/~~* Converting WMV to MPEG Issues *~~\

[steve.t]

Hey everyone,

I created a video in windows movie maker, obviously ing WMV format. Im trying to convert the WMV into an MPEG, preferably MPEG4.
When I select the encoder profile "Video - MPEG-4 + AAC (MP4)" it results in an error, VLC could not open the encoder. Oh, and apparently the logger cant initialise either so I cant track the error.
If I use the setting "Video - H.264 + AAC (TS)" the sound plays but the video dosnt appear straight away. Furthermore, in some places the quality is awful (confetti, abstract pixel art etc.) and the length has increasef from 3 minutes to 8 minutes. (!?)
And then if i use "Video - MPEG-2 + MPGA (TS)", the encoder cant be opened again.

Then I tired to make my own profile using MPEG-TS as encapsulation, MPEG4 1024KBit, 25.00fps and MPEG4 audio (AAC) 192Kbit/s and a sample rate of 44100.
Finally i thought it was working, good quality, clear sound and then whole patches of pixels "freeze" and others just show some crazy analog looking picture (green, bars and stripes etc.)

My laptop has an Intel dualcore 2.1GHz, NVIDIA G210M and 4GB RAM and uses the VLC 1.0.3 Goldeneye version.
Windows 7 32-bit

Summary >> So in short, can someone tell me what to do? Just want to convert a WMV into a mpg

Thanks in advance guys,
Steve

[steve.t]

Small update,
I read a few times that the result is better encoding through the CLI... so here is what I got:
Tried different settings and encoders, the best seems to be the mpeg2 with mpga (cli_maddy2), but still far from perfect


Original: WMV - 73,8MB - 0:03:42 - 1280x720 (HD Ready) video: 5840KBit/s and audio : 192KBit/s

cli_maddy1 - 28MB - 0:06:15
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=mp2v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128,deinterlace,audio-sync,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=ts,dst="c:\cli_maddy.mpg"}
Picture quality not very good. pulsating pixelation.

cli_maddy2 - 36MB - 0:04:06
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=mp2v,acodec=mpga,vb=1152,ab=128,deinterlace,audio-sync,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=ts,dst="c:\cli_maddy2.mpg"}
Better, but still not perfect... bigger in size
pulsating pixelation

cli_maddy3 - 30MB - 0:06:15
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=mp2v,acodec=mpga,vb=,ab=128,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=ts,dst="c:\cli_maddy3.mpg"}
same as first (cli_maddy1)...

cli_maddy4 - 27MB - 0:05:15
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=h264,acodec=mpga,vb=,ab=128,deinterlace,audio-sync,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=ts,dst="c:\cli_maddy4.mpg"}
Pretty bad! Patches of pixels 'freezing', pixelated, lag

cli_maddy5.mpg - 27MB - 0:11:35
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=1152,ab=128,deinterlace,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=ts,dst="c:\cli_maddy5.mpg"}
goes blurry and analog (bars, stripes, strange colours)

cli_maddy6.mpg - 34MB - X:XX:XX
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=1152,ab=128,deinterlace,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=avi,dst="c:\cli_maddy6.mpg"}
Lags, goes blurry and analog (bars, stripes, strange colours)

cli_maddy7 - 28MB - 0:06:36
vlc -vvv "C:\Users\Bernard\Videos\Mein Film.wmv" --sout=#transcode{vcodec=mp2v,acodec=mpga,vb=,ab=128,fps=25}:standard{access=file,mux=ts,dst="c:\cli_maddy7.mpg"}
pulsating pixelation, sometimes laggy

[flame62]

Same experience here .... it's frustrating

my WMV files are 1280*720 as yours, some with variable bitrate, some with constanat bitrate ... it's just not possible to maintain the quality (not only with VLC, tried others and more expensive as well). I wanted to convert to TS in order to show them from my DreamBox but I am about to give up; too many different formats, too many incompatibilities, technology still is in its childhood; let's wait 5 years more

[flame62]

Hello All,

played around a bit more, and I seem to have arrived at something which works fine and is reproducable (and maybe to admit VLC is not the biggest source of troubles here ...)

key findings:
WMV <> WMV (WMV is not equal WMV) ... a transcoding program (not only VLC, also ffmpeg) may have troubles maintaining the original quality up to the target, if the source uses an -letmesay-"inconvenient" format.

My demand is to produce an MPEG-TS of a slide show/movie created with Windows Moviemaker in either 16/9 or 4/3 aspect ration with the highest quality that my (HD) TV can display (TS because that's the only format my Dreambox can display without any extra software). The sources are still images from cameras (with very high resolutions compared with what I need), "manual" screen captures from Googel Earth animations (WMV), and occasionally video clips from digital cameras (AVI)

Transcoding any other WMV produced with WMM to MPEGTS with VLC works but the results vary from "average" to "arggghhhh+{DEL}"

I achieved best results (i.e. lowest loss in quality end-to-end) following these steps:

- create storyboard in WMM
- resize all images to target resolution (1024 x 768 for 4/3, 1280 x 720 for 16/9) before final WMV punching (e.g. XNView where you can select the algorithm) - WMM's own resizing is "grggghhhh" sometimes (more an effect filter - huhhh) - VLC can't correct this later on
- create WMV with a custom profile (created with Windows Media Profile Editor):
-- Audio: CBR / WMA 9.1 / 32kbps, 44kHz, Stereo CBR
-- Video: Quality VBR / WMV9-AP / {size} / 25fps / KFI=2sec / quality=90
- before final WMV punching WMM Tools/Options/Advanced set to PAL and proper aspect ratio (!!)
- after this preparation I use VLC 1.1.7 (WinXP/GUI) and convert WMV to TS with quality very close to the original WMV:
-- Profile: Video - MPEG-2 + MPGA (TS)
-- Bitrate: 10000kb/s - I found this enough for even 1280x720 (bitrate as indicated by WinExplorer was always below 10M)

have (re-)processed and converted 12 MSWMM's over the weekend - reproduceable good results

Hope this helps
Good luck!

PS: I had some WMV's with 10 and 15 fps (to save disk space - instructional vid's mainly) ... you don't want to look at a TS made of them