[PotzUK]

Just added it to the FTP m8y, hope you don't mind?

[ShivanSpS]

No, but I will give the 1.9c patch this Saturday (i hope)

[karajorma]

Are you going to bring out a whole new pack when 3.6.9 is finally released?

[ShivanSpS]

yeah, but they still in test of the 3.6.9 vps right?

[Ace Pace]

yeah, but they still in test of the 3.6.9 vps right?

Yes

[ShivanSpS]

Affer cheking the craizy size of the .MVE movies I decided to still which the .avi ones...

teh FS2 movies sizes are:

287MB the .avi and 692 the .MVE! xD

Anyways... I will upload the .MVE ones for FS1 and FS2 if someone whant it can use it... of course, it will be a diferent threat.


BTW: I discoverer a badname .AVI cutscenes in FS2... the "endpart2a" and "2b"... it should be called "ENDPRT2A" and "ENDPRT2B", thats why the second movie is not played affer finish the campaing

I have remember, I have Downloaded the .avis from Karajorma guide

[karajorma]

I've been trying to warn people about that error in the names for a while. I've got no idea if I got them from TurboNed with the wrong names or if I renamed them in a moment of insanity.

On thing though ShivanSPS. Avi support is going to disappear from FS2_Open after 3.6.9 to be replaced with Theora\MVE only. That means that post 3.6.9 the avi versions will be useless anyway.

[ShivanSpS]

Well ok then, the MVE can be compressed anyway, but it about an 400-500MB size increse the change of AVi->MVE. Incluing both FS1 and FS2 movies.

[PotzUK]

On thing though ShivanSPS. Avi support is going to disappear from FS2_Open after 3.6.9 to be replaced with Theora\MVE only. That means that post 3.6.9 the avi versions will be useless anyway.

May I ask why?  It seems a step backwards too me?

[Herra Tohtori]

AVI code is being replaced with Theora code and you see that as backward step?

Considering the problems that have surrounded the AVI playback in FSO (unwanted DivX toolbar interaction and other similar stuff), I'd say it's a step forward. And I reckon theora files have greater quality/filesize ratio than avi (XVid/DivX)? Though I'm not sure about the latter one.

[Cyker]

Toolbar problems? Please explain - I'm not too clear on what that particular problem is, as I've not had that with AVI's on mine, although I am using Shivan's pack atm (It's sooo much less hassle. THANK YOOU!!!! ).


I don't like the idea of going to Theora/MVE only. If it was ADDING Theora support, then fine, I like that, but removing AVI too? Don't like that at all.
AVI is a lot more mature at this stage and creating an AVI is a damned lot easier than a Theora at this point in time.


Is it that hard to keep both in there?!

And how are the cutscenes going to be converted to OGM from MVE? I've only ever seen an MVE to AVI convertor, so unless the plan is to transcode the all the AVIs and degrade the videos and weapon shots even more...

No, I'd agree this is a step backward; There's no real reason to get rid of the AVI support, none that I can see anyway.

[ShivanSpS]

Toolbar problems? Please explain - I'm not too clear on what that particular problem is, as I've not had that with AVI's on mine, although I am using Shivan's pack atm (It's sooo much less hassle. THANK YOOU!!!! ).


I don't like the idea of going to Theora/MVE only. If it was ADDING Theora support, then fine, I like that, but removing AVI too? Don't like that at all.
AVI is a lot more mature at this stage and creating an AVI is a damned lot easier than a Theora at this point in time.


Is it that hard to keep both in there?!

And how are the cutscenes going to be converted to OGM from MVE? I've only ever seen an MVE to AVI convertor, so unless the plan is to transcode the all the AVIs and degrade the videos and weapon shots even more...

No, I'd agree this is a step backward; There's no real reason to get rid of the AVI support, none that I can see anyway.

Well, the .MVE are the retail movies and have more quality than .AVI ones which some codecs... like ffdshow...

I also noticed that when .MVE movies be played also have the HDRRish-Lite LOL!

[Herra Tohtori]

AVI files require codecs to play, even on Freepace Open. If you don't have the correct codecs, the videos won't play.

Theora also requires codecs, but as far as I know, there is just one and single Theora codec, unlike avi codecs, which are multiple... to be more exact, avi files can be of many variety. Most avi files are MPEG-3 compressed. And to make things more complex, MPEG-3 includes for example DivX, Xvid and 3ivx compression codec types. There might be other types also, but I don't know about them really.

So, to be able to play all the different avi files you need several different codecs, and Freespace Open also needs those codecs in order to play the videos. Unfortunately, some codecs and/or codec packs sometimes interference each other even in Windows' own media programs such as Media Player or WinAmp. So it's no big wonder that these codecs/codec packs also make things unclick in Freespace Open video playback system, resulting in unwanted phenomena such as picture not visible but sound audible, no videos played at all, or other things like that. DivX toolbar is one of the instances that when enabled, makes the avi playback in FSO not to work. That's the most common problem encountered with avi video playback in FSO, at least according to questions and help queries on these forums.

So, when the files are Theora compressed (*.ogg files, I believe) and FSO knows that and there's just the one and only Theora codec on the PC, things become *much* less complicated. Less complicated code works faster and better, and there are less chances to be considered in the programming work -> less bugs and other problems.

Besides, avi format(s) are widely considered outdated. Theora is better in almost every regards as far as I know.

[karajorma]

I knew I'd be setting the cat amongst the pigeons when I posted that but I feel it's best we get a handle on this now. If we distribute Shivan's 2.0 pack (i.e the 3.6.9 one) with the MVE movies then everything works perfectly. If we continue to distribute the AVIs then in 3.6.10 or 3.7 (which ever one is the next release) we will have problems when the avi code is removed as all the movies will suddenly cease to work and we'll be flooded with support requests.

Given the amount of time I spend on those I'm in favour of pre-emptive action whenever possible

Toolbar problems? Please explain - I'm not too clear on what that particular problem is, as I've not had that with AVI's on mine, although I am using Shivan's pack atm (It's sooo much less hassle. THANK YOOU!!!! ).

Taylor is the man in charge of the upgrade so I'm sure he'll correct me if I get anything wrong but here's the problem. When freespace wants to play a movie it has to call direct show to decode it. Direct show then has to scan its list of codecs to find a suitable one which it then uses to play the movie. Problem is that things like Divx don't like being used this way as they want to install divx toolbar to the window. As a result we are constantly getting problems with people who only get sound and no video from cutscenes.

The solution generally given is to uninstall divx and install xvid or to turn off divx toolbar. This is a crap solution. We shouldn't have to forcing people to turn off 3rd party software in order to use FS2. It's a problem that is indicative of the fact that using DirectShow is a dreadful idea in the first place.

Theora on the other hand won't use DirectShow. FS2_Open will decode the movies internally (the way any sensible game coder does it). We don't have to tell people to install codecs. We don't have to support problems with the codecs the user has already screwed his machine up with. We don't have to deal with a multitude of other DirectShow screw ups.

I don't like the idea of going to Theora/MVE only. If it was ADDING Theora support, then fine, I like that, but removing AVI too? Don't like that at all.
AVI is a lot more mature at this stage and creating an AVI is a damned lot easier than a Theora at this point in time.

The avi code however is full of holes and goes wrong with startling regularity. That's why it's being removed. It will be in 3.6.9 because we aren't foolish enough to suddenly remove it without trying to get most of the community to see what's coming but next time it breaks (and it will break) it won't be worth the hassle of repairing it. So why keep it when it's broken?

Is it that hard to keep both in there?!

Unless you can find a coder willing to keep it working yes. I'd rather Taylor was giving me the new pilot code he's been working on than fixing yet another bug in the movie code.

And how are the cutscenes going to be converted to OGM from MVE? I've only ever seen an MVE to AVI convertor, so unless the plan is to transcode the all the AVIs and degrade the videos and weapon shots even more...

1) Why on Earth would we recode? FS2_Open only added support for avi because we couldn't play MVE. We can now play the original MVEs without the loss of quality going from MVE to AVI. So if quality is what you're worried about you can just play the MVEs.
2) MVE2AVI produces uncompressed AVIs. So there shouldn't be much loss of quality anyway.

[Goober5000]

There's no real reason to get rid of the AVI support, none that I can see anyway.

This, gentlemen, is why democracy doesn't work.  People are only too willing to give their opinion on things they know nothing about.

In addition to the reasons karajorma posted, AVI support doesn't work on non-Windows platforms.  The AVI support we do have isn't mature at all; it's basically a bunch of hacks.

[PotzUK]

Ahh, fair enough points.  I've not heard of Theora before though, I'll read up at some point.  My only worry with theora is it's appears to be a fiddley process to generate the movie files, but as long as MVE support remains (which it looks like that's the case anyway) then there shouldn't be a problem 

[karajorma]

http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,41956

Anyone who still wants to argue about why avi support should be put out of it's misery is welcome to try

[phoenixemperor]

Is there anywhere other than the FTP or Oxyshare to get the 1.8 update. I can never get a connection to the FTP and Oxyshare doesn't let Getright resume downloads, which is rather not cool for a dialup user such as myself.

Also, I hate to seem like a retard who can't read, but how exactly do I get mods to work properly?

[karajorma]

If you're talking about the ones included then all you need to do is to go to the mod tab of the launcher and select the folder that they're in.

If you're adding a new mod look at my FAQ's installing mods section for help.

[phoenixemperor]

Well it tells me mod folders can't contain spaces. Yet the folders have no spaces in their names...