[MPlayer-DOCS] [PATCH] improving encoding guide

[The Wanderer]

Guillaume Poirier wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> The Wanderer wrote:
> 
>> Guillaume POIRIER wrote:

>> I might actually have gotten around to this sooner if I'd noticed
>> this comment specifically... for some while now, I've been mostly
>> almost skimming the mailing lists, sometimes barely reading each
>> message.
> 
> Would it be okay if I were sending a copy of my patches to you in
> private mail next time?

It would be okay, but I can't guarantee that it would get any more
prompt attention - it depends heavily on what else is going on in my
mind and my life at the time. Now that I know you're specifically
looking for my responses, though, I'll make an effort to look at your
patches more actively in future.

>>>   <option>vqmin</option>, which is 2 by default). As soon as you specify a
>>>   low enough bitrate that <systemitem class="library">libavcodec</systemitem>
>>>   is forced to use a higher quantizer, then you're almost certainly ruining
>>>-  the quality of your video. In general, you should avoid CBR altogether if
>>>-  you care about quality.
>>>+  the quality of your video.
>>>+  In order to avoid that, you should probably down-scale your video, according
>>>+  to the method that will be exposed later.
>>>+  In general, you should avoid CBR altogether if you care about quality.
>> 
>> I don't understand what "the method that will be exposed later"
>> means.
> 
> I'm referring to the technique to compute the right scaling factor,
> later on the guide.

Ah - you probably mean "explained", then. Try something like "down-scale
your video; a way to do this will be explained later".

> Maybe I should put a hyperlink to it to make this connection more
> obvious?

That might not hurt either.

>>>+  That would probably be nice, but unfortunately hard to implement as different
>>>+  encoding options yield different qualities depending on the source material.
>>>+  Anime and live action are for example two very different materials that
>>>+  require different care.
>> 
>> "different care" seems a little odd to me, but I've got no
>> suggestions to improve it, and I'm not completely certain that it
>> needs to be changed at all.
> 
> I had the same problem. I wanted to translate into English a sentence
> such as "les dessins animés et les films sont deux types très
> différents, qui nécessitent chacun une attention particulière"... but
> I just couldn't find an equivalent that wouldn't be a literal
> translation.

Well, I don't know the source language well enough to understand that
sentence as it stands. ^_^ I'd give another try at expressing it better,
with that additional information, but I've got a headache right now and
I'm at the tail end of my normal wake-cycle - I'll try to give this
another look in the morning.

>>>+<listitem><para>
>>>+  <emphasis role="bold">psnr</emphasis>: doesn't affect the actual encoding,
>>>+  but writes a log file giving the type/size/quality of each frame, and
>>>+  summarizes psnr at the end.
>> 
>> "prints a sumary of", perhaps?
>> 
>> It might be worthwhile to explain what PSNR stands for, since not
>> everyone is necessarily going to know that, and it isn't trivial to
>> figure out from context. (I got it, but I'm good with acronyms.)
> 
> ;-) I figured that too when  re-reading it to correct the mistake you
>  pointed out just above.

 From my perspective, that's an impressive feat from someone for whom
English is not a first language.

> Well, Thanks a lot The Wanderer!

Just for future reference: that's almost more a title than a name, and
as such in this kind of context (i.e., speaking to me), a) the word
"the" should not be included and b) it wouldn't be capitalized anyway. I
don't particularly mind, but as long as we're in a nitpicking
grammatical mood here anyway... ^_^

> I imagine that this was quite a lot of work, and I really appreciate
> your input.

<shrug> Took fifteen minutes to half an hour, split up among
TV-watching; I'm out of the habit of doing the work, recently, but it's
not really that difficult when I'm not unable to concentrate on it.

I'm glad to be appreciated!

> I think I'll commit this part tomorrow and submit the section about
> muxing with third parties software soon after, so that the patch will
> be smaller. As you said, this was quite a big patch, so I guess it's
> better to break the re-witting of the guide in several chunks.

As you please. Don't delay applying the patch on account of the one
pending suggestion I have left, above; if I do wind up making a
suggestion, it can be dealt with later on.

-- 
       The Wanderer

Warning: Simply because I argue an issue does not mean I agree with any
side of it.

A government exists to serve its citizens, not to control them.