[MPlayer-users] Preventing filters from being reset on play tree iteration

[Aleks Huson]

I need to overlay an image over video similar to an OSD. I've managed to get
both the bmovl and vf_overlay filters to work, and they both more or less do
exactly what I want; however...

Each time play starts for a file (whether the same file in a loop, or the
next file in a play tree) the filter gets reset and the image that is being
displayed is removed.

I have searched the lists and Internet in general, and have found no
detailed information on the expected functionality. I've tried the -fixed-vo
option (despite it not being suitable as I'm using fbdev) and it doesn't
resolve the issue (and just cause more issues with the video). It does seem
obvious to allow changes to settings/filters etc to persist between playing
files, and I have seen some commentary on unrelated issues people have had
(such as volume), however there have never been any concrete answers on
these, and they all seem to be from a while back, leading me to think they
aren't relevant to the latest versions of the code.

I see from looking through the code for the vf_overlay patch, that it
anticipates being called during a loadfile or loop, and that it will re-use
the existing image, however it appears from tracing the code during
execution, that the filter is reloaded each time, and therefore doesn't
maintain any state.

For timing and state reasons, simply re-displaying the image at the
commencement of play each time is not suitable.

I'm currently using mplayer-export-2009-08-23 (and have tried a few versions
prior to this), and an example of how to reproduce:-

  mplayer -vo fbdev -vf bmovl=0:0:/tmp/fifo -loop 0 test.avi

I then dump the image into the fifo (as per the instructions) and it is
displayed correctly, however when the file loops, it disappears, and I need
to dump the image in again. Another example:-

  mplayer -vo fbdev -vf bmovl=0:0:/tmp/fifo -loop 0 -playlist test_playlist

Same as above, however the image disappears as each file is played from the
play list.

I've tried the above with the vf_overlay patch and get the same result.

Can anyone tell me if this is the expected behavior here or is there
something going wrong?


Thanks in advance for any advice.

Aleks Huson