MLV App 1.14 - All in one MLV Video Post Processing App [Windows, Mac and Linux]

[bouncyball]

You said, you fixed the Actual Frame export issue.  Is there a new old-CPU build with that bug fixed and if yes, where should I download it from?

Yes masc fixed it but there is no release or compiled build for win yet. If you need to get highest quality frames from MLV App you need to export TIFF sequence. This PNG is just a quick show-me-the-frame thingy and is 8bit per channel. In contrary exported TIFFs are 16bit!

[Danne]

One nice thing I noticed is that you can drag all MLV files onto Mlv app and the lot will open inside the application. Might be a really nice starting point calling Mlv app from a bash script in Switch for instance. Very nice previewing capabilities and toggling mlv functions on and off along with sliders makes it very intutive and useful.

[ilia3101]

@Danne You can launch MLV App from bash with mac open command

Code Select Expand

open -a "MLV App" file_1 file_2 file_3 This will launch default version of MLV app on the Mac and load all the specified files in to it.

[Danne]

Cool tip. I think I add some binding through that command in Switch for fast acces to Mlv app.

[bouncyball]

Ah yes I also wanted to tell you that MLV App can be used from cli, however there are no interesting features accessible except importing of files.

[Danne]

Perfect.
Added integration to Mlv App like following:
https://youtu.be/sDqZTzJRYlk

I could include the whole Mlv App package but I´d rather keep the already overweight "Switch" package on a strict diet nowadays  .
Thank you all for a great tool.


Another question:
Is it possible to move on to the next MLV file when using the arrow keys(up or down)? Right now I can move the up or down but if I want to preview the file I also need an addittional step to double click the file before it becomes viewable/selected.

[masc]

@Danne: hehe, great! Thank you!

For changing the clip press J or K. You'll also find the actions in Playback menu (menubar).

[Danne]

For changing the clip press J or K. You'll also find the actions in Playback menu (menubar).

Awesomeness!

[bouncyball]

@masc I've been always curious why J/K and not something more intuitive

[masc]

@masc I've been always curious why J/K and not something more intuitive

Someone made a proposal, the keys were not used, so I realized that...

[bouncyball]

[Danne]

Someone made a proposal, the keys were not used, so I realized that...

Where are the keys specified in qt code? Searching but can´t find

[masc]

Look into MainWindow.ui (under Forms in QtCreator) - in the designer window there is a list of actions.

[jpegmasterjesse]

@jpegmasterjesse, @Danne

Anyway using dualiso means wide DR is needed, data bits less then 14 already restricts DR and this makes no sense b/c, during 14bit lossless raw recording, writing speed is good enough.

Interesting - do we know the exact degree to which bit reduction reduces dynamic range?

I still greatly appreciate the easy work-arounds, in this case, as the 5d2 build I used to create the dual-iso 12 bit .mlvs has dysfunctional 14bit raw (I should test this again to be sure.)

[bouncyball]

So, please render them more than once, maybe at different MLVApp settings until you end up with  a crash event.  I also tested both files on a more powerful machine of a colleague of mine at work and they both rendered fine, without crashes.  So, the crash issue seems to occur only on old CPU machines under Windows x64.

I've downloaded both files and tested them together with your older files on my Core2 Duo but unfortunately I could not reproduce crashes.

[bouncyball]

@jpegmasterjesse

Latest MLV App directly supports your 12bit uncompressed dualiso MLVs recorded by 5D2. Ask @masc or @Danne for Mac build to test.

[masc]

Danne made a testbuild yesterday.
https://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=20025.msg198721#msg198721
If you are using macOS 10.12 or 10.13 this should work.

[IDA_ML]

I've downloaded both files and tested them together with your older files on my Core2 Duo but unfortunately I could not reproduce crashes.

Bouncyball,

I have just tested on my laptop the version that you sent to me this morning and IT WORKS WITHOUT CRASHES !!!  Please keep a good record of this version so you know what to do if crashes start occurring again.  Also the Actual Frame export works perfectly now.  Thank you so much!  I'll keep testing and report if I find further problems.

[bouncyball]

Well there have been done some changes (fixes) since previously posted version, so I'm glad to hear that!

[hjfilmspeed]

Same!!! the version you sent me is still working great! I have an older CPU and I was having trouble with the other builds. The fast CDNG is awesome. I had some 5D3 footage today that didn't seem to have any vert stripes or bad pix so I blasted that out with the fast CDNG. This is becoming a super awesome MLV tool!!!! Great work!!!

[IDA_ML]

Now that I have played with MLVApp for more than a week, I have a few questions to Masc and Bouncyball:
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1) What is the difference between "AMaZe" and "Bilinear", as well as "Kostya" and "Anatolij" and how does this difference affect video quality?  Which combination of both parameters would you recommend for best video quality when exporting to ProRess422 or ProRes422 HQ for color grading and/or further processing in DaVinci Resolve?

2) I have noticed that the H.264 and H.265 codecs provide very compact file sizes, much smaller than DaVinci Resolve for example.  This means quite high compression.  Does this cause any visible loss of quality when exporting to the original MLV resolution or to some downsized resolutions, compared to DaVinci Resolve?  Have you performed any comparisons on that?

3) Now that Actual Frame export works so well, would it be possible to automate the process in such manner that, instead of exporting a PNG file, it exports it in 16-bit ProPhoto RGB TIFF at the resolution set in the export settings OR at the resolution of the original MLV video file (selectable option).  I know, I know, I asked this already and know that now this can be done with the Cut-In and Cut-Out option and subsequent TIFF export, but if the process is automated, just as this is the case with the PNG export at the cursor position, this would save some tweaking time.

4) Would it be possible to implement in MLVApp the possibility for opening video files that have already been saved in one of its own export formats (ProRes4444, ProRes422, H.264, etc.)?   This would be very useful for at least two practical reasons:

a) It would allow to extract an Actual Frame from those compressed videos to check quality of the final video clips;

b) This would allow small additional adjustments on certain clips to match basic adjustments between clips, clean color noise with Chroma separation, etc.
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Thank you.

[masc]

1) What is the difference between "AMaZe" and "Bilinear", as well as "Kostya" and "Anatolij" and how does this difference affect video quality?  Which combination of both parameters would you recommend for best video quality when exporting to ProRess422 or ProRes422 HQ for color grading and/or further processing in DaVinci Resolve?

AMaZE and Bilinear are two types of debayer algorithms. Bilinear is ugly but fast, AMaZE is slower (on most machines) but amazing. Zoom 100% or more into the picture and toggle - you'll see a big difference in detail.

Kostya and Anatolij are two encoding algorithms from ffmpeg. I can't tell what the exact difference is - it is different. Mostly Anatolij is a bit faster for me... quality: I don't know.

If you grade in DaVinci, I would export as CDNG! When just cutting in FCPX I use ProRes4444.

2) I have noticed that the H.264 and H.265 codecs provide very compact file sizes, much smaller than DaVinci Resolve for example.  This means quite high compression.  Does this cause any visible loss of quality when exporting to the original MLV resolution or to some downsized resolutions, compared to DaVinci Resolve?  Have you performed any comparisons on that?

For these two codecs we set a medium crf 24 setting. I don't know what Resolve sets. Sure: H264 & H265 means always loss of quality. The resolution is what you set up - or what the clip is.

3) Now that Actual Frame export works so well, would it be possible to automate the process in such manner that, instead of exporting a PNG file, it exports it in 16-bit ProPhoto RGB TIFF at the resolution set in the export settings OR at the resolution of the original MLV video file (selectable option).  I know, I know, I asked this already and know that now this can be done with the Cut-In and Cut-Out option and subsequent TIFF export, but if the process is automated, just as this is the case with the PNG export at the cursor position, this would save some tweaking time.

The single frame export was a quick and easy function realized by Qt libs. Qt does not support 16bit graphics. That is why we added the ffmpeg 16bit TIFF option to the main clip export.

4) Would it be possible to implement in MLVApp the possibility for opening video files that have already been saved in one of its own export formats (ProRes4444, ProRes422, H.264, etc.)?

Nothing is impossible. But this would mean to reimplement nearly half of the low level functionality...

[IDA_ML]

Thanks a lot for this very comprehensive and informative reply, Masc.  MLVApp is great!

[masc]

It took some time, but now i added a Table of Contents to the english version of my mlvapp-compile guide for linux: https://sternenkarten.com/tutorial-englisch/

@escho: I linked your nice guide to the readme at github! Thanks for your work!

@IDA_ML: Thanks. If you have further questions, you can always ask

[Danne]

Yea, love this collaborative all in one mlv tool.