[HacktionLab] [Escapegoat] DEPENDENCY CHANGE: video improvements

[JimDog]

Crikey.

Perhaps at the upcoming BradLab we could compile this for northern and nottingham and make the binary from that.

Another idea would be to wrap it up as a debian .deb package whilst we're at it that could be hosted on the goat. We could also do the same with swftools perhaps.

Could the same be done with hyperactive itself? It would make it really easy to roll out the latest stable version that way and might make us a little more disciplined when it comes to new releases.

Jimdog

http://northern-indymedia.org

----- Reply message -----
From: "yossarian" <yossarian at aktivix.org>
Date: Mon, Nov 1, 2010 15:20
Subject: [Escapegoat] DEPENDENCY CHANGE: video improvements
To: <escapegoat at lists.aktivix.org>

Hi,

I've done some code work to upgrade the quality of video on the London
site.  To see the quality difference, check out:

http://london.indymedia.org/videos/5849 (new)

vs

http://london.indymedia.org/videos/5716 (old)

As you can see, switching from the old H263 codec to the new libx264
codec brings a vast quality improvement for almost no increase in file
size. It does take longer to encode video, but to me waiting ten minutes
instead of one is way worth it considering the better quality.

The one disadvantage to the switch is that it requires that you install
a version of ffmpeg onto your server which can output libx264 encoded
mp4 videos.  Basically, it's a question of compiling ffmpeg with libx264
support. 

So.  Until you've got this kind of ffmpeg installed, *do not* upgrade
your site's running code to the latest trunk, because it won't do video
conversion anymore. 

We basically have the following options:

a) Me or somebody else can write up a tutorial on how to set up a build
of ffmpeg.

b) Somebody who has access to the relevant servers can just go ahead and
build ffmpeg and distribute a binary.

c) I can put a setting in the admin system (like "use old crappy codec",
"use new awesome codec").  This would allow people to choose.

In general, I'm not super-hip on option (c), primarily because this is
only the first stage of a general improvement of video handling in
Hyperactive, and in order to make that upgrade actually work properly,
people are going to need to be able to encode x264 server-side.

The reason for this is that I've been working quietly for the past
several weeks on upgrading the site so that it does HTML 5 video (x264
and Ogg) with a Flash player fallback.

So far it's looking really good (I've got the new code in a private
branch).  I am also working on a way to make re-encoding of everyones'
older videos a seamless and pleasant experience - maybe this can be a
major workshop at the Hacktionlab if people want to do it?  I think the
new video code can be ready for then.

Any takers on writing a "how to compile ffmpeg with libx264 support"
tutorial? I used this:

http://stream0.org/2008/01/install-ffmpeg-on-debian-etch.html

and this:

http://www.vps.net/forum/topic/820-how-to-install-ffmpeg-on-debian-lenny-from-svn-and-x264-from-git/page__view__findpost__p__6013

There were a few minor things I had to change but I didn't document them
as I went, because I'm an idiot.  If I remember right, there were
basically some extra output codecs I didn't need so I didn't bother
compiling them.



Yossarian

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