[Tex/LaTex] Trouble using ffmpeg to encode a h264 video in a .mp4 container to use with media9

beamermedia9pdftex

I can't get an ffmpeg encoded libx264 video in a .mp4 container to work with media9 and beamer. The pdf is created using pdfLaTeX. It seems to be some kind of ffmpeg issue since the following work fine:

  • The random.mp4 from the media9 package works

  • So is the .flv default in ffmpeg though the video quality is naturally not as good

    ffmpeg -i Test.mp4  -sameq Test.flv

Any video I encode in ffmpeg using 

ffmpeg -i EB_%03d.png -c:v libx264 -x264opts keyint=30 -r 30 -b:v 1000k -s 640x512 Test.mp4

plays flawless in e.g. VLC (and I see the duration bar in the pdf though not the video). ffmpeg -i Test.mp4 yields for the video stream

Stream #0:0(und): Video: h264 (High 4:4:4 Predictive) (avc1 / 0x31637661), yuv444p, 640x512, 1021 kb/s, 30 fps, 30 tbr, 30 tbn, 60 tbc

which is slightly different from ffmpeg -i random.mp4

Stream #0:0(und): Video: h264 (High) (avc1 / 0x31637661), yuv420p, 320x240 [SAR 1:1 DAR 4:3], 170 kb/s, 30 fps, 30 tbr, 30 tbn, 60 tbc

Output from ffmpeg

ffmpeg version 2.0.2 Copyright (c) 2000-2013 the FFmpeg developers
built on Oct 19 2013 08:34:03 with gcc 4.7 (SUSE Linux)
configuration: --shlibdir=/usr/lib --prefix=/usr --mandir=/usr/share/man 
--libdir=/usr/lib --enable-shared --disable-static --enable-debug --disable-stripping 
--extra-cflags='-fomit-frame-pointer -fmessage-length=0 -O2 -Wall -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 
-fstack-protector -funwind-tables -fasynchronous-unwind-tables -g -D_LARGEFILE_SOURCE 
-D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -I/usr/include/gsm' --enable-gpl --enable-x11grab --enable-version3 
--enable-pthreads --enable-avfilter --enable-libpulse --enable-libvpx --enable-libopus 
--enable-libass --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libvorbis --enable-libtheora --enable-libspeex 
--enable-libxvid --enable-libx264 --enable-libschroedinger --enable-libgsm --enable-libopencore-amrnb 
--enable-libopencore-amrwb --enable-postproc --enable-libdc1394 --enable-librtmp --enable-libfreetype 
--enable-avresample --enable-libtwolame --enable-libvo-aacenc
  libavutil      52. 38.100 / 52. 38.100
  libavcodec     55. 18.102 / 55. 18.102
  libavformat    55. 12.100 / 55. 12.100
  libavdevice    55.  3.100 / 55.  3.100
  libavfilter     3. 79.101 /  3. 79.101
  libavresample   1.  1.  0 /  1.  1.  0
  libswscale      2.  3.100 /  2.  3.100
  libswresample   0. 17.102 /  0. 17.102
  libpostproc    52.  3.100 / 52.  3.100

The code snippet for media9 

\begin{frame}
\frametitle{Here should be a .mp4 video}
\framesubtitle{Apparently, something is wrong with my x264 codec}

\includemedia[
width=3.5in,height=2.8in,
activate=pageopen,
addresource=Figures/Test.mp4,
transparent,
flashvars={
source=Figures/Test.mp4&
autoPlay=true&
loop=true&
scaleMode=letterbox
}
]{\includegraphics{Figures/EB_001}}{VPlayer.swf}
\end{frame}

Ideas anybody?

Best Answer

UPDATE

Choosing the right libx264 options with ffmpeg / avconv is a bit tricky.

The following ffmpeg command line should produce usable video files (adjust frame -r ... and keyframe -g ... rates to your needs):

ffmpeg -i <input> -vf scale="trunc(iw/2)*2:trunc(ih/2)*2" -c:v libx264 -profile:v high -pix_fmt yuv420p -g 25 -r 25 output.mp4

<input> to be replaced by a video file to be transcoded, or a PNG/JPEG/... file sequence with wildcards, e.g. frame-%d.png for numbered files frame-0.png, frame-1.png etc.

Replace ffmpeg with avconv, if the latter is installed. Both share the same options.

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