videos encoded with episode, wowza won't stream...
 

Robbie maybe you can answer this questions?

I'm encoding with Episode pro.

My settings are

Source video is RAW DV
H.264 Hinted
vbr using vbv
average rate 1760k
vbv buffer 1.9
natural and forced keyframes distance 100.
reference frames=5
b-frames=1
profile=main
entropy coding=CAVLC
aspect ratio=from source
2 pass with de-blocking

These setting results in a file thats about 1.5 gigs per hour of video.

The video will play in jwplayer, but does not allow you to seek, jump around like it should. videos re encoded via ffmpeg seem to work just fine but, I would like the original to work without having to re encode each....

Sounds like a problem with metadata. Flash can be particular about the H.264 files it plays.

First thing to do is run the file through MP4Box (to reorder the moov atom in the file).

I'm Mac, based. doesn't look like MP4Box will work.

But Episode Pro is a 1000.00 piece of encoding software... I wouldn't think it would require me to use a secondary program just to get the finished file correct....

Never heard of Episode Pro.

Wowza is pretty particular about how and where it will stream... Doesn't matter how much you spent on your encoding software. FFmpeg conversion was how I typically corrected mp4 files for streaming whenever issues popped up. Look carefully at what flags you are using as well with ffmpeg.

You also might want to check around for notes on the specific version of JWplayer since you are using that as your video container. Some of the newer versions believe it or not we're showing some pretty heavy incompatibilities with wowza streaming out of box, while older versions worked fine. I'm on ICQ after this weekend, or email if you'd like a second set of experienced eyes on the issues.

Cory, whatever you figure out on this issue.. please be sure to let us know if we're not already in the loop.

Thanks!

Brad

I always have to use another piece of software to hint the video. Seems it never works during the encode as it should.

This is probably all you need to do. I don't know what to use for a Mac but you simply need to hint it again with software that specializes on that alone.

Still can't find the goddamn like button on this forum... :1orglaugh:1orglaugh You guys are on the ball when it comes to streaming tech.

Episode Pro is shit software... switch over to fcp with compressor .... then for flash videos nothing beats adobe .. if you need any software or serials and what not let me know...

im a mac guy as well... my specialty is video..... many many many hours in the classs room and on many big sets and not to mention I have filmed over 1800 scenes ....

I have FCP also, but it does not do watch folders which is the main reason I'm using episode. My encoding times, of course, are horrible.. taking me 5 hours per 1 hour of video. So everything time I have to redo something it's taking me forever. I'm going to get one of the new Matrox Mini mxo2 with MAX, which supposedly will take the encoding time to, or faster than, real time on my macbook pro.

Brad, your guys are always top notch and I do have a ticket in about this, the issue I'm having it that elevated X support is tying to get this working insides their script. But they don't do any of the actual wowza setup part.... So, when they need something changed, I have to update the mojohost ticket, then back to the elevated x ticket and so on. Your guys answer whatever is asked of them in usually minutes, but the response from Elevated is slower, sometimes days... so I have been going back and for on the issue now since July 12th.. even the slightest issue like one letter misplaced in the configuration seems to add another 5 days on the ticket....

What I'm trying to do today is see if this issue had to do with the extension of the video. The episode pro encoder outputs the video as filename only, and I manually added the mp4 extension. (Don't ask my why this is, I have support ticket in over at telesteam)

In reading deeper on the Jwplayer forums I found this...

"hi,

in my case, Extremists.m4v file does not stream with mp4: prefix, but it's working without the prefix. Is something wrong with my installation?"

with the reply,

"Nothing is wrong, it's because JW Player is adding the prefix. If you add it, it's being added again anyway.

Richard"

Which got me thinking that maybe I should not have added the .mp4 to the prefix and left it alone.... I'm copying one of my videos over to the test folder and having it changed to filename.mp4, filename.flv, and just plain filename. To see if I can get either of the 3 to work correctly. Sounds simple, but I have been working on this already 3 hours this morning cause I can't seem to move the files around myself (just too damn large) and reuploading them would take another 3 hours.

If I find the solution I'll share.

I've been through exactly the situation you explained above... after some research and well placed guidance from the EX programmers, if memory serves correctly we fixed the problem with switching up to an older jw player, and redoing the Wowza setup to use simplestreaming... There were a few code changeovers tied in, but I'm pretty sure source code would've been update to reflect these by now. I was banging my head up against a wall for a while, but EX came through bigtime for me, and we got everything running relatively painlessly once we new what we were dealing with.

ARRGGG.

see, this is the kind of stuff that's making this take forever. So, I moved the file over and the original filename.mp4 WORKS....

But support told me yesterday

"Hello,

The issue is not with wowza or the player, but with the encoding of the video. During testing, I did upgrade Wowza to version 2 to rule out the older version having problems. I've re-encoded the video provided in the test video and setup a test page at:
http://extremehole.com/location/locationjd/ (edited to hide actual location)

Skipping, streaming, etc. are all working properly on the test page.
"

So, the that would tell me that the issue is NOT my encoding, but the setup of the elevated x script in trying to use the wowza server and jwplayer... sigh. another 2 days wasted.

The jwplayer used in the test is version 4.2.90 the version in the members area is 4.5.230, you may be on to something....

:thumbsup:thumbsup You are on the same cusp I rode for a few days before pulling my hair out... :thumbsup:thumbsup I'm on ICQ tomorrow if I can help any further...

It is JW player we use a config like what you describe to encode though its over a cluster of XServe boxes and had the same issues and had to roll back JWplayer to make it work.