Enhancement Request Re. Non-DVD Files

[flowney]

Now that Handbrake supports working with files other than DVD, the time may be ripe to ask for the following new features for .m4v output:

a) add/delete a chapter track, edit chapter markers.

b) add/delete one or more soft subtitle tracks, possibly incorporating Muxo functionality. Apps such as Jubler should be fine for creating the requisite .srt files from scratch.

c) add/delete one or more audio tracks, possibly incorporating MPEG4Box functionality, to include being able to set language label and specify which audio track is the alternative to the other.

... and two very far out and probably impossible things:

y) option to set two audio tracks as simultaneously enabled (e.g. one for ambient noise, the other for dialog etc.).

z) ducking in software such that a designated audio track will always subordinate its volume to any other enabled audio track. probably would require that playback vendor (Apple in the case of .m4v files) add the ability to act on a flag set in the subordinated (ducked) audio track.

[refulgentis]

Now that Handbrake supports working with files other than DVD, the time may be ripe to ask for the following new features for .m4v output:

a) add/delete a chapter track, edit chapter markers.

b) add/delete one or more soft subtitle tracks, possibly incorporating Muxo functionality. Apps such as Jubler should be fine for creating the requisite .srt files from scratch.

c) add/delete one or more audio tracks, possibly incorporating MPEG4Box functionality, to include being able to set language label and specify which audio track is the alternative to the other.

... and two very far out and probably impossible things:

y) option to set two audio tracks as simultaneously enabled (e.g. one for ambient noise, the other for dialog etc.).

z) ducking in software such that a designated audio track will always subordinate its volume to any other enabled audio track. probably would require that playback vendor (Apple in the case of .m4v files) add the ability to act on a flag set in the subordinated (ducked) audio track.

Subler will do ABC except add audio tracks.
Y will never happen, because source audio is never separated out that way. If you for some reason do have it separated out that way, mp4track from the libmp4v2 project will let you enable tracks. Z would be possible at encoding time with a lot of work I would think, and it wouldn't be a flag, but why?

[nightstrm]

Now that Handbrake supports working with files other than DVD, the time may be ripe to ask for the following new features for .m4v output:

a) add/delete a chapter track, edit chapter markers.

b) add/delete one or more soft subtitle tracks, possibly incorporating Muxo functionality. Apps such as Jubler should be fine for creating the requisite .srt files from scratch.

c) add/delete one or more audio tracks, possibly incorporating MPEG4Box functionality, to include being able to set language label and specify which audio track is the alternative to the other.

... and two very far out and probably impossible things:

y) option to set two audio tracks as simultaneously enabled (e.g. one for ambient noise, the other for dialog etc.).

z) ducking in software such that a designated audio track will always subordinate its volume to any other enabled audio track. probably would require that playback vendor (Apple in the case of .m4v files) add the ability to act on a flag set in the subordinated (ducked) audio track.

Subler will do ABC except add audio tracks.
Y will never happen, because source audio is never separated out that way. If you for some reason do have it separated out that way, mp4track from the libmp4v2 project will let you enable tracks. Z would be possible at encoding time with a lot of work I would think, and it wouldn't be a flag, but why?

Subler can add chapter tracks now? If that's the case, I can consolidate some steps in my HDDVD guide.

[dynaflash]

Either way, this is not a macgui pony, its a core pony.

[refulgentis]

I stand corrected: subler will edit an already present chapter track, but will not add a new one (at this point).

[flowney]

Thank you for the link to "subler: I will try that out tho I have been happy with Muxo for soft subtitles.

Still, the remaining "biggie" is adding and removing multiple audio tracks in such a way that Apple playback UIs see them properly. That is, iPhone and iPod touch as well as Apple TV have UIs that see these tracks and enable audiences to switch between and among them. (see: http://hercules.gcsu.edu/~flowney/resea ... subtitles/ for screencasts that exemplify the typical use of these UIs) Handbrake now does a nice job of extracting up to four audio tracks from DVD. This is done in such as way as to make these audio tracks available to Apple UIs as illustrated the the previously cited screencasts). MPEG4 BOX should do this but, for Mac users at least, this is a CLI that isn't all that approachable.

The point here was not that there aren't tools for doing these kinds of things but to point out the opportunity for Handbrake to be the "one ring that rules them all" by corralling all of this code under a consistent UI that is usable by more people.

So what are the technical, conceptual or philosophic barriers to integrating chapter markers, multiple soft subtitles and multiple audio tracks into Handbrake's new role of handler of non-DVD content?

[Ritsuka]

You can just uses QuickTime. iPod and all Apple devices reads mov files better than mp4. There is no drawback in using mov.

[refulgentis]

You can just uses QuickTime. iPod and all Apple devices reads mov files better than mp4. There is no drawback in using mov.

afaik its the opposite, there's trouble with tagging and mov
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread. ... ht=mov+mp4

[Ritsuka]

QuickTime metadata format is different from the iTunes mp4 one, so I am not surprised if metax does not work or some tags are missing.

[flowney]

QuickTime metadata format is different from the iTunes mp4 one, so I am not surprised if metax does not work or some tags are missing.

Yes, this is the fundamental problem. There is little or no interoperability between .m4v and .mov in QuickTime. Moreover, there are major documentation gaps such as for soft subtitles which are supported by iPhone et. al. but not documented by Apple. I have confirmation on this from Apple engineers.

Here's a simple "acid test" which QuickTime will fail every time:

1) Create an .m4v file with multiple language audio tracks and chapter tracks.

2) Try to change one letter in an annotation w/o loosing the chapter track and all but the default language tracks.

The same result is obtained when there are multiple soft subtitle tracks such as those added by Muxo.

I suppose that we'll have to wait for QuickTime X later this year.

[Ritsuka]

You won't lose anything if you save it as a mov file. But the mp4 exporter component is limited to one video track and one audio track,

[flowney]

You won't lose anything if you save it as a mov file. But the mp4 exporter component is limited to one video track and one audio track,

That's not my experience with the iPhone. Although the .mov container will retain and use chapter markers, multiple audio tracks and multiple subtitle tracks (Muxo-installed) in QuickTime Player and in the iTunes.app, these files refuse to play on an iPhone or iPod touch. "This movie could not be played" is the error msg I get when I place such a .mov container on an iPod touch using "Manually Manage ..." setting in iTunes.app.

[jbrjake]

This is a HandBrake request thread, not a tech support thread for iPods or QuickTime or iTunes or Subler or Muxo . Stay on topic or go somewhere else.