[FFmpeg-user] Convert MOV to some lossless format.

[Peter B.]

A Commuter wrote:
> I'm looking for a simple ffmpeg command that will convert a MOV file created using a digital camera, to a high quality format that can be read by my DVD creator software. I've tried mov to mpg with no arguments, and my source, 95 MB turned into an output of 5MB. The quality looks a little grainy. FYI. Only a 32 second video if you're wondering. :-
You're saying that you'd like to use a lossless format, but MPEG is lossy.

Depending on the operating system you use, as well as the DVD creator
software, different containers/formats would be suitable for your case.
For example, if your DVD creator is able to use system codecs, you could
install ffdshow-tryouts[1] (for Windows) or Perian[2] (for MacOS) and
then use Huffyuv or FFv1 lossless codecs in an AVI container.

Another question is, what the actual codec within your original MOV file
is (audio/video). MOV is just the container...
Depending on the lossy codec inside the MOV, it might be enough to just
copy the data into another container - without any transcoding.

Like this:

ffmpeg -i in.mov -acodec copy -vcodec copy output.avi

The "-vcodec copy" and "-acodec copy" arguments tell FFmpeg to leave the
actual audio/video data as it is :)

If that doesn't work, you could post the output of "ffmpeg -i in.mov",
as this should contain information about the audio/video codecs inside.


Good luck,
Pb