linux1394-devel

Re: dvgrab

[Timothy M. S. <ts...@k-...>]

Bryan:

I'm curious what set of parameters you used with dvgrab ... I have a PCILynx
card, 2.3.99-pre3 kernel, and a Canon XL-1, and I haven't been able to grab
anything - I'm able to successfully control the camera through my SDPAVC
library, but not so much as a "peep" of isochronous data.

Also, another good solution for viewing AVIs under Windoze without a reboot
is VMWare ... it's proprietary software ($99 for non-commercial use), but
works like a charm - it allows you to run any flavor of DOS/Windows in an X
window, using a virtual filesystem (no more partitioning!).

Us XL-1 guys gotta stick together ... :)
Tim



Last night my friend and I went out and bought a $79 Digital Research
firewire card at Best Buy.  This card runs off the TI chipset which is
OHCI compliant.  I recompiled my kernel and got everything working, but I
don`t know what to use to view/convert the outported avi file from dvgrab.
I tried using gvplay, but it crashes complaining about audio not being
supported yet.  xanim doesn`t work either.  Maybe someone knows of a
converter program I can use to convert the uncompressed avi to a mpeg2 or
regular mpeg?

Here`s the specs of my setup:

Digital Research IEEE-1394 4-port card (3ext, 1int)
Canon XL1 Digital Camcorder
AMD K6-3 450
128MB RAM
1GB free on this computer, but will be using a 36GB drive NFS mounted
later for storage.
Sound Blaster Live! Value with pretty new open source drivers.

The IEEE-1394 will eventually go in a nicer computer with an 18GB SCSI-3
drive and probably dual-processors.  I want to be able to use Broadcast
2000 to generate movies with eventually...

If there`s any other information that might be needed such as the actual
chipset model number on the IEEE-1394 card please ask.  Right now I`m
either thinking that the avi file was created correctly and I haven`t
found any programs that can read it yet, or the XL1 isn`t fully supported
yet and I can try and help you guys out with adding support.

Bryan


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mailing list lin...@li...
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RE: dvgrab

[Arne S. <ar...@sc...>]

An AVI file is actually a sort of container that can contain lots of different 
file formats. It has a field that tells which decoder is required for playing 
this particular file type. If the player program does not know about the file 
type, it can't display the movie.

Currently there is no AVI player for Linux that can decode the AVI DV format.

You can use the Microsoft media player to play back your AVI file. In case it 
does not recognize the file format either, try installing the video editing 
software that came with your card. If you don't have software, download the 
demo version of ULead VideoStudio (the media player extensions are not time 
limited).

I am not aware of any converter programs for MS Windows, but there should be 
alot.

If everything fails (but I don't think so), drop me a note.

Happy grabbing.... Arne

RE: dvgrab

[Bryan S. <ar...@ve...>]

Nope, neither Microsoft Media Player or ULead VideoStudio worked.  They
both in fact created the same screwed up picture.  The movie plays, but
the picture is screwed and audio is just a hiss.

Go to http://www.verinet.com/~arcane/screwedup.jpg to see what the picture
looks like.  You can definately tell that it's rendering some parts
correctly, but they're in weird places...

It might have something to do with when I compiled everything.  I ran into
a problem compiling dvgrab and had to update a few libraries.  The
standard compiler in Debian now is egcs based, and for me it dies of an
internal compiler error when compiling the kernel.  I was using the older
compiler, but I think dvgrab required g++ so I had to install the latest
stuff.

Thanks for any help,
Bryan

On Wed, 12 Apr 2000, Arne Schirmacher wrote:

> An AVI file is actually a sort of container that can contain lots of different 
> file formats. It has a field that tells which decoder is required for playing 
> this particular file type. If the player program does not know about the file 
> type, it can't display the movie.
> 
> Currently there is no AVI player for Linux that can decode the AVI DV format.
> 
> You can use the Microsoft media player to play back your AVI file. In case it 
> does not recognize the file format either, try installing the video editing 
> software that came with your card. If you don't have software, download the 
> demo version of ULead VideoStudio (the media player extensions are not time 
> limited).
> 
> I am not aware of any converter programs for MS Windows, but there should be 
> alot.
> 
> If everything fails (but I don't think so), drop me a note.
> 
> Happy grabbing.... Arne
> 

Re: dvgrab

[Timothy M. S. <ts...@k-...>]

I've been following dvgrab with a lot of interest, and just got it working
last night.  I'm thinking that, rather than putting too much time into
figuring out how view an AVI, it would be more productive to:

* Capture the video to disk using dvgrab --raw
* Write a program that can read the raw file and write it back to the
firewire interface isochronously, so it can be viewed using a camcorder.

Since this would allow you to visually verify that the capture worked,
without actually decoding it, I'm hoping it will be a (relatively) easy
first step towards creating an actual DV decoder.  Plus it would be an
important component of a future open-source non-linear editor.

Tim Shead
ts...@k-...

----- Original Message -----
From: "Bryan Stillwell" <ar...@ve...>
To: "Arne Schirmacher" <ar...@sc...>
Cc: <lin...@li...>
Sent: Wednesday, April 12, 2000 1:09 PM
Subject: RE: dvgrab


> Nope, neither Microsoft Media Player or ULead VideoStudio worked.  They
> both in fact created the same screwed up picture.  The movie plays, but
> the picture is screwed and audio is just a hiss.
>
> Go to http://www.verinet.com/~arcane/screwedup.jpg to see what the picture
> looks like.  You can definately tell that it's rendering some parts
> correctly, but they're in weird places...
>
> It might have something to do with when I compiled everything.  I ran into
> a problem compiling dvgrab and had to update a few libraries.  The
> standard compiler in Debian now is egcs based, and for me it dies of an
> internal compiler error when compiling the kernel.  I was using the older
> compiler, but I think dvgrab required g++ so I had to install the latest
> stuff.
>
> Thanks for any help,
> Bryan
>
> On Wed, 12 Apr 2000, Arne Schirmacher wrote:
>
> > An AVI file is actually a sort of container that can contain lots of
different
> > file formats. It has a field that tells which decoder is required for
playing
> > this particular file type. If the player program does not know about the
file
> > type, it can't display the movie.
> >
> > Currently there is no AVI player for Linux that can decode the AVI DV
format.
> >
> > You can use the Microsoft media player to play back your AVI file. In
case it
> > does not recognize the file format either, try installing the video
editing
> > software that came with your card. If you don't have software, download
the
> > demo version of ULead VideoStudio (the media player extensions are not
time
> > limited).
> >
> > I am not aware of any converter programs for MS Windows, but there
should be
> > alot.
> >
> > If everything fails (but I don't think so), drop me a note.
> >
> > Happy grabbing.... Arne
> >
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> mailing list lin...@li...
> http://lists.sourceforge.net/mailman/listinfo/linux1394-devel
>

Re: dvgrab

[Alastair M. <ala...@ww...>]

Timothy M. Shead wrote:
> 
> I've been following dvgrab with a lot of interest, and just got it working
> last night.  I'm thinking that, rather than putting too much time into
> figuring out how view an AVI, it would be more productive to:
> 
> * Capture the video to disk using dvgrab --raw
> * Write a program that can read the raw file and write it back to the
> firewire interface isochronously, so it can be viewed using a camcorder.

I'd been thinking along the same lines, but with an additional ulterior
motive (I'll get to in a moment).  Meanwhile, Windows Media Player apparently
can read raw DV files (er, make that MoviePlayer).  At least it recognizes
the single-frame DV grabs I downloaded from somebody's web site, although
being single frames it doesn't play them.  It does correctly report the
meta-information.  (Perhaps somebody could point me too a short DV video
clip for me to experiment with?)

The ulterior motive is that pushing the DV data back to the camera is a
necessary step for doing DV editing. (Pushing it back to a recorder,
actually).  It's also a necessary step for using a camcorder as a backup
device (using the video frame to store arbitrary data rather than images),
a project I'm getting some enthusiasm for (see http://www.ajwm.net/backfire )
(No code yet, I'm still working on getting my camcorder to talk happily
to my 1394 card.  Turns out I didn't have the latest (0318) patch to 2.2.14)

Of course a program to play DV files directly under Linux would be nice
for us DV enthusiasts, but that's another issue.

-- Alastair

RE: dvgrab

[Arne S. <ar...@sc...>]

did you use the --pal or --ntsc parameter, depending of the type of your camera?

Arne

-----Original Message-----
From:	Bryan Stillwell 
Sent:	Wednesday, April 12, 2000 10:10 PM
To:	Arne Schirmacher
Cc:	lin...@li...
Subject:	RE: dvgrab

Nope, neither Microsoft Media Player or ULead VideoStudio worked.  They
both in fact created the same screwed up picture.  The movie plays, but
the picture is screwed and audio is just a hiss.

Go to http://www.verinet.com/~arcane/screwedup.jpg to see what the picture
looks like.  You can definately tell that it's rendering some parts
correctly, but they're in weird places...

It might have something to do with when I compiled everything.  I ran into
a problem compiling dvgrab and had to update a few libraries.  The
standard compiler in Debian now is egcs based, and for me it dies of an
internal compiler error when compiling the kernel.  I was using the older
compiler, but I think dvgrab required g++ so I had to install the latest
stuff.

RE: dvgrab

[Bryan S. <ar...@ve...>]

I didn't specify either, I thought it defaulted to ntsc which is what the
camera is.  I'll try again during my lunch in an hour with --ntsc and see
if it helps.  Hell, I'll try it with --pal as well to see what the
difference is...

Bryan

On Thu, 13 Apr 2000, Arne Schirmacher wrote:

> did you use the --pal or --ntsc parameter, depending of the type of your camera?
> 
> Arne
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Bryan Stillwell 
> Sent:	Wednesday, April 12, 2000 10:10 PM
> To:	Arne Schirmacher
> Cc:	lin...@li...
> Subject:	RE: dvgrab
> 
> Nope, neither Microsoft Media Player or ULead VideoStudio worked.  They
> both in fact created the same screwed up picture.  The movie plays, but
> the picture is screwed and audio is just a hiss.
> 
> Go to http://www.verinet.com/~arcane/screwedup.jpg to see what the picture
> looks like.  You can definately tell that it's rendering some parts
> correctly, but they're in weird places...
> 
> It might have something to do with when I compiled everything.  I ran into
> a problem compiling dvgrab and had to update a few libraries.  The
> standard compiler in Debian now is egcs based, and for me it dies of an
> internal compiler error when compiling the kernel.  I was using the older
> compiler, but I think dvgrab required g++ so I had to install the latest
> stuff.
> 

RE: dvgrab

[Bryan S. <ar...@ve...>]

Ok, I tried both even though it's supposed to be ntsc.  Neither worked.
--ntsc did the same thing as without specifying anything.  --pal had a lot
of Xs when running dvgrab, which was to be expected.  I didn't get a
screen shot, but the movie scrolled upwards pretty quickly and I could
make out any of the video.  With --ntsc it was all boxy just like before,
and just like before each box was always rendering the same portion of the
video, just in the wrong place.

Some things I've noticed though.  The outputted avi shows up as being
360x240 in the properties section of media player instead of 720x480 like
I though it would. Each rectangle appears to be 32x8 if it was in 720x480
mode, and I remember in some documentation that I was reading that that
size is special for DV stuff.

Bryan

On Thu, 13 Apr 2000, Arne Schirmacher wrote:

> did you use the --pal or --ntsc parameter, depending of the type of your camera?
> 
> Arne
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Bryan Stillwell 
> Sent:	Wednesday, April 12, 2000 10:10 PM
> To:	Arne Schirmacher
> Cc:	lin...@li...
> Subject:	RE: dvgrab
> 
> Nope, neither Microsoft Media Player or ULead VideoStudio worked.  They
> both in fact created the same screwed up picture.  The movie plays, but
> the picture is screwed and audio is just a hiss.
> 
> Go to http://www.verinet.com/~arcane/screwedup.jpg to see what the picture
> looks like.  You can definately tell that it's rendering some parts
> correctly, but they're in weird places...
> 
> It might have something to do with when I compiled everything.  I ran into
> a problem compiling dvgrab and had to update a few libraries.  The
> standard compiler in Debian now is egcs based, and for me it dies of an
> internal compiler error when compiling the kernel.  I was using the older
> compiler, but I think dvgrab required g++ so I had to install the latest
> stuff.
> 

RE: dvgrab

[Alastair M. <ala...@ww...>]

A couple of days ago Bryan Stillwell mentioned that he was getting 
scrambled images (eg http://www.verinet.com/~arcane/screwedup.jpg ).
Compare that to the slide of how a DV packet is assembled by taking
chunks (8x32) from different areas of the image: 
http://desktopvideo.miningco.com/compute/desktopvideo/library/graphics/dvpres/bgSlide23.GIF
(sorry for the ridiculously long URL)
The little black rectangles mixed in with the purple and orange ones 
show where the pixel data for the first video segment comes from. The
scrambled image above exhibits a similar arrangement of pixel blocks.

I think (from a quick glance over the code) that dvgrab just puts the
DV data into the AVI file in the order in which it was received, and
that some AVI-playing software is smart enough to reassemble the chunks
into correct order for display (if it recognizes the frames as DV).
Part of making a more general DV codec will of course be shifting this
stuff around into pixel-orders more recognizable by other graphic pgms,
and vice versa.

If I have enough time this weekend I'll get dvgrab running on my system
and start working on code to do that.

-- Alastair

Re: dvgrab

[Bryan S. <ar...@ve...>]

On Tue, 11 Apr 2000, Timothy M. Shead wrote:

> I'm curious what set of parameters you used with dvgrab ... I have a PCILynx
> card, 2.3.99-pre3 kernel, and a Canon XL-1, and I haven't been able to grab
> anything - I'm able to successfully control the camera through my SDPAVC
> library, but not so much as a "peep" of isochronous data.

I just ran it as `./dvgrab --frames 300 test`.  I'll have to check out
your SDPAVC library, just saw the link on the sourceforge page.  :)


> Also, another good solution for viewing AVIs under Windoze without a reboot
> is VMWare ... it's proprietary software ($99 for non-commercial use), but
> works like a charm - it allows you to run any flavor of DOS/Windows in an X
> window, using a virtual filesystem (no more partitioning!).

vmware is a pretty cool program, but I only rebooted once into windows to
see if the avi played at all and then started looking for a linux
solution.  I'll try and get some screenshots of what mediaplayer is doing
under windows tonight, but it does look like the data is there just
jumbled up a little.  (I can make out people's faces at least)


> Us XL-1 guys gotta stick together ... :)

No doubt!  :)


One thing that also might be helpful is I'm running the latest unstable
version of Debian.  Here's some version numbers for you:

gcc --version: 2.95.2
ld --version: 2.9.5
c++ --version: 2.95.2
cpp --version: 2.95.2


Bryan