HOWTO: Install and use the latest FFmpeg and x264

[mahela007]

Isn't there a way around building from source? Other instructions I have read say that ffmpeg (with all the proprietary codes) should be available in the universe (or multiverse) repository. It could have been mentioned in this thread but it is a hundred pages long...

NEVERMIND.. I found the answer in post #1

[Tybion]

Should you add the (optional) step -
sudo apt-get install libgpac-dev
before running ./configure ?

Only after I did this, configure reported -
MP4 output: Yes

[FakeOutdoorsman]

Should you add the (optional) step -
sudo apt-get install libgpac-dev
before running ./configure ?

Only after I did this, configure reported -
MP4 output: Yes

You only need libgpac-dev if you want to directly use x264 to output to .mp4.

[andrew.46]

Looks like the FFmpeg developers are really getting close to the cutting edge of x264 now:

enabled libx264    && require  libx264 x264.h x264_encoder_encode -lx264 -lm &&
                      { check_cpp_condition x264.h "X264_BUILD >= 98" ||
                        die "ERROR: libx264 version must be >= 0.98."; }

Andrew

[qyot27]

My guess is because it's probably a major enough bugfix/change to warrant it.

http://git.ffmpeg.org/?p=ffmpeg;a=co...9f64b953a701e8

Properly initialize x264_picture_t in libx264.

Bump libx264 version requirement accordingly.

I'm simply assuming that x264_picture_t is a critical function.

[@H.264]

I'm having problem regarding x264 with ffms support.
Can someone help me out how to install ffmpeg and x264 with ffms support?

[FakeOutdoorsman]

I'm having problem regarding x264 with ffms support.
Can someone help me out how to install ffmpeg and x264 with ffms support?

What have you tried so far and what kind of problems are you experiencing? What version of Ubuntu are you using?

[qyot27]

I'm having problem regarding x264 with ffms support.
Can someone help me out how to install ffmpeg and x264 with ffms support?

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php...&postcount=900

The only thing that needs changing is to take out the --disable-filters option in the first FFmpeg compile. And of course adding any additional decoding/encoding libraries you might want to the relevant FFmpeg (only decoders for the first one, decoders and encoders for the second).

Works on Karmic and Lucid, or should (I migrate up to the next version immediately, so I know it works on Lucid; it worked on Karmic when I wrote those steps back in March).

[verb3k]

Now it is possible to produce a WebM-compliant file with latest ffmpeg SVN if you build with libvpx and libvorbis. It can be as simple as:

ffmpeg -i input output.webm

Plays nicely in Firefox's WebM build.
The only problem is that I can't find how to disable frame dropping of libvpx. Libvpx drops frames by default so your video might be choppy in some high motion areas.

[FakeOutdoorsman]

Now it is possible to produce a WebM-compliant file with latest ffmpeg SVN if you build with libvpx and libvorbis. It can be as simple as:

ffmpeg -i input output.webm

Plays nicely in Firefox's WebM build.
The only problem is that I can't find how to disable frame dropping of libvpx. Libvpx drops frames by default so your video might be choppy in some high motion areas.

I plan on adding a libvpx section to the guide soon. I was waiting for the muxer to be finished. Yeah, that's my excuse:

$ svn log -l 24 svn://svn.mplayerhq.hu/ffmpeg/trunk
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r23474 | conrad | 2010-06-04 14:40:54 -0800 (Fri, 04 Jun 2010) | 3 lines

Add WebM muxer

Patch by James Zern <jzern at google>
------------------------------------------------------------------------

As requested through a PM, I will also add qt-faststart installation instructions once I can figure out an elegant package management solution. It's tasks like this that make me especially admire the ports-like capable systems such as Arch and Slackware (amirite, andrew.46? da.). This little FFmpeg tool moves the moov atom to the beginning of a file so it can start playing before it is completely downloaded. Useful for web videos. Usage: qt-faststart input.foo output.foo.

Update: I added a qt-faststart section to the Lucid guide. It's a somewhat messy way of doing it, but I can't make myself use checkinstall more than I have to. Anyone have a better method that works with Ubuntu package management, or is this Good Enough?