MPEG_ENCODE

The encoder will take as input a sequence of digital images, along with a parameter file, and compute an MPEG movie for you. This is an expensive compute process. CPU times of upwards of 20 minutes can be expected for movies which are only a few hundred frames in length, depending upon the image complexity and the choice of parameters.

The settings for mpeg_encode (which files to use, how to pre-process them, etc.) are contained in an ascii text parameter file. You must edit this file before running mpeg_encode. A sample file, "template.param" is included with the distribution, but seems to sacrifice quality for better compression. Another sample file is available here. This file makes a movie from a series of Portable PixMap (ppm) frames, which mpeg_encode accepts as input.

The movie produced by this parameter file is here (~700KB), a full sized version is here (~3.2MB).

To use mpeg_encode on davinci.nersc.gov, you first need to load the visit module:

    % module load visit/1.4.5

Change the settings for mpeg_encode in the ASCII text parameter file:
- Change the filename listed after the "OUTPUT" line to the desired name for your MPEG-1 movie.
- Change the "BASE_FILE_FORMAT" line to reflect the input image file type. The example expects the JPEG image type.
- After the "INPUT" line, you will see the line: "file*.jpg [000-099]". Change this line to reflect the name of your input image files, the format and the frame numbers. In this case files named file000.jpg through file099.jpg will be encoded. You can have multiple lines specifying the input files.
Start the movie making process as follows:

    % mpeg_encode <name of parameter file>

Mpeg_encode was developed by the Berkeley Multimedia Research Center at the University of California at Berkeley. You can download the latest version from the BMRC MPEG Software page, which also includes more documentation and FAQ's.