[MEncoder-users] mplayer / mencoder timing mismatch (WAS: Re: mplayer / mencoder: precision of -ss)

[Reza Roboubi]

Thanks so much for all your replies.

>>If someone specifies "321 seconds" he probablay expects
>>321  seconds and not some position between 321 and 331 seconds.
> 
> 
> Yes, well, if someone types-in -ss 300 he probably DOESN'T want to waste
> time decoding from the last keyframe, up until EXACTLY 300 seconds.

Actually, the issue is a significant lag between how mencoder and mplayer
talk about time.  I'm trying to seek to a point which mplayer reports as
(maybe) 1617.9 seconds into a stream.  At this distance, I need to
put mencoder (maybe) about 50 seconds back, to get close to the desired
location.

The lag is quite significant, and cannot be explained by iframe/pframe
arguments.

A more traditional video editing tool may be used, but what I need
is so simple, and I would be happier if I could even find some time, and
help develop a patch for it, just so I can do it within mplayer/mencoder.
(Of course, someone would have to advise me on how to do this.)  In any
case, real interested to know _why_ this lag exists.

Reza.