[MPlayer-users] capturing and seeking

[RC]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2005 01:23:42 +1200
keithcsl at ihug.co.nz wrote:

> I am capturing video from a camera using mencoder in mpeg4
> format.

You seem confused on the subject.  The video codec you are using is NOT
the file-format.  With mencoder, unless you use the "-of" option, it is
outputting AVI files.

.mp4 is a container format which a CVS snapshot of mencoder can output
to.  However, it's not an MPEG format, it's actually a modified .mov
format.

.mpg files can be made with MPEG-4 video, using mencoder, but it's
definately not normal, and I doubt many players can handle it.

> However, having read from previous posts, the -ss is
> inaccurate for mpeg files.

-ss is innacurate for some MPEG files, because mpeg is rather flexible
in how it allows you to write the timestamps (pos), and some encoders
use that to make very screwy files.  Since mencoder has a pretty
straight-forward mpeg muxer, it should not be a problem to seek in the
mpeg files it creates (no special options needed).