Ffmpeg
From charlesreid1
Introduction
ffmpeg is an all-in-one video conversion swiss army knife. The power of ffmpeg lies in its ability to convert just about anything to just about anything else.
You can do a number of different operations, but these can be roughly grouped into a few categories.
It is easy to see the flexibility and limitless combinations of conversions possible by typing
$ ffmpegwhich returns all of the options available:
usage: ffmpeg [[infile options] -i infile]... {[outfile options] outfile}...
Hyper fast Audio and Video encoder
Main options:
-L show license
-h show help
-version show version
-formats show available formats, codecs, protocols, ...
-f fmt force format
-img img_fmt force image format
-i filename input file name
-y overwrite output files
-t duration set the recording time
-fs limit_size set the limit file size
-ss time_off set the start time offset
-itsoffset time_off set the input ts offset
-title string set the title
-timestamp time set the timestamp
-author string set the author
-copyright string set the copyright
-comment string set the comment
-v verbose control amount of logging
-target type specify target file type ("vcd", "svcd", "dvd", "dv", "dv50", "pal-vcd", "ntsc-svcd", ...)
-dframes number set the number of data frames to record
-scodec codec force subtitle codec ('copy' to copy stream)
-newsubtitle add a new subtitle stream to the current output stream
-slang code set the ISO 639 language code (3 letters) of the current subtitle stream
Video options:
-b bitrate set video bitrate (in kbit/s)
-vframes number set the number of video frames to record
-r rate set frame rate (Hz value, fraction or abbreviation)
-s size set frame size (WxH or abbreviation)
-aspect aspect set aspect ratio (4:3, 16:9 or 1.3333, 1.7777)
-croptop size set top crop band size (in pixels)
-cropbottom size set bottom crop band size (in pixels)
-cropleft size set left crop band size (in pixels)
-cropright size set right crop band size (in pixels)
-padtop size set top pad band size (in pixels)
-padbottom size set bottom pad band size (in pixels)
-padleft size set left pad band size (in pixels)
-padright size set right pad band size (in pixels)
-padcolor color set color of pad bands (Hex 000000 thru FFFFFF)
-vn disable video
-bt tolerance set video bitrate tolerance (in kbit/s)
-maxrate bitrate set max video bitrate tolerance (in kbit/s)
-minrate bitrate set min video bitrate tolerance (in kbit/s)
-bufsize size set ratecontrol buffer size (in kByte)
-vcodec codec force video codec ('copy' to copy stream)
-sameq use same video quality as source (implies VBR)
-pass n select the pass number (1 or 2)
-passlogfile file select two pass log file name
-newvideo add a new video stream to the current output stream
Advanced Video options:
-pix_fmt format set pixel format
-g gop_size set the group of picture size
-intra use only intra frames
-vdt n discard threshold
-qscale q use fixed video quantiser scale (VBR)
-qmin q min video quantiser scale (VBR)
-qmax q max video quantiser scale (VBR)
-lmin lambda min video lagrange factor (VBR)
-lmax lambda max video lagrange factor (VBR)
-mblmin q min macroblock quantiser scale (VBR)
-mblmax q max macroblock quantiser scale (VBR)
-qdiff q max difference between the quantiser scale (VBR)
-qblur blur video quantiser scale blur (VBR)
-qsquish squish how to keep quantiser between qmin and qmax (0 = clip, 1 = use differentiable function)
-qcomp compression video quantiser scale compression (VBR)
-rc_init_cplx complexity initial complexity for 1-pass encoding
-b_qfactor factor qp factor between p and b frames
-i_qfactor factor qp factor between p and i frames
-b_qoffset offset qp offset between p and b frames
-i_qoffset offset qp offset between p and i frames
-ibias bias intra quant bias
-pbias bias inter quant bias
-rc_eq equation set rate control equation
-rc_override override rate control override for specific intervals
-me method set motion estimation method
-me_threshold motion estimaton threshold
-mb_threshold macroblock threshold
-bf frames use 'frames' B frames
-preme pre motion estimation
-bug param workaround not auto detected encoder bugs
-strict strictness how strictly to follow the standards
-deinterlace deinterlace pictures
-psnr calculate PSNR of compressed frames
-vstats dump video coding statistics to file
-vhook module insert video processing module
-intra_matrix matrix specify intra matrix coeffs
-inter_matrix matrix specify inter matrix coeffs
-top top=1/bottom=0/auto=-1 field first
-sc_threshold threshold scene change threshold
-me_range range limit motion vectors range (1023 for DivX player)
-dc precision intra_dc_precision
-mepc factor (1.0 = 256) motion estimation bitrate penalty compensation
-vtag fourcc/tag force video tag/fourcc
-skip_threshold threshold frame skip threshold
-skip_factor factor frame skip factor
-skip_exp exponent frame skip exponent
-genpts generate pts
-qphist show QP histogram
Audio options:
-aframes number set the number of audio frames to record
-ab bitrate set audio bitrate (in kbit/s)
-aq quality set audio quality (codec-specific)
-ar rate set audio sampling rate (in Hz)
-ac channels set number of audio channels
-an disable audio
-acodec codec force audio codec ('copy' to copy stream)
-vol volume change audio volume (256=normal)
-newaudio add a new audio stream to the current output stream
-alang code set the ISO 639 language code (3 letters) of the current audio stream
Advanced Audio options:
-atag fourcc/tag force audio tag/fourcc
Subtitle options:
-scodec codec force subtitle codec ('copy' to copy stream)
-newsubtitle add a new subtitle stream to the current output stream
-slang code set the ISO 639 language code (3 letters) of the current subtitle stream
Audio/Video grab options:
-vd device set video grab device
-vc channel set video grab channel (DV1394 only)
-tvstd standard set television standard (NTSC, PAL (SECAM))
-ad device set audio device
-grab format request grabbing using
-gd device set grab device
Advanced options:
-map file:stream[:syncfile:syncstream] set input stream mapping
-map_meta_data outfile:infile set meta data information of outfile from infile
-benchmark add timings for benchmarking
-dump dump each input packet
-hex when dumping packets, also dump the payload
-re read input at native frame rate
-loop_input loop (current only works with images)
-loop_output number of times to loop output in formats that support looping (0 loops forever)
-threads count thread count
-vsync video sync method
-async audio sync method
-vglobal video global header storage type
-copyts copy timestamps
-shortest finish encoding within shortest input
-dts_delta_threshold timestamp discontinuity delta threshold
-ps size set packet size in bits
-error rate error rate
-muxrate rate set mux rate
-packetsize size set packet size
-muxdelay seconds set the maximum demux-decode delay
-muxpreload seconds set the initial demux-decode delayConversion operations
Images to video
Before you begin
If you have a big set of images, ffmpeg can convert them into a video. You have your choice of options: image format, video format, frames per second, bitrate, quality, etc etc etc.
There are a few things you have to do. First, your images have to be sequentially numbered, starting at 0 or 1. This means your files should be in the form
$ ls
file0001.jpg
file0002.jpg
file0003.jpg
file0004.jpg
file0005.jpgetc... (Note that they don't have to be jpg format, that's just an example).
When you point ffmpeg to your images, you can't use the usual bash syntax, like ffmpeg -i file*.jpg (the -i is the flag telling ffmpeg which files are the input files). You have to use printf format, like this:
$ ffmpeg -i file%04d.jpg ...where %04d means "a 4-digit number, zero-filled," and ffmpeg starts the number at 0 or 1.
You could also do:
$ ffmpeg -i file0%03d.jpg ...where %03d means "a 3-digit number, zero-filled," and the 0 in front means the digit before that number is always 0.
Picking a video format
To see a list of video formats available to ffmpeg, you can run ffmpeg with the formats command:
$ ffmpeg -formats
File formats:
E 3g2 3gp2 format
E 3gp 3gp format
D 4xm 4X Technologies format
D RoQ Id RoQ format
D aac ADTS AAC
DE ac3 raw ac3
E adts ADTS AAC
DE aiff Audio IFF
DE alaw pcm A law format
DE amr 3gpp amr file format
DE asf asf format
E asf_stream asf format
DE au SUN AU Format
DE avi avi format
D avs avs format
E crc crc testing format
D daud D-Cinema audio format
D dts raw dts
DE dv DV video format
E dvd MPEG2 PS format (DVD VOB)
D ea Electronic Arts Multimedia Format
DE ffm ffm format
D film_cpk Sega FILM/CPK format
D flic FLI/FLC/FLX animation format
DE flv flv format
E framecrc framecrc testing format
DE gif GIF Animation
DE h261 raw h261
DE h263 raw h263
DE h264 raw H264 video format
D idcin Id CIN format
DE image image sequence
DE image2 image2 sequence
DE image2pipe piped image2 sequence
DE imagepipe piped image sequence
D ingenient Ingenient MJPEG
D ipmovie Interplay MVE format
DE m4v raw MPEG4 video format
D matroska Matroska file format
DE mjpeg MJPEG video
D mm American Laser Games MM format
DE mmf mmf format
E mov mov format
D mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2 QuickTime/MPEG4/Motion JPEG 2000 format
E mp2 MPEG audio layer 2
DE mp3 MPEG audio layer 3
E mp4 mp4 format
DE mpeg MPEG1 System format
E mpeg1video MPEG video
E mpeg2video MPEG2 video
DE mpegts MPEG2 transport stream format
D mpegvideo MPEG video
E mpjpeg Mime multipart JPEG format
DE mulaw pcm mu law format
D nsv NullSoft Video format
E null null video format
DE nut nut format
D nuv NuppelVideo format
D ogg Ogg
E psp psp mp4 format
D psxstr Sony Playstation STR format
DE rawvideo raw video format
D redir Redirector format
DE rm rm format
E rtp RTP output format
D rtsp RTSP input format
DE s16be pcm signed 16 bit big endian format
DE s16le pcm signed 16 bit little endian format
DE s8 pcm signed 8 bit format
D sdp SDP
D shn raw shorten
D smk Smacker Video
D sol Sierra SOL Format
E svcd MPEG2 PS format (VOB)
DE swf Flash format
D tta true-audio
DE u16be pcm unsigned 16 bit big endian format
DE u16le pcm unsigned 16 bit little endian format
DE u8 pcm unsigned 8 bit format
E vcd MPEG1 System format (VCD)
D vmd Sierra VMD format
E vob MPEG2 PS format (VOB)
DE voc Creative Voice File format
DE wav wav format
D wc3movie Wing Commander III movie format
D wsaud Westwood Studios audio format
D wsvqa Westwood Studios VQA format
DE yuv4mpegpipe YUV4MPEG pipe format
Image formats (filename extensions, if any, follow):
DE gif gif
Codecs:
D V 4xm
D V D 8bps
DEA aac
D V D aasc
DEA ac3
DEA adpcm_4xm
DEA adpcm_adx
DEA adpcm_ct
DEA adpcm_ea
DEA adpcm_ima_dk3
DEA adpcm_ima_dk4
DEA adpcm_ima_qt
DEA adpcm_ima_smjpeg
DEA adpcm_ima_wav
DEA adpcm_ima_ws
DEA adpcm_ms
DEA adpcm_sbpro_2
DEA adpcm_sbpro_3
DEA adpcm_sbpro_4
DEA adpcm_swf
DEA adpcm_xa
DEA adpcm_yamaha
D A alac
DEA amr_nb
DEA amr_wb
DEV D asv1
DEV D asv2
D V D avs
D V bmp
D V D camstudio
D V D camtasia
D V D cinepak
D V D cljr
D A cook
D V D cyuv
DES dvbsub
DES dvdsub
DEV D dvvideo
DEV D ffv1
DEVSD ffvhuff
D A flac
D V D flic
DEVSD flv
D V D fraps
DEA g726
DEV D h261
DEVSDT h263
D VSD h263i
EV h263p
DEV DT h264
DEVSD huffyuv
D V D idcinvideo
D V D indeo2
D V indeo3
D A interplay_dpcm
D V D interplayvideo
EV jpegls
D V kmvc
EV ljpeg
D V D loco
D A mace3
D A mace6
D V D mdec
DEV D mjpeg
D V D mjpegb
D V D mmvideo
DEA mp2
DEA mp3
D A mp3adu
D A mp3on4
DEVSDT mpeg1video
DEVSDT mpeg2video
DEVSDT mpeg4
D A mpeg4aac
D VSDT mpegvideo
DEVSD msmpeg4
DEVSD msmpeg4v1
DEVSD msmpeg4v2
D V D msrle
D V D msvideo1
D V D mszh
D V D nuv
DEV pam
DEV pbm
DEA pcm_alaw
DEA pcm_mulaw
DEA pcm_s16be
DEA pcm_s16le
DEA pcm_s24be
DEA pcm_s24daud
DEA pcm_s24le
DEA pcm_s32be
DEA pcm_s32le
DEA pcm_s8
DEA pcm_u16be
DEA pcm_u16le
DEA pcm_u24be
DEA pcm_u24le
DEA pcm_u32be
DEA pcm_u32le
DEA pcm_u8
DEV pgm
DEV pgmyuv
DEV png
DEV ppm
D A qdm2
D V D qdraw
D V D qpeg
D V D qtrle
DEV rawvideo
D A real_144
D A real_288
D A roq_dpcm
D V D roqvideo
D V D rpza
DEV D rv10
DEV D rv20
D A shorten
D A smackaud
D V smackvid
D V D smc
DEV snow
D A sol_dpcm
DEA sonic
EA sonicls
D V D sp5x
DEV D svq1
D VSD svq3
D V theora
D V D truemotion1
D V D truemotion2
D A truespeech
D A tta
D V D ultimotion
D V vc9
D V D vcr1
D A vmdaudio
D V D vmdvideo
D A vorbis
D V vp3
D V D vqavideo
D A wmav1
D A wmav2
DEVSD wmv1
DEVSD wmv2
D V D wnv1
D A ws_snd1
D A xan_dpcm
D V D xan_wc3
D V D xl
EV xvid
DEV D zlib
D V zmbv
Supported file protocols:
file: pipe: udp: rtp: tcp: http:
Frame size, frame rate abbreviations:
ntsc pal qntsc qpal sntsc spal film ntsc-film sqcif qcif cif 4cif
Motion estimation methods:
zero(fastest) full(slowest) log phods epzs(default) x1 hex umh iter
Note, the names of encoders and decoders dont always match, so there are
several cases where the above table shows encoder only or decoder only entries
even though both encoding and decoding are supported for example, the h263
decoder corresponds to the h263 and h263p encoders, for file formats its even
worseA few of the more popular video codecs include:
mpg- This format doesn't allow you to control the frame rate (it's fixed at 30)
mjpegmovavimpeg4wmv1/wmv2
Typically you simply specify the extension of the output file, and the corresponding video codec is automatically used:
$ ffmpeg -i files%04d.jpg movie.mpgOther times you may want to specify the video codec explicitly:
$ ffmpeg -i files%04d.jpg -vcodec mov movie.movVideo output options
While there are a plethora of options to fiddle with, there are a couple important ones.
The first is the quality of the video. This assumes you don't care about the final size of the video, you simply want to specify the quality of the final video. This can be done using the -qscale argument. This outputs a video with a quality on the scale of 1 (the very best) to 30 (the very worst).
$ ffmpeg -i files%04d.jpg -qscale 1 movie.movIf you don't specify a quality, the final video can potentially look really bad. Specifying the quality is a good way to check if the quality is bad because of the images you're using, or because of the video encoding process.
Another important option is the framerate. This controls how quickly your movie will progress. I typically use ffmpeg to visualize CFD results, and sometimes I want a slow video. To do this, I can set the framerate with the -r option.
$ ffmpeg -i files%04d.jpg -qscale 1 -r 10 movie.mov
Video to images
Video to video
Scripts, tricks, and tips
(slow motion section of video)
(sed renaming scripts)
Examples
The following set of examples can be run using a sample image sequence, available here:
http://files.charlesmartinreid.com/ffmpeg/example_image_set.tar.gz (5.9 MB, .tar.gz format)
This file contains a sequence of 150 jpeg images, which can be used to create movies in various formats with various settings.
Images to video
mpeg
# Convert a set of .jpeg images to an .mpeg movie
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg movie_noqual.mpg
# Specify a high quality
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -qscale 1 movie_hiqual.mpg
# Explicitly specify the video codec
$ ffmpeg -i
# You can't specify a frame rate with the mpeg video codec...
# This will throw an error!
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -qscale 1 -r 10 movie_highqual_framerate10.mpg
mp4
# Convert a set of .jpeg images to an .mp4 movie
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -vcodec mpeg4 movie_noqual.mp4
# Specify a high quality
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -vcodec mpeg4 -qscale 1 movie_hiqual.mp4
# Set a framerate of 10 fps (default is 30 fps)
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -vcodec mpeg4 -qscale 1 -r 10 movie_hiqual_framerate10.mp4
mov
# Convert a set of .jpeg images to a .mov movie
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg movie_noqual.mov
# Specify a high quality
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -qscale 1 movie_highqual.mov
# Set a framerate of 20 fps (default is 30 fps)
$ ffmpeg -i moment0_instant_%03d.jpeg -qscale 1 -r 20 movie_highqual_framerate20.mov