MOVIE FILES
 

VIDEO-and-AUDIO-and-CONTAINER
formats


that have proved to be playable
by various movie players
on various operating systems


She hasn't met a movie format that she liked.

FE Home page > FE Video Demos page >

This Movie Video-Audio-Container Formats page

! Note !
A few more Video-Audio-Container examples
may be added occasionally --- and more info
on 'players' may be added.

< Go to MOVIE SAMPLES (video-audio-container samples) below. >
(Skip the Introduction)

INTRODUCTION :

Anyone who has been creating and converting movie files around the years 2000 to 2011 knows that the movie file formats (for video, audio, container) are still in a state of change. 'Codecs' (coders and de-coders) for movie files are still being devised --- to reduce file sizes as much as possible while keeping quality (video and audio) at an appealing level.

In contrast, image file formats (and their coding and decoding algorithms) have been pretty settled since the late 1990's --- with JPEG, PNG, and GIF formats being popular and stable. The SVG (scalable vector graphics) format is perhaps the main example of a 'less-than-a-movie' image file format that may still see some changes in features and in coding and decoding algorithms.

    [Well ... there IS the area of 3D models and their viewers, in the mix of visual presentation possibilities. That area is in a great state of flux also.]

Just when there seemed to be a 'light at the end of the tunnel' in the search for minimal-sized-high-quality video-audio recording formats, the popularity of 3D movies indicates that there may be a push to develop better 'codecs' for new-and-improved 3D movie files --- with the need to reduce file sizes as much as possible while maintaining high-quality 3D video and bazillion channel audio.

So, instead of movie formats perhaps settling down to about 3 highly desirable, relatively compact formats within the next 5 years (by 2016), it looks like it might be about 10 years (about 2021) before we see a 'stabilization' of movie formats.

And if holographic-like movies become feasible around that time, we may see a further string of developments in movie (video and audio) formats to handle moving 3D scenes that we can walk around (and walk within).

Will animation formats EVER settle down?


Some semblance of video-audio order, via YouTube :

The phenomenon of popular movies being made available, in large numbers, from sites like YouTube, for playing on computers of various types (desktops, laptops, netbooks, pads, pods, game-boxes, and phones) has created some order out of the video-audio chaos.

The YouTube site takes movies, submitted in various formats, and converts them to a YouTube-standard format --- of reasonable size (for relatively fast downloading) and of reasonable quality (video and audio).

    Note: The YouTube 'standard' format for video encoding has actually changed at least a couple of times in the 2005-2011 time frame. And the 'standard' will probably change again, as noted at the bottom of this web page.

You can find many comments on the web from people who have uploaded their movies to YouTube only to find that there are various types of problems in the audio or video, after their submission goes through the YouTube conversion process.

Those people know (now) that the movie file scene is populated with so many video-and-audio formatting possibilities that it can make for some trying times in making movies playable on commonly available movie players. Player examples :

  • QuickTime player --- on Apple and Microsoft OSes.

  • Windows Media Player --- on Microsoft OSes.

  • ffplay and mplayer --- and 'mplayer' offshoots like 'gmplayer', 'smplayer', and 'Totem' --- on Linux OSes. VLC is another popular movie player available on Linux.

      [Several of these players are also available on Apple and Microsoft OSes --- for example, Mplayer, Smplayer, and VLC.]

  • Flash movie players (Adobe and other) --- on Apple, Microsoft, and Linux OSes.

These players (QuickTime, Windows Media Player, Mplayer, Flash-players) are usually available in two forms :

  • a 'plug-in' (connected into a web browser) that displays the targets of movie file links in web pages

  • a 'stand-alone' program that displays movie files from directories/folders of your computer's file systems --- including movie files on DVD's or CD's or USB sticks

Some of the newer video formats (such as H.264) are still (in 2011) undergoing enhancements (feature additions). The movie-player developers are continually coming out with new versions of their players to handle the recent additions and enhancements in formats --- and, more specifically, to handle the additions and changes in the IMPLEMENTATION of those formats in de-coders.

    [It's one thing to have IDEA(s) for a new video/audio format --- it's another thing to IMPLEMENT the idea(s) well in computer code.]

In order to have a good chance of playing most movie files that you might encounter, it is best to try to keep your movie players up to date, with release levels at least as high as these (circa 2010-2011) :

  • QuickTime 7.6.9
  • Windows Media Player 12
  • Mplayer 1.0
  • Smplayer 0.6.7
  • Totem 2.28.2
  • Adobe Flash plugin 10.3.x.x (for example, 10.3.181.14 in 2011)

There may be some separate decoder libraries that these players use. Those libraries may also need to be installed or updated.

I am getting close to explaining the intent of this web page, but first a little more background information.


The 3 formats of movie files :
(Video, Audio, Container)

It was mentioned on the FE Video Demos page that, besides the video format and the audio format within a movie file, there is also the 'container' format --- that is, the format that is used to 'interleave' the video and the audio data together.

Here is an introduction to 'containers' for video and audio (Wikipedia) --- with links to info on coding formats for video and audio.

Often movie files are referred to by the 'container' name, without specifying the format of the video and audio streams within the container.

One man, who makes movie files for others and who is often frustrated that they specify a container format but no format for the video and audio, explains it this way.

The container is like the bread on a sandwich. If you ordered a sandwich you would not simply specify the bread that you want, like 'whole wheat' (the 'container').

You would also need to specify the contents of the sandwich ... such as peanut butter and jelly ... or turkey and lettuce ... or ham and cheese (video and audio).

    Actually, this man should probably have his customers specify which player(s) (and which version) the customer has in mind for playing the movie file. That would probably be much easier for the customer to specify than the video and audio formats.

    Furthermore, this would probably be more likely to result in a satisfied customer --- avoiding 'but you said'/'but I meant' arguments.

    You could probably find this guy's web site by Googling on the terms 'movie sandwich bread container video'.

The 3 formats --- video, audio, and container --- are used to organize the following list of movie samples.


The Intent of this page :

This page is intended to point out movie file formats (specifically, the combinations of video, audio, and container formats) that are playable on at least one of the several popular movie players mentioned above. The combinations that are presented are based on specific examples of playable movies.

I have run the 'ffmpeg -i' command on various movie clips collected from the web and other sources, and I have assembled the ffmpeg output for the various movie file formats below. The movie clips are ones that I have found playable in at least one of the several movie players mentioned above.

The ffmpeg outputs are shown below, in order by the triplets comprised of video-audio-container format abbreviations. Hence the sample ffmpeg outputs are basically in order by the first of the 3 formats, the video stream format.

The first 2 lines of the ffmpeg output (the lines that start with 'Input' and 'Duration') are mostly 'container' info. The last 2 lines ('Stream #0.0' and 'Stream #0.1') are mostly video and audio info.

    I have not found a REALLY good explanation of the 'tbr', 'tbn', and 'tbc' values that show on the 'Video' lines of the 'ffmpeg -i' output. If I ever find a REAL good explanation, I may put it here.

    In the mean time, you can try Googling ffmpeg tbr tbn tbc.


You can use the Find Text facility of your web browser to quickly locate examples below. For example, if you want to look for samples of 'flv' containers, you could search for '-FLV' or '-flv'. And if you want to look for samples involving mp3 audio, you could search for '-MP3-' or '-mp3-'.

The main container formats include ASF (closed source, Microsoft may claim royalty rights to all implementations), AVI (early Microsoft), FLV ('Flash', closed source, Adobe may claim royalty rights to all implementations), MKV (Matroska, open standard), MP4 (a Motion Pictures Experts Group standard, MPEG-4 part 14 ; similar to MOV and 3GP container formats), MPEG (an older Motion Pictures Experts Group standard), OGG (open spec of xiph.org), WEBM (Google, open, Matroska-based).

The main video formats include H.264 (a standard for Blu-ray; used by YouTube ; said to be the best, around 2010-2011), MPEG1 (Motion Picture Experts' early standard, CD era ; said to be the most widely compatible world-wide, circa 2011), MPEG2 (Motion Picture Experts' later standard, DVD era), MPEG4 (Motion Picture Experts' recent standard, into the Blu-ray era), Sorenson (proprietary ; several versions ; used for a while in some Flash container movies), Theora (open spec of xiph.org ; not as small file sizes as H264 and VP8), VP6 and VP7 (On2 proprietary), VP8 (Google is opening the spec, after acquiring On2), WMV2 and WMV3 (Microsoft may claim royalty rights to all implementations, hence 'encumbered').

The main audio formats include AAC (designed as improvement on MP3 ; an audio standard for iPhone, iPod, iPad, Nintendo, PlayStation, and more), MP2 (Motion Picture Experts' standard, MPEG-1 'Layer 2'), MP3 (Motion Picture Experts' standard, MPEG-1 'Layer 3'), PCM (method of converting analog signals to digital ; a high-quality standard used in CD, DVD, Blu-ray audio recording), VORBIS (open spec of xiph.org ; unencumbered by patents ; produces small files), WMAV2 and WMAV3 (designed for voice playback applications ; Microsoft may claim royalty rights to all implementations, hence 'encumbered').

FLV(Sorenson)-MP3-FLV :
(video file from a web page circa 2008)



Input #0, flv, from 'yadayadayada.flv':
  Duration: 00:xx:xx.xx, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 32 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: flv, yuv420p, 320x240, 15 tbr, 1k tbn, 1k tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: mp3, 22050 Hz, mono, s16, 32 kb/s


The 'Totem' player showed that the 'flv' video data is in a Sorenson format.


H264-AAC-FLV :
(a YouTube video file circa 2010)



Input #0, flv, from 'yadayadayada.flv':
  Duration: 00:08:57.91, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 352 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: h264, yuv420p, 852x480 [PAR 1:1 DAR 71:40], 352 kb/s, 25 tbr, 1k tbn, 50 tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: aac, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16


H264-AAC-FLV :
(a video file from an ffmpeg conversion
from an H264-PCM-MKV video file)



Input #0, flv, from 'yadayadayada.flv':
  Duration: 00:05:04.03, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 200 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: h264, yuv420p, 640x480 [PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3], 200 kb/s, 29.97 tbr, 1k tbn, 60 tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: aac, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16


H264-AAC-MP4 :
(a video file from an ffmpeg conversion
from an H264-PCM-MKV video file - uploadable to YouTube)



Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from 'yadayadayada.mp4':
  Duration: 00:05:04.06, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 210 kb/s
    Stream #0.0(und): Video: h264, yuv420p, 640x480, 30 tbr, 30 tbn, 60 tbc
    Stream #0.1(und): Audio: aac, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16


'ffmpeg' probably lists the 'mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2' container formats together because their coding/decoding algorithms are quite similar, if not the same.


H264-PCM(s16le)-MKV :
(a 'lossless' video recording ; an ffmpeg 'x11grab')
(Based on the guide HOWTO: Proper Screencasting on Linux
at ubuntuforums.org.)



Input #0, matroska, from 'yadayadayada.mkv':
  Duration: 00:05:04.06, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
    Stream #0.0: Video: h264, yuv420p, 1024x768, PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3, 30 tbr, 1k tbn, 2k tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: pcm_s16le, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16, 1411 kb/s


MPEG1VIDEO-MP2-MPEG :
(a video file from a web page circa 2008)



Input #0, mpeg, from 'yadayadayada.mpg':
  Duration: 00:xx:xx.xx, start: 0.xxxxxx, bitrate: 650 kb/s
    Stream #0.0[0x1e0]: Video: mpeg1video, yuv420p, 320x240 [PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3], 512 kb/s,
                                                           23.98 tbr, 90k tbn, 23.98 tbc
    Stream #0.1[0x1c0]: Audio: mp2, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16, 128 kb/s


MPEG1VIDEO-MP2-MPEG :
(a video file from an ffmpeg conversion
from an H264-PCM-MKV video file)



Input #0, mpeg, from 'yadayadayada.mpg':
  Duration: 00:05:04.06, start: 0.500000, bitrate: 658 kb/s
    Stream #0.0[0x1e0]: Video: mpeg1video, yuv420p, 640x480 [PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3], 104857 kb/s,
                                                                   30 tbr, 90k tbn, 30 tbc
    Stream #0.1[0x1c0]: Audio: mp2, 44100 Hz, mono, s16, 96 kb/s


Note:
Each of the 'mpeg' containers of data, above, are in a '.mpg' suffix file, instead of '.mpeg'.


MPEG4-MP3-AVI :
(a video file from an ffmpeg conversion
from an H264-PCM-MKV video file)



Input #0, avi, from 'yadayadayada.avi':
  Duration: 00:05:04.06, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 369 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: mpeg4, yuv420p, 640x480 [PAR 1:1 DAR 4:3], 30 tbr, 30 tbn, 30 tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16, 128 kb/s


MPEG4-PCM-AVI :
(video file from a web page circa 2009)



Input #0, avi, from 'yadayadayada.avi':
  Duration: 00:00:xx.xx, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 2687 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: mpeg4, yuv420p, 720x544 [PAR 1:1 DAR 45:34], 25 tbr, 29.97 tbn, 25 tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: pcm_s16le, 41000 Hz, stereo, s16, 1312 kb/s


THEORA-VORBIS-OGG :
('ripped' from a DVD, for backup,
in case the DVD were to be scratched)



Input #0, ogg, from 'yadayadayada.ogv':
  Duration: 00:36:xx.xx, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 6472 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: theora, yuv420p, 480x320, PAR 8:9 DAR 4:3, 29.97 tbr, 29.97 tbn, 29.97 tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: vorbis, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16, 128 kb/s


Note:
This 'ogg' container is in a '.ogv' (OGG-Video) suffix file, instead of '.ogg'.


VP6F-MP3-FLV :
(video file from a web page circa 2009)



Input #0, flv, from 'yadayadayada.flv':
  Duration: 00:xx:xx.xx, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 56 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Video: vp6f, yuv420p, 320x240, 25 tbr, 1k tbn, 1k tbc
    Stream #0.1: Audio: mp3, 22050 Hz, mono, s16, 56 kb/s


WMV2-WMAV2-ASF :
(video file from a web page circa 2008)



Input #0, asf, from 'yadayadayada.wmv':
  Duration: 00:00:xx.xx, start: 3.000000, bitrate: 1495 kb/s
    Stream #0.0: Audio: wmav2, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16, 64 kb/s
    Stream #0.1: Video: wmv2, yuv420p, 512x384, 1300 kb/s, 25 tbr, 1k tbn, 1k tbc


Note:
This 'asf' container format is in a '.wmv' suffix file, instead of '.asf'.

Furthermore, the audio data is in Stream #0.0, while most other movie file formats have video in that stream.

Since many movies are 'type-cast' according to their container format (flash, mpeg, avi, etc.), here is a list of the above video-audio-container combinations, sorted by container format. There are exceptions to this verbal type-casting. Sometimes the video format is used, as indicated in some examples detailed below this list.

  • WMV2-WMAV2-ASF

  • MPEG4-MP3-AVI
  • MPEG4-PCM-AVI

  • H264-AAC-FLV
  • VP6F-MP3-FLV
  • Sorenson-MP3-FLV

  • H264-PCM(s16le)-MKV

  • MPEG1VIDEO-MP2-MPEG

  • H264-AAC-MP4
    (MOV or 3GP may be similar container formats)

  • THEORA-VORBIS-OGG

On 'Flash'

The several FLV (FLash Video) container 'combos' in this list are probably indicative of YouTube videos changing their 'standard' of video and audio encoding over the years.

For example, YouTube may have migrated over the years from Sorenson to VP6 to H264 video encoding. So you may find that old YouTube videos use Sorenson or VP6 for video encoding, and recent (2010-2011) YouTube videos use H264 video encoding.


The name confusion (and avoiding it)

Note that you hardly ever hear of people referring to movies as being ASF or MKV (Matroska) movies. Rather you hear/read of 'wmv' or 'h.264' movies --- the video encoding rather than the container encoding.

I believe this inconsistency in 'typing' of movies leads to lots of confusion --- for example, sometimes referring to an H264-xxx-MKV movie as a Matroska movie and other times referring to it as an H.264 movie.

Further, sometimes OGG files are referred to as 'ogv' or Theora files. And ASF files are usually referred to as 'wmv' files.

And then there's the phenomenon of the internals (video and audio encoding) in 'flv' files changing over the years.

This is why, in these web pages, I have tried to avoid a lot of the confusion about movie formats by specifying the triplet --- video-audio-container formats, all three.

'ffmpeg' formats :

The utility program 'ffmpeg' is a popular program (with libraries of coders and decoders) used to convert and create movie (video-only and video-with-audio) and audio files.

For reference, below is the output of the command 'ffmpeg -formats' (circa 2010).

Although this output is a rather jumbled list of 'container' and 'video' and 'audio' format 'codecs' (coders and decoders), the output indicates the ffmpeg-supported container formats and the ffmpeg video and audio codecs.

The names can be confusing. For example, there is an 'flv' CONTAINER format and an 'flv' VIDEO format (Flash Video).

Admittedly, this list is not easy to decipher at first (or second) glance. But it is a fairly compact list that shows the wide variety of video, audio, and container formats that were developed up to about 2009.

Note that there are a heck of a lot more formats (video, audio, AND container) than seen in the ten or so 'popular' movie examples seen above.



------------------------
'ffmpeg -formats' OUTPUT:
------------------------

'-formats' shows available formats, codecs, bitstream filters, protocols, and
frame size and frame rate abbreviations.

The fields preceding the format and codec names have the following
meanings:

	   D   Decoding available

	   E   Encoding available

  [ For codecs, NOT containers : ]

       V/A/S   Video/audio/subtitle codec

	   S   Codec supports slices

	   D   Codec supports direct rendering

	   T   Codec can handle input truncated at random locations instead of
	       only at frame boundaries




File formats:      [Container formats --- and
                    container-less video-ONLY and audio-ONLY formats]

  E 3g2             3GP2 format
  E 3gp             3GP format
 D  4xm             4X Technologies format
 D  IFF             IFF format
 D  ISS             Funcom ISS format
 D  MTV             MTV format
 DE RoQ             raw id RoQ format
 D  aac             raw ADTS AAC
 DE ac3             raw AC-3
  E adts            ADTS AAC
 DE aiff            Audio IFF
 DE alaw            PCM A-law format
 DE alsa            ALSA audio output
 DE amr             3GPP AMR file format
 D  apc             CRYO APC format
 D  ape             Monkey's Audio
 DE asf             ASF format
  E asf_stream      ASF format
 DE ass             SSA/ASS format
 DE au              SUN AU format
 DE avi             AVI format
  E avm2            Flash 9 (AVM2) format
 D  avs             AVS format
 D  bethsoftvid     Bethesda Softworks VID format
 D  bfi             Brute Force & Ignorance
 D  c93             Interplay C93
 D  cavsvideo       raw Chinese AVS video
  E crc             CRC testing format
 DE daud            D-Cinema audio format
 DE dirac           raw Dirac
 DE dnxhd           raw DNxHD (SMPTE VC-3)
 D  dsicin          Delphine Software International CIN format
 DE dts             raw DTS
 DE dv              DV video format
 D  dv1394          DV1394 A/V grab
  E dvd             MPEG-2 PS format (DVD VOB)
 D  dxa             DXA
 D  ea              Electronic Arts Multimedia Format
 D  ea_cdata        Electronic Arts cdata
 DE eac3            raw E-AC-3
 DE f32be           PCM 32 bit floating-point big-endian format
 DE f32le           PCM 32 bit floating-point little-endian format
 DE f64be           PCM 64 bit floating-point big-endian format
 DE f64le           PCM 64 bit floating-point little-endian format
 DE ffm             FFM (FFserver live feed) format
 D  film_cpk        Sega FILM/CPK format
 DE flac            raw FLAC
 D  flic            FLI/FLC/FLX animation format
 DE flv             FLV format
  E framecrc        framecrc testing format
  E gif             GIF Animation
 D  gsm             raw GSM
 DE gxf             GXF format
 DE h261            raw H.261
 DE h263            raw H.263
 DE h264            raw H.264 video format
 D  idcin           id Cinematic format
 DE image2          image2 sequence
 DE image2pipe      piped image2 sequence
 D  ingenient       raw Ingenient MJPEG
 D  ipmovie         Interplay MVE format
  E ipod            iPod H.264 MP4 format
 D  libdc1394       dc1394 v.2 A/V grab
 D  lmlm4           lmlm4 raw format
 DE m4v             raw MPEG-4 video format
 DE matroska        Matroska file format
 DE mjpeg           raw MJPEG video
 D  mlp             raw MLP
 D  mm              American Laser Games MM format
 DE mmf             Yamaha SMAF
  E mov             MOV format
 D  mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2 QuickTime/MPEG-4/Motion JPEG 2000 format
  E mp2             MPEG audio layer 2
 DE mp3             MPEG audio layer 3
  E mp4             MP4 format
 D  mpc             Musepack
 D  mpc8            Musepack SV8
 DE mpeg            MPEG-1 System format
  E mpeg1video      raw MPEG-1 video
  E mpeg2video      raw MPEG-2 video
 DE mpegts          MPEG-2 transport stream format
 D  mpegtsraw       MPEG-2 raw transport stream format
 D  mpegvideo       raw MPEG video
  E mpjpeg          MIME multipart JPEG format
 D  msnwctcp        MSN TCP Webcam stream
 DE mulaw           PCM mu-law format
 D  mvi             Motion Pixels MVI format
 DE mxf             Material eXchange Format
  E mxf_d10         Material eXchange Format, D-10 Mapping
 D  nc              NC camera feed format
 D  nsv             Nullsoft Streaming Video
  E null            raw null video format
 DE nut             NUT format
 D  nuv             NuppelVideo format
 DE ogg             Ogg
 D  oma             Sony OpenMG audio
 DE oss             Open Sound System playback
  E psp             PSP MP4 format
 D  psxstr          Sony Playstation STR format
 D  pva             TechnoTrend PVA file and stream format
 D  r3d             REDCODE R3D format
 DE rawvideo        raw video format
  E rcv             VC-1 test bitstream
 D  redir           Redirector format
 D  rl2             RL2 format
 DE rm              RealMedia format
 D  rpl             RPL/ARMovie format
  E rtp             RTP output format
 D  rtsp            RTSP input format
 DE s16be           PCM signed 16 bit big-endian format
 DE s16le           PCM signed 16 bit little-endian format
 DE s24be           PCM signed 24 bit big-endian format
 DE s24le           PCM signed 24 bit little-endian format
 DE s32be           PCM signed 32 bit big-endian format
 DE s32le           PCM signed 32 bit little-endian format
 DE s8              PCM signed 8 bit format
 D  sdp             SDP
 D  shn             raw Shorten
 D  siff            Beam Software SIFF
 D  smk             Smacker video
 D  sol             Sierra SOL format
  E svcd            MPEG-2 PS format (VOB)
 DE swf             Flash format
 D  thp             THP
 D  tiertexseq      Tiertex Limited SEQ format
 D  tta             True Audio
 D  txd             Renderware TeXture Dictionary
 DE u16be           PCM unsigned 16 bit big-endian format
 DE u16le           PCM unsigned 16 bit little-endian format
 DE u24be           PCM unsigned 24 bit big-endian format
 DE u24le           PCM unsigned 24 bit little-endian format
 DE u32be           PCM unsigned 32 bit big-endian format
 DE u32le           PCM unsigned 32 bit little-endian format
 DE u8              PCM unsigned 8 bit format
 D  vc1             raw VC-1
 D  vc1test         VC-1 test bitstream format
  E vcd             MPEG-1 System format (VCD)
 D  video4linux     Video4Linux device grab
 D  video4linux2    Video4Linux2 device grab
 D  vmd             Sierra VMD format
  E vob             MPEG-2 PS format (VOB)
 DE voc             Creative Voice file format
 DE wav             WAV format
 D  wc3movie        Wing Commander III movie format
 D  wsaud           Westwood Studios audio format
 D  wsvqa           Westwood Studios VQA format
 D  wv              WavPack
 D  x11grab         X11grab
 D  xa              Maxis XA File Format
 DE yuv4mpegpipe    YUV4MPEG pipe format



Codecs:                [video and audio]

 D V    4xm             4X Movie
 D V D  8bps            QuickTime 8BPS video
 D A    8svx_exp        8SVX exponential
 D A    8svx_fib        8SVX fibonacci
 D A    aac             Advanced Audio Coding
 D V D  aasc            Autodesk RLE
 DEA    ac3             ATSC A/52A (AC-3)
 D A    adpcm_4xm       ADPCM 4X Movie
 DEA    adpcm_adx       SEGA CRI ADX ADPCM
 D A    adpcm_ct        ADPCM Creative Technology
 D A    adpcm_ea        ADPCM Electronic Arts
 D A    adpcm_ea_maxis_xa ADPCM Electronic Arts Maxis CDROM XA
 D A    adpcm_ea_r1     ADPCM Electronic Arts R1
 D A    adpcm_ea_r2     ADPCM Electronic Arts R2
 D A    adpcm_ea_r3     ADPCM Electronic Arts R3
 D A    adpcm_ea_xas    ADPCM Electronic Arts XAS
 D A    adpcm_ima_amv   ADPCM IMA AMV
 D A    adpcm_ima_dk3   ADPCM IMA Duck DK3
 D A    adpcm_ima_dk4   ADPCM IMA Duck DK4
 D A    adpcm_ima_ea_eacs ADPCM IMA Electronic Arts EACS
 D A    adpcm_ima_ea_sead ADPCM IMA Electronic Arts SEAD
 D A    adpcm_ima_iss   ADPCM IMA Funcom ISS
 DEA    adpcm_ima_qt    ADPCM IMA QuickTime
 D A    adpcm_ima_smjpeg ADPCM IMA Loki SDL MJPEG
 DEA    adpcm_ima_wav   ADPCM IMA WAV
 D A    adpcm_ima_ws    ADPCM IMA Westwood
 DEA    adpcm_ms        ADPCM Microsoft
 D A    adpcm_sbpro_2   ADPCM Sound Blaster Pro 2-bit
 D A    adpcm_sbpro_3   ADPCM Sound Blaster Pro 2.6-bit
 D A    adpcm_sbpro_4   ADPCM Sound Blaster Pro 4-bit
 DEA    adpcm_swf       ADPCM Shockwave Flash
 D A    adpcm_thp       ADPCM Nintendo Gamecube THP
 D A    adpcm_xa        ADPCM CDROM XA
 DEA    adpcm_yamaha    ADPCM Yamaha
 DEA    alac            ALAC (Apple Lossless Audio Codec)
 D V    amv             AMV Video
 D A    ape             Monkey's Audio
 DEV D  asv1            ASUS V1
 DEV D  asv2            ASUS V2
 D A    atrac3          Atrac 3 (Adaptive TRansform Acoustic Coding 3)
 D V D  avs             AVS (Audio Video Standard) video
 D V    bethsoftvid     Bethesda VID video
 D V    bfi             Brute Force & Ignorance
 DEV    bmp             BMP image
 D V D  c93             Interplay C93
 D V D  camstudio       CamStudio
 D V D  camtasia        TechSmith Screen Capture Codec
 D V D  cavs            Chinese AVS video (AVS1-P2, JiZhun profile)
 D V D  cinepak         Cinepak
 D V D  cljr            Cirrus Logic AccuPak
 D A    cook            COOK
 D V D  cyuv            Creative YUV (CYUV)
 D A    dca             DCA (DTS Coherent Acoustics)
 DEV D  dnxhd           VC3/DNxHD
 D A    dsicinaudio     Delphine Software International CIN audio
 D V D  dsicinvideo     Delphine Software International CIN video
 DES    dvbsub          DVB subtitles
 DES    dvdsub          DVD subtitles
 DEV D  dvvideo         DV (Digital Video)
 D V    dxa             Feeble Files/ScummVM DXA
 D A    eac3            ATSC A/52B (AC-3, E-AC-3)
 D V D  eacmv           Electronic Arts CMV video
 D V D  eatgq           Electronic Arts TGQ video
 D V    eatgv           Electronic Arts TGV video
 D V D  eatqi           Electronic Arts TQI Video
 D V D  escape124       Escape 124
 DEV D  ffv1            FFmpeg codec #1
 DEVSD  ffvhuff         Huffyuv FFmpeg variant
 DEA    flac            FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec)
 DEV D  flashsv         Flash Screen Video
 D V D  flic            Autodesk Animator Flic video
 DEVSD  flv             Flash Video (FLV)
 D V D  fraps           Fraps
 DEA    g726            G.726 ADPCM
 DEV    gif             GIF (Graphics Interchange Format)
 DEV D  h261            H.261
 DEVSDT h263            H.263 / H.263-1996
 D VSD  h263i           Intel H.263
  EV    h263p           H.263+ / H.263-1998 / H.263 version 2
 D V D  h264            H.264 / AVC / MPEG-4 AVC / MPEG-4 part 10
 D V D  h264_vdpau      H.264 / AVC / MPEG-4 AVC / MPEG-4 part 10 (VDPAU acceleration)
 DEVSD  huffyuv         Huffyuv / HuffYUV
 D V D  idcinvideo      id Quake II CIN video
 D A    imc             IMC (Intel Music Coder)
 D V D  indeo2          Intel Indeo 2
 D V    indeo3          Intel Indeo 3
 D A    interplay_dpcm  DPCM Interplay
 D V D  interplayvideo  Interplay MVE video
 DEV D  jpegls          JPEG-LS
 D V    kmvc            Karl Morton's video codec
 DEA    libamr_nb       libamr-nb Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) Narrow-Band
 DEA    libamr_wb       libamr-wb Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) Wide-Band
  EV    libdirac        libdirac Dirac 2.2
  EA    libfaac         libfaac AAC (Advanced Audio Codec)
 D A    libfaad         libfaad AAC (Advanced Audio Codec)
 DEA    libgsm          libgsm GSM
 DEA    libgsm_ms       libgsm GSM Microsoft variant
  EA    libmp3lame      libmp3lame MP3 (MPEG audio layer 3)
 D V    libopenjpeg     OpenJPEG based JPEG 2000 decoder
 DEV    libschroedinger libschroedinger Dirac 2.2
 D A    libspeex        libspeex Speex
  EV    libtheora       libtheora Theora
  EA    libvorbis       libvorbis Vorbis
  EV    libx264         libx264 H.264 / AVC / MPEG-4 AVC / MPEG-4 part 10
  EV    libxvid         libxvidcore MPEG-4 part 2
  EV    ljpeg           Lossless JPEG
 D V D  loco            LOCO
 D A    mace3           MACE (Macintosh Audio Compression/Expansion) 3:1
 D A    mace6           MACE (Macintosh Audio Compression/Expansion) 6:1
 D V D  mdec            Sony PlayStation MDEC (Motion DECoder)
 D V D  mimic           Mimic
 DEV D  mjpeg           MJPEG (Motion JPEG)
 D V D  mjpegb          Apple MJPEG-B
 D A    mlp             MLP (Meridian Lossless Packing)/TrueHD
 D V D  mmvideo         American Laser Games MM Video
 D V D  motionpixels    Motion Pixels video
 D A    mp1             MP1 (MPEG audio layer 1)
 DEA    mp2             MP2 (MPEG audio layer 2)
 D A    mp3             MP3 (MPEG audio layer 3)
 D A    mp3adu          ADU (Application Data Unit) MP3 (MPEG audio layer 3)
 D A    mp3on4          MP3onMP4
 D A    mpc7            Musepack SV7
 D A    mpc8            Musepack SV8
 DEVSDT mpeg1video      MPEG-1 video
 D V DT mpeg1video_vdpau MPEG-1 video (VDPAU acceleration)
 DEVSDT mpeg2video      MPEG-2 video
 DEVSDT mpeg4           MPEG-4 part 2
 D VSDT mpegvideo       MPEG-1 video
 D V DT mpegvideo_vdpau MPEG-1/2 video (VDPAU acceleration)
 D VSDT mpegvideo_xvmc  MPEG-1/2 video XvMC (X-Video Motion Compensation)
 DEVSD  msmpeg4         MPEG-4 part 2 Microsoft variant version 3
 DEVSD  msmpeg4v1       MPEG-4 part 2 Microsoft variant version 1
 DEVSD  msmpeg4v2       MPEG-4 part 2 Microsoft variant version 2
 D V D  msrle           Microsoft RLE
 D V D  msvideo1        Microsoft Video 1
 D V D  mszh            LCL (LossLess Codec Library) MSZH
 DEA    nellymoser      Nellymoser Asao
 D V D  nuv             NuppelVideo/RTJPEG
 DEV    pam             PAM (Portable AnyMap) image
 DEV    pbm             PBM (Portable BitMap) image
 DEA    pcm_alaw        PCM A-law
 D A    pcm_dvd         PCM signed 20|24-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_f32be       PCM 32-bit floating point big-endian
 DEA    pcm_f32le       PCM 32-bit floating point little-endian
 DEA    pcm_f64be       PCM 64-bit floating point big-endian
 DEA    pcm_f64le       PCM 64-bit floating point little-endian
 DEA    pcm_mulaw       PCM mu-law
 DEA    pcm_s16be       PCM signed 16-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_s16le       PCM signed 16-bit little-endian
 D A    pcm_s16le_planar PCM 16-bit little-endian planar
 DEA    pcm_s24be       PCM signed 24-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_s24daud     PCM D-Cinema audio signed 24-bit
 DEA    pcm_s24le       PCM signed 24-bit little-endian
 DEA    pcm_s32be       PCM signed 32-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_s32le       PCM signed 32-bit little-endian
 DEA    pcm_s8          PCM signed 8-bit
 DEA    pcm_u16be       PCM unsigned 16-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_u16le       PCM unsigned 16-bit little-endian
 DEA    pcm_u24be       PCM unsigned 24-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_u24le       PCM unsigned 24-bit little-endian
 DEA    pcm_u32be       PCM unsigned 32-bit big-endian
 DEA    pcm_u32le       PCM unsigned 32-bit little-endian
 DEA    pcm_u8          PCM unsigned 8-bit
 DEA    pcm_zork        PCM Zork
 D V    pcx             PC Paintbrush PCX image
 DEV    pgm             PGM (Portable GrayMap) image
 DEV    pgmyuv          PGMYUV (Portable GrayMap YUV) image
 DEV    png             PNG image
 DEV    ppm             PPM (Portable PixelMap) image
 D V    ptx             V.Flash PTX image
 D A    qcelp           QCELP / PureVoice
 D A    qdm2            QDesign Music Codec 2
 D V D  qdraw           Apple QuickDraw
 D V D  qpeg            Q-team QPEG
 DEV D  qtrle           QuickTime Animation (RLE) video
 DEV    rawvideo        raw video
 D A    real_144        RealAudio 1.0 (14.4K)
 D A    real_288        RealAudio 2.0 (28.8K)
 D V D  rl2             RL2 video
 DEA    roq_dpcm        id RoQ DPCM
 DEV D  roqvideo        id RoQ video
 D V D  rpza            QuickTime video (RPZA)
 DEV D  rv10            RealVideo 1.0
 DEV D  rv20            RealVideo 2.0
 D V D  rv30            RealVideo 3.0
 D V D  rv40            RealVideo 4.0
 DEV    sgi             SGI image
 D A    shorten         Shorten
 D A    smackaud        Smacker audio
 D V    smackvid        Smacker video
 D V D  smc             QuickTime Graphics (SMC)
 DEV    snow            Snow
 D A    sol_dpcm        DPCM Sol
 DEA    sonic           Sonic
  EA    sonicls         Sonic lossless
 D V D  sp5x            Sunplus JPEG (SP5X)
 D V    sunrast         Sun Rasterfile image
 DEV D  svq1            Sorenson Vector Quantizer 1
 D VSD  svq3            Sorenson Vector Quantizer 3
 DEV    targa           Truevision Targa image
 D V    theora          Theora
 D V D  thp             Nintendo Gamecube THP video
 D V D  tiertexseqvideo Tiertex Limited SEQ video
 DEV    tiff            TIFF image
 D V D  truemotion1     Duck TrueMotion 1.0
 D V D  truemotion2     Duck TrueMotion 2.0
 D A    truespeech      DSP Group TrueSpeech
 D A    tta             True Audio (TTA)
 D V    txd             Renderware TXD (TeXture Dictionary) image
 D V D  ultimotion      IBM UltiMotion
 D V    vb              Beam Software VB
 D V    vc1             SMPTE VC-1
 D V D  vc1_vdpau       SMPTE VC-1 VDPAU
 D V D  vcr1            ATI VCR1
 D A    vmdaudio        Sierra VMD audio
 D V D  vmdvideo        Sierra VMD video
 D V    vmnc            VMware Screen Codec / VMware Video
 DEA    vorbis          Vorbis
 D V    vp3             On2 VP3
 D V D  vp5             On2 VP5
 D V D  vp6             On2 VP6
 D V D  vp6a            On2 VP6 (Flash version, with alpha channel)
 D V D  vp6f            On2 VP6 (Flash version)
 D V D  vqavideo        Westwood Studios VQA (Vector Quantized Animation) video
 D A    wavpack         WavPack
 DEA    wmav1           Windows Media Audio 1
 DEA    wmav2           Windows Media Audio 2
 DEVSD  wmv1            Windows Media Video 7
 DEVSD  wmv2            Windows Media Video 8
 D V    wmv3            Windows Media Video 9
 D V D  wmv3_vdpau      Windows Media Video 9 VDPAU
 D V D  wnv1            Winnov WNV1
 D A    ws_snd1         Westwood Audio (SND1)
 D A    xan_dpcm        DPCM Xan
 D V D  xan_wc3         Wing Commander III / Xan
 D V D  xl              Miro VideoXL
 D S    xsub            XSUB
 DEV D  zlib            LCL (LossLess Codec Library) ZLIB
 DEV    zmbv            Zip Motion Blocks Video

Bitstream filters:
 text2movsub remove_extra noise mov2textsub mp3decomp mp3comp mjpegadump
                                            imxdump h264_mp4toannexb dump_extra
Supported file protocols:
 file: gopher: http: pipe: rtp: tcp: udp:
Frame size, frame rate abbreviations:
 ntsc pal qntsc qpal sntsc spal film ntsc-film sqcif qcif cif 4cif

Note, the names of encoders and decoders do not always match, so there are
several cases where the above table shows encoder only or decoder only entries
even though both encoding and decoding are supported. For example, the h263
decoder corresponds to the h263 and h263p encoders, for file formats it is even
worse.


For more info on 'ffmpeg' than the Wikipedia 'FFmpeg' page, this ffmpeg FAQ page can be very helpful.

The FAQ page includes examples of coding for movies playable on iPod and PSP (Play Station Portable) --- as well as parameters to use for high-quality MPEG-4 (Blu-ray-1080p, 3D) and MPEG-2 (DVD and hi-def-720p TV) and MPEG-1 (CD and low-def-480i TV) video --- and for interlaced video.

For even more info on 'ffmpeg', this ffmpeg DOC page may be helpful.

The WEBM container format (with VP8 video and Vorbis audio) may be the next format used on YouTube --- sometime after 2010.

Bottom of this
MOVIE FILES -- VIDEO-and-AUDIO-and-CONTAINER formats page.

To return to a previously visited web page location, click on the Back button of your web browser a sufficient number of times. OR, use the History-list option of your web browser.
OR ...

< Go to Start of ffmpeg Codecs, above. >

< Go to Start of ffmpeg Containers, above. >

< Go to Start of movie Format Samples, above. >

< Go to Top of Page, above. >

Page history

Page was created 2011 May 16.

Page was changed 2011 Jun 11.

Page was changed 2018 Aug 08.
(Added css and javascript to try to handle text-size for smartphones, esp. in portrait orientation.)