC-HC\MPC-HC\ExePath

If I don't find that, and you configured SVP's path in settings, then I will look for
C:\Program Files (x86)\SVP\MPC-HC\mpc-hc.exe (or wherever you configured SVP to be located)

9 Reply by Blackfyre (edited by Blackfyre 18-06-2015 07:59:28)

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Thanks for this, keeping an eye on it  smile I'll test later.

10 Reply by Nintendo Maniac 64 (edited by Nintendo Maniac 64 18-06-2015 08:15:02)

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Mystery wrote:

To find MPC-HC, first I look at this registry key. What do you have there?
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\MPC-HC\MPC-HC\ExePath

Well there's the problem, I have it but it's pointing to a location that only ever existed while I was testing SVP stuff several months ago.  I'll fix that and report back...


Mystery wrote:

If I don't find that, and you configured SVP's path in settings, then I will look for
C:\Program Files (x86)\SVP\MPC-HC\mpc-hc.exe (or wherever you configured SVP to be located)

Yup, I had that path correct.  However, the issue is the fact that I had a registry entry at all, regardless of it being valid, that was then preventing the program from falling back to just looking in the SVP folder.

Perhaps it'd be wiser to instead fallback to the SVP folder' if MPC is not found via the registry entry rather than if the registry entry just exists?


Also, if you aren't already doing this, it'd be more wise to use "%programfiles(x86)%\SVP\MPC-HC" as the folder path to SVP's bundled MPC-HC.exe file.


EDIT: There we go!  Sure enough, fixing the registry entry to point to an actual valid MPC-HC location made it work.  However, it's now 4am where I am, so I'll have to try out the rest of the program another time...

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Nintendo Maniac 64 wrote:

Perhaps it'd be wiser to instead fallback to the SVP folder' if MPC is not found via the registry entry rather than if the registry entry just exists?

Fixed

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Mystery
Thanks. Did you see InterFrameGUI?

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

The software itself is for doing stuff like this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ARlXguvJTk

I've seen people literally anti-age by 5 to 10 years in front of my eyes with what we're doing with it

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Perhaps I saw it quickly on time. InterFrameGUI does allow to convert to 60fps easily, but it doesn't have all of the other quick image enhancement features to convert from 240p to 720p. It also doesn't have all the dependencies that my application has.

Still no news from Source Forge about the missing project.

15 Reply by Mystery (edited by Mystery 18-06-2015 23:27:57)

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Ok I didn't know about the WebM format. I edited the code to use that if available. Thanks!

That also means all videos will need to be redownloaded...

Are WebM videos really better quality than MP4 ones?

Yes. The WebM is 356MB while the MP4 one is 245MB, although reading the thread you linked, people were saying WebM had lower bitrate. That doesn't seem to be true here.

It look like I'll have to program a tool to auto-redownload the entire playlist. Also detect broken download links along the way. Well... it would also serve to auto-download it to begin with for new users.

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Since I'm still without news from Source Forge, I'll go for Plan B and distribute it otherwise.

You can download the Natural Grounding Player here

17 Reply by Mystery (edited by Mystery 20-06-2015 02:25:01)

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Nintendo, downloading WebM instead of H264 gives mixed results... not sure what to think about it.

This video is 18.6MB in H264 and 22.9MB in WebM, which means the quality has to be definitely better.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E80TUBjw_Vs

This one, however, is 69.5MB in H264 and 30.3MB in WebM. I understand that it must be compressing better, but I can't imagine having higher quality with half the file size!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NB3NPNM4xgo

It seems that the WebM format is much less stable in terms of bitrate, with some videos being higher and others much lower. The video quality is probably sometimes higher, sometimes lower.

What are your thoughts on this?

I'm not concerned about the file size, but I want the highest quality available.

18 Reply by Mystery (edited by Mystery 20-06-2015 04:03:01)

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

I got a HD WebM file that is playing with 50% CPU usage WITHOUT SVP!!

I'm not sure WebM is any better than H264 when it comes to playing it locally with SVP. Unless the YouTube source is 60fps.

Edit: Woah... now after pausing and resuming, it plays at 20-30% *without SVP*, so there's definitely something else going on in terms of high CPU usage.

19 Reply by Nintendo Maniac 64 (edited by Nintendo Maniac 64 20-06-2015 08:17:09)

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Are you using the MPC-HC v1.7.3 that came with SVP 3.1.6?  If so, then it's no wonder you're seeing such poor performance -  the 32bit LAVfilters bundled with that version of MPC-HC had a very unoptimized VP9 decoder.  Modern versions of 32bit LAVfilters, such as though bundled with MPC-HC v1.7.8 and later, have a much more optimized VP9 decoder.

Alternatively, perhaps it would be better to just include a setting similar to SVPtube to select whether you want h.264 or VP9?  That way you could also take advantage of hardware acceleration if you want.  For non tech-savvy people, you could label the options as "h.264 (better performance(" and "VP9 (better quality)".


Lastly, you're falling for the video equivalent of the MHz myth - more bit rate is only higher quality if the format is the same.  Allow me to link to a post I made on Doom9 showing direct comparisons between the formats:
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p … ost1719952


Mystery wrote:

I've seen people literally anti-age by 5 to 10 years in front of my eyes with what we're doing with it

If I de-aged by that much then I'd be a child. tongue (9 months ago I was mistaken for being under 18, and I was 24!)

Random question - what is your nationality?  I don't recognize your accent from your video...

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

I'm French Canadian.

I'm already using MPC-HC v1.7.9

Nintendo Maniac 64 wrote:

Lastly, you're falling for the video equivalent of the MHz myth - more bit rate is only higher quality if the format is the same.  Allow me to link to a post I made on Doom9 showing direct comparisons between the formats:
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p … ost1719952

2kbps VP9 for sure is much higher quality than 1kbps VP9.

Whether 1kbps VP9 would be higher quality than 2kbps MP4, however, would need to be proved. The VP9 seems to look a bit more like plastic to me.

Overall, MP4 looks more grainy when reducing bitrate, while VP9 maintains the shapes but looks more like plastic. It's probably working with vectors of shapes.

Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Mystery wrote:

Overall, MP4 looks more grainy when reducing bitrate, while VP9 maintains the shapes but looks more like plastic. It's probably working with vectors of shapes.

If you need more comparisons, find any video of the game BeamNG DRIVE and look at the texture detail when in-motion.

22 Reply by Mystery (edited by Mystery 20-06-2015 19:56:33)

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

For now, I re-downloaded all my FLV into WebM. With some videos taking half the space, the quality is MUCH higher because FLV has always done a terrible job with videos.

As for MP4 vs VP9, you've taken the time to do plenty of comparison yourself? Are you 100% sure that VP9 provides a better quality than MP4 at half the bitrate?

I'm not convinced of it for all videos, and one option could be to look at the file sizes of MP4 and WebM before downloading and chosing based on the file size, but if you can tell me that you've done your homework and can guarantee that VP9 is a better option, then I could simply go for that.

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

I plugged the 1080p TV and compared some videos. I'm not convinced with WebM yet. It seems to do better at preserving edges while making images that look more "cartoonish". Furthermore, I had to lower SVP settings just for WebM videos.

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

Did you try the Media Encoder within the software? One person told me it wasn't working with his computer (issues with Spanish characters, and perhaps something else). Does it work on your computer?

25 Reply by Mystery (edited by Mystery 21-06-2015 05:12:57)

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Re: Convert Videos to 60fps in just a few clicks

From what I can observe, WebM thinks in terms of vectors while MP4 thinks in terms of pixels. For low-quality videos, the shapes get preserved with WebM while a lot of the noise gets discarded. With MP4, it just takes more bitrates to store the noise. So, it seems to be giving good results on SD videos from what I observed so far. For 1080p, however, I'm still not convinced, because the bitrate is too low to keep enough details to make it look natural. WebM is supposed to get increased benefits with 2K and 4K videos.