FLV Media Support

I've been messing around with SL's media. It's cool that you can now have it display your own linked pictures, websites and even movies. BUT the supported movies are MUCH too limited. Quicktime is outdated and is no longer used by any site - it's not natively supported by Windows either. So why have SL use it? It makes no sense!

Now, FLV may not be natively supported but just about every website under the sun uses it and you know why? Because it beats Quicktime and MP4 when it comes to streaming and file size. People could directly stream off websites instead of having to download, convert, find a host, and then see SL free up as it tries to stream the movie.

So when will FLV support be added? It would make things a hell of a lot easier.

I think anything to make video stream faster is a good idea.

Well FLV streams better than Quicktime - Quicktime is a lot slower to start playing and needs a bigger chunk in its buffer. I've tested this with clips I converted between Quicktime (MP4 & MOV files) en FLV and FLV is a clear winner here. Not only are file sizes smaller for similar detail (which is great for people hosting streamable content) but when a clip starts playing without having to buffer for half a minute, it has a clear advantage.

Also, Second Life tends to freeze up for a few seconds while loading Quicktime movies.

Mine freezes for a split second on loading movies,
Must be qt loading in the sl client, it loads slow enough by itself,

Can't you use swf files instead?

I believe the answer is "no" and (almost) why this thread exists (I say "almost" becasue FLV is SWF minus all the actionscript).

Strictly speaking client is open-source - so there is patch?
or at least there is Jira entry with description why FLV is better
(also, preferably, including how to stream from live cam to FLV, how much bandwith is used(file size is nothing, bandwith usage for video is),etc ?

p.s.May be it's better to push LL in direction of full support for plugins(i mean Flash one -) in LLMozLib (which will give FLV automatically)

I agree that it would be nice to be able to play Flash videos, and even interactive Flash content in SL. I think that this support will come if/when we have a more integrated and compatible web browser in-world. Quicktime, and the SL client, actually used to play some Flash videos but Apple removed that capability in recent updates - not sure why.

If I'm not mistaken, the Flash Video format (FLV) is really just a wrapper for other video codecs - just like Quicktime. Each format has a list of audio/video codecs that they support, like Sorensen, h.264, etc. I'm sure that each format has it's strengths and weaknesses, but Quicktime does support a much wider range of codecs - including nearly all of the codecs supported by FLV.

Here's a list of codecs supported by Quicktime:
http://www.isholf.is/klipklap/quicktime/

And a Wiki entry that details the codecs supported by FLV:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Video

I'll admit to being a bit of a Quicktime fanboy, but I would like to respond to some of the things mentioned in this thread.


"Well FLV streams better than Quicktime. Quicktime is a lot slower to start playing and needs a bigger chunk in its buffer."

I disagree. A properly formatted quicktime file can begin playing almost immediately - especially one that will work well in SL.


"Now, FLV may not be natively supported but just about every website under the sun uses it and you know why? Because it beats Quicktime and MP4 when it comes to streaming and file size."

My guess as to why Flash video is so common? A higher percentage of people had a Flash player installed in their browsers as video became popular on the Web. And since both formats support similar codecs I see no reason why Flash is a superior format. For instance H.264, an extremely efficient codec, is the same no matter what wrapper it is in. The visual quality and file size will depend on the settings used when encoding.


"BUT the supported movies are MUCH too limited."

Quicktime has supports dozens of different codecs and formats. See the link above for a list. Quicktime is not just .mov files: it also supports mp4, avi, mpg, 3gp, etc.


"Quicktime is outdated and is no longer used by any site"

Not true. Quicktime is as relevant and useful as ever. It's used on many sights, especially when video quality is important. It's supported by every video sharing site that I have ever used, and a lot of times it is the preferred upload format on these sites. Even on a site like Pond5, a high quality stock video footage store, Quicktime is the only supported format.

What I personally think on this issue:
- QuickTime works and works good
- To implement FLV without making HTML-on-prim fully workable (which will be be needed anyway, and there are some signs that LL considers switching to WebKit(used in for example Safari and Konqueror) core instead of Mozilla one for browser for more easy integration) for this,well, to implement FLV separatly will require very big effort. Which is not needed. Of course you could try to send patch yourself (LL accept 3rd party patches after all)
- Flash(and FLV) has one more problem. Linux player for latest version of Flash is not fully here yet. And SL supports all 3 platforms.

That shouldn't be true. Flash video is a standalone file that can be played in a standalone player, I don't see why it needs the HTML page.

Not HTML page. 'Regular' Flash player display graphics to desktop using GDI calls(windows,simplified) and it's necessary to make it display as prim texture so special integration is needed anyway (which is done for QuickTime and LLMozLib is in fact such 'integration' for Gecko(Firefox's engine) and (in future) WebKit(Safari's engine))
So, it's not very easy.
And such integration work what will wasted when HTML-On-Prim support will become fully workable.

As an SL new comer, may I ask, if I don't have a quicktime supported stream server, how do I upload my videos and play them in the SL?

ZhouLiang: You don't need a Quicktime streaming server set-up to get your videos into SL. Any web host will work just fine. Or you could host your videos for free at a place like Blip.tv or the Internet Archive.

I've made a couple of videos that explaining how to use videos in SL and also how to convert and host them for free.

http://www.shiny-life.com/2007/12/31/how-to-use-video-in-second-life/

http://www.shiny-life.com/2008/03/06/converting-videos-for-second-life/