[FFmpeg-user] default mp4 encoding changed to x264

[Lou]

On Thu, 8 Sep 2011 11:33:39 -0600
Roger Pack <rogerdpack2 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello.
> I noticed with this version of (windows) ffmpeg: N-31706-g335bbe4
> 
> And this command line:
> 
> $ ffmpeg -f dshow -i video=screen-capture-recorder  -r 5 -t 1
> "yo3.mp4"
> 
> The output video encoding appears to default to
> 
> Output #0, mp4, to 'yo3.mp4':
>   Metadata:
>     encoder         : Lavf53.6.0
>     Stream #0.0: Video: mpeg4, yuv420p, 500x500, q=2-31, 200 kb/s, 5
> tbn, 5 tbc
> 
> However with this newer version: N-32138-g312645e
> 
> The output appears to default to:
> 
> Output #0, mp4, to 'yo3.mp4':
>   Metadata:
>     encoder         : Lavf53.10.0
>     Stream #0.0: Video: h264 (![0][0][0] / 0x0021), yuv420p, 500x500,
> q=2-31, 5 tbn, 5 tbc
> 
> (so newer one uses h264 instead of mpeg4 for default).
> Is this change expected?
> https://gist.github.com/1204022 has more complete outputs
> Cheers!
> -roger-

Yes, it's expected behavior due to a recent commit:

movenc: use libx264 by default when possible for mov, mp4 and psp
<http://git.videolan.org/gitweb.cgi/ffmpeg.git/?a=commit;h=fb42d156ed3a726f9a6c76025ea9e1237e6b4840>

You can add "-vcodec mpeg4" (did the syntax change for this recently? I
recall another recent commit...) if you want the previous behavior.