Comment by embedding-shape
5 hours ago
It seems really weirdly written. It's written with a lot of authority, like saying "Don't use VLC" and "Don't use Y" yet provides no reasoning for those things. Just putting "Trust me, just don't" doesn't suddenly mean I trust the author more, it probably has the opposite effect. Some sections seem to differ based on if the reader knows/doesn't know something, but I thought the article was supposed to be for the latter.
Would have been nice if these "MUST KNOW BEFORE" advises were structured in a way so one could easily come back and use it as a reference, like just a list, but instead it's like a over-dinner conversation with your "expert and correct but socially-annoying" work colleague, who refuses to elaborate on the how's and why's, but still have very strong opinions.
Average fansubber for you.
Exactly, very hard to take the rest of it seriously after the VLC bit. VLC has literally never left me hanging, across I don't know how many decades. It's gonna take more than a trust me bro to challenge that.
You're talking about VLC for video playback, TFA is taking about video editing.
VLC ignores a lot for it's outstanding video playback support, which is great if you want the playback too just work... But that's the player perspective, not the editing/encoding
While VLC is excellent at playing every format under the sun, it's not good at playing all those formats correctly. Off the top of my head:
- Transfer functions are just generally a mess but are close enough that most people don't notice they're wrong. Changing the render engine option will often change how the video looks.
- Some DV profiles cause videos to turn purple or green.
- h.264 left and right crops are both applied as left crops that are summed together which completely breaks many videos. They could just ignore this metadata but from what I've heard their attitude is that a broken implementation is better than no implementation.
The author did mention to use MPV, which is much much lightweight than VLC. Being using it as default for quite some times now.
what are you talking about? Of course it's only about playback just like the other 2 alternatives
> single best media player out there ... VLC is not recommended.
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VLC has always caused problems for me when seeking backwards (graphical glitches). mpv has never caused any issues in this regard.
VLC and mpv literally use the same underlying codec library. (As well as ffmpeg.)
VLC is great for playing stuff back, but can produce some horribly incorrect video files especially if you're dealing with stuff for editing.
There's a reason why VLC isn't used in broadcast stuff and ffmpeg is.
IIRC VLC used the wrong primaries for converting to RGB for a long time (years) even after it being reported to them as wrong
>even after it being reported to them as wrong
Source?
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VLC has left me hanging many times. It's play a file wrong or not played at all while mpv plays it no problem. Do not use vlc.
And? It’s a GitHub gist not an oreilly book. Context.
technically correct is the best kind. who cares if it's obnoxious? take the opinions and agree or disagree with them.
How do you know it is technically correct without explanation. It's not much different from someone getting blown off for being annoying because they constantly question simple answers when seeking better understanding. I was fortunate to work with a group of engineers when I was very young that accepted my constant use of "why?" not as disrespectful questioning but realized I was actually learning so they naturally just provided more details leading to less "why?" being asked. This eventually got to the point where I would ask a question, and the answer would be to read a specific book on the shelf. This was way before the internet. I received a better education on the job than I ever was going to get in school.
So no, I'm not just going to take an opinion without more information. I don't change my mind just on say so.
Why? Is the most simple test of a valid explanation. If you don't need to ask why any more, you've answered the question. Sometimes it takes 3 or 5 white in a row!
How can I disagree when they don't provide a reasoning behind why something is the better option?
When we switched from x264 to hardware based encoders it saved something like 90% on our customers' power and cooling bills.
So while this essay might be "technically correct" in some very narrow sense the author is speaking with far more authority than they have the experience to justify, which is what makes it obnoxious in the first place.
The author is directing this at complete noobs who are subbing their first anime and you are complaining that it is not applicable to running a datacenter?
This is already mentioned in the article. Software vs. hardware is a tradeoff. x264 produces higher quality (perceptual or compression efficiency) video, at the expense of latency.
the author never talked about power savings or cooling bills, they talked about quality so they are still correct.
It works if you know the person and have a baseline for how much confidence you give their opinions. If it's just a random person on the internet, they need to support their argument.
I mean—they can. They don’t need to give more than they’re already giving we anonymous strangers for free. For all we know, this person wrote this for people they encounter personally or professionally, and we’re just incidentally benefitting.
We as readers should gauge their credibility for ourselves, whether by reputation or by checking the claims. I don’t know who wrote it but it seems basically correct, consistent, and concisely argued to me.