Will Darkroom Use the New H.264 QT Codec?

[catep]

Well just as I got pretty good in scripting G-Force, my colleagues tell me my QT G-Force movies should be HD. QT 7 has new codec, H.264 that will deliver HD. Will SoundDarkroom work with this new codec?

[Rovastar]

Try it and see. Let us know of the results you find.

[brightblack]

I'm posting this knowing I'm not giving all the best info but bear with me, I'm posting this quickly. I've been trying on the below setup to encode in Darkroom using H264 on high, and each time it just crashes out. I'll try to get more info (a coredump or similar) as soon as I can - again, sorry, rushing out.

System:
Dual 867 G4 / 1.25Gb RAM / ATI 9000 PRo
Mac 10.4 (thus QT7)
Darkroom 1.3.7
G-Force 2.8.1

Set Darkroom to 400*300 (default size), selected Highest Quality of H264, the small preview window comes up for a few seconds to say how many frames left, then it crashes.

[willrob]

There are two issues here. First under Tiger you are not supported, with your current video card, for Core Image (Core Video). That means your processors are taking a load of the viewing of any higher compressed footage. But you haven't gotten to that stage yet, unless you tried the HD preview footage at the Apple web site.

Then there's the processing power that this new codec requires. I have a dual 1G G4 and trying to use the new codec even for a ten second clip, takes forever. Even the newest dual G5s can take a lot of time encoding H264. It may simply be outside the range of your processors. Possibly more ram might help, but from what I've read even Apple isn't claiming every Mac can use the new codec.

I'm not sure what happens when you try to burn it to a DVD (assuming you get a project to compress). The DVD format will require it be recompressed to MPEG.... no telling what the results would look like?

[brightblack]

Hi again, sorry for my delayed posting on this.

I'm not sure it's a CPU/machine issue - I can run H264 in other situations, from DVD footage etc., and a friend can encode to it on his MacMini. I'm hoping to spend a bit more time playing with it this weekend. I'm looking to put some more GForce on my PSP .

[andy55]

I'm posting this knowing I'm not giving all the best info but bear with me, I'm posting this quickly. I've been trying on the below setup to encode in Darkroom using H264 on high, and each time it just crashes out. I'll try to get more info (a coredump or similar) as soon as I can - again, sorry, rushing out.

System:
Dual 867 G4 / 1.25Gb RAM / ATI 9000 PRo
Mac 10.4 (thus QT7)
Darkroom 1.3.7
G-Force 2.8.1

Set Darkroom to 400*300 (default size), selected Highest Quality of H264, the small preview window comes up for a few seconds to say how many frames left, then it crashes.

Hi there... SoundSpectrum Darkroom 1.4 just got posted with GF3 yesterday. It has a couple significant bug fixes that would be causing your problem. But to be clear, SSD will allow you to use any installed codec on your system, so any tiger install will let you export in H.264. There is currently an issue (in Tiger?) what H264 errors out if key frames are turned on. If you d/l SSD 1.4 and use HD264 w/o keyframes, you should be good for now. I am currently researching the issue.

Andy

[andy55]

I'm posting this knowing I'm not giving all the best info but bear with me, I'm posting this quickly. I've been trying on the below setup to encode in Darkroom using H264 on high, and each time it just crashes out. I'll try to get more info (a coredump or similar) as soon as I can - again, sorry, rushing out.

System:
Dual 867 G4 / 1.25Gb RAM / ATI 9000 PRo
Mac 10.4 (thus QT7)
Darkroom 1.3.7
G-Force 2.8.1

Set Darkroom to 400*300 (default size), selected Highest Quality of H264, the small preview window comes up for a few seconds to say how many frames left, then it crashes.

Hi there... SoundSpectrum Darkroom 1.4 just got posted with GF3 yesterday. It has a couple significant bug fixes that would be causing your problem. But to be clear, SSD will allow you to use any installed codec on your system, so any tiger install will let you export in H.264. There is currently an issue (in Tiger?) what H264 errors out if key frames are turned on. If you d/l SSD 1.4 and use HD264 w/o keyframes, you should be good for now. I am currently researching the issue.

Andy

SoundSpectrum Darkroom 1.5 has been posted and adds QuickTime 7's ICM support, allowing unrestricted H.264 compression. You should no longer get any video glitches, white output frames, or any other abnormal video output (please submit a bug report if you do experience this).

Andy

[Truus]

I still playing with Darkroom, and every time it surprised me what the outcome is when the movie is finished. But is it possible to choose a background, I have this ask earlyer this year, but I have received no answer. I think you can for someone making something special.

[willrob]

Normally Darkroom allows you to control the output movie by scripts. The script controls the colormaps, flowfields, waveshaps, etc. and at what precise moment they are triggered. Unfortunately both the 1.4.1 and 1.5 versions no longer seem to follow scripts—at least not on my Mac. So like you, I am surprised at the outcome.