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OpenCube XFConverter
User Manual
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EVS OpenCube XFConverter User Manual

XFConverter v1.3 - User Guide
(February 12, 2013)
http://www.evs-opencube.com
http://www.evs-opencube.com
OpenCube Technologies SAS 6 rue Brindejonc des Moulinais Bâtiment A – CS95836 31505 Toulouse Cedex 5 FRANCE
Tel : +33 (0)561 285 606 Fax : +33 (0)561 285 635 E-mail : contact@opencubetech.com XFConverter Support : support_xfconverter@opencubetech.com Website : http://www.opencubetech.com
XFConverter version 1.3 - User Guide
DISCLAIMER
This document has been prepared out of concern for accuracy and constitutes a copy of the specifications when printed and delivered. However, contents and specifications may be subject to change without prior notice. OpenCube Technologies SAS shall not be liable for any errors or omissions, or any direct or indirect damage, financial or otherwise, that may result from the use of information contained in this document or the software itself.
All trademarks mentioned in this document are owned by their respective holders and under no circumstances may be used in any way by OpenCube product users.
[Microsoft, Windows and Windows Media Player are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.] [Quicktime is a registered trademark of Apple Computer, Inc.] [eVTR and XDCam are registered trademarks of Sony Corporation.] [P2 is a registered trademark of Panasonic Corporation.] [Dolby E is registered trademark of Dolby Laboratories.] [This product may include the DNxHD® codec. DNxHD® means Avid DNxHD.] [Avid, Avid Media Toolkit (AMT), Interplay, Isis and Lanshare are registered trademarks or trademarks of Avid Technology, Inc.] This product includes software developed by the Apache Software Foundation (http://www.apache.org/).
All rights reserved. This publication, as well as the software and the user guides mentioned in the document, are protected under the copyright laws currently in application. No part of this publication may be copied or reproduced, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication or these rights may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damage.
The present document is governed by French law. In the case of a dispute, the parties shall submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the French courts.
2013 Edition. Questions or comments concerning this publication should be addressed to: OpenCube Technologies SAS, 6 rue Brindejonc des Moulinais, Bâtiment A – CS95836, 31505 Toulouse Cedex 5 ­FRANCE, Tel: +33 (0)561 285 606.
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ABLE OF CONTENTS
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1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................... 6
1.1 Application Use ................................................................................................................................................ 6
1.2 Hardware Requirements ................................................................................................................................. 6
1.3 Supported Operating Systems......................................................................................................................... 6
1.4 XFConverter Installation ................................................................................................................................ 6
2 XFCONVERTER IN PRACTICE ................................................................................ 9
2.1 Overview ........................................................................................................................................................... 9
2.1.1 Source Directory ........................................................................................................................................ 9
2.1.2 Destination Directory ............................................................................................................................... 10
2.1.3 Launching the Process .............................................................................................................................. 10
2.1.4 Projects ..................................................................................................................................................... 10
2.2 Conversion Graph .......................................................................................................................................... 11
2.2.1 Input Plug-in Configuration ..................................................................................................................... 11
2.2.2 Output Plug-in Configuration ................................................................................................................... 12
2.2.3 Plug-in Connections ................................................................................................................................. 12
3 VIDEO AND AUDIO STREAM CONFIGURATION ................................................. 13
3.1 DV Stream ...................................................................................................................................................... 13
3.2 MPEG Elementary Stream ........................................................................................................................... 14
3.2.1 MPEG 1&2 video elementary stream ...................................................................................................... 14
3.2.2 AVC-Intra elementary stream .................................................................................................................. 16
3.2.3 MPEG 1&2 audio elementary stream ...................................................................................................... 17
3.3 JPEG 2000 stream .......................................................................................................................................... 18
3.4 AIFF, WAV and PCM streams ..................................................................................................................... 19
3.5 Dolby audio stream ........................................................................................................................................ 20
3.6 Timecode stream ............................................................................................................................................ 21
3.7 Metadata (XML) stream ................................................................................................................................ 22
3.8 Ancillary Data – VBI Stream ........................................................................................................................ 23
4 PLUG-IN CONFIGURATION ................................................................................... 24
4.1 AVI Plug-in ..................................................................................................................................................... 24
4.2 GXF Plug-in .................................................................................................................................................... 25
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4.3 QUICKTIME (MOV) Plug-in ....................................................................................................................... 26
4.4 MPEG Plug-in ................................................................................................................................................ 27
4.5 MXF Plug-in ................................................................................................................................................... 28
4.6 Wrap Plug-In .................................................................................................................................................. 30
5 XFCONVERTER CONFIGURATION ...................................................................... 32
5.1 File Management ............................................................................................................................................ 32
5.2 Application Start-up and Shutdown ............................................................................................................. 33
5.3 Watch Folder Configuration ......................................................................................................................... 34
5.1 Global Options ................................................................................................................................................ 35
5.2 Interplay Configuration (optional) ............................................................................................................... 35
6 XFCONVERTER API............................................................................................... 38
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IGURE 1: ABOUT DIALOG BOX (WITHOUT LICENSE
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IGURE 2: ABOUT DIALOG BOX (WITH EXAMPLES OF LICENSE FILES
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IGURE 4: FILE MENU
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IGURE 5: CONFIGURE CONVERSION WINDOW
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IGURE 6: DV STREAM SETTINGS
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XFC
ONVERTER MAIN WINDOW
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MPEG 1&2
AVC-I 10: MPEG 1&2 11: JPEG 2000 12: U
NCOMPRESSED AUDIO
13: D
OLBY STREAM SETTINGS
14: T
IMECODE STREAM SETTINGS
15: M
ETADATA STREAM SETTINGS
16: A
NCILLARY DATA –
17: AVI 18: GXF 19: Q
UICKTIME PLUG-IN SETTINGS
20: MPEG 21: MXF 22: MXF A 23: W
RAP PLUG-IN SETTINGS
24: M
UTE PLUG-IN
25: F
ILE MANAGEMENT OPTIONS
26: A
PPLICATION START-UP AND SHUTDOWN OPTIONS
27: W
ATCH FOLDER OPTIONS
28: XFC 29: I
NTERPLAY CONFIGURATION
30: L
ANSHARE SETTINGS
31: B
ROWSING INTERPLAY CATALOG
32: C
REATE NEW INTERPLAY CATALOG
VIDEO ELEMENTARY STREAM SETTINGS
MPEG
VIDEO ELEMENTARY STREAM
NTRA ELEMENTARY STREAM SETTINGS
AUDIO ELEMENTARY STREAM SETTINGS
STREAM SETTINGS
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(AIFF, WAV
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VBI
STREAM SETTINGS PLUG-IN SETTINGS PLUG-IN SETTINGS
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PLUG-IN SETTINGS
PLUG-IN SETTINGS
VID OPATOM SETTINGS
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ONVERTER GLOBAL OPTIONS
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) ...................................................................................................... 7
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AND
PCM)
STREAM SETTINGS
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1 Introduction
1.1 Application Use
XFConverter is a gateway solution between non-interoperable video systems. It enables users to wrap, unwrap and convert a wide range of video and audio wrapper formats (AVI, GXF, MOV and MXF). XFConverter does not transcode media during the conversion process, ensuring that no information is lost. The conversions can be automated with the watch folder module, creating a seamless workflow in your networked environment.
1.2 Hardware Requirements
The minimum hardware requirements are:
- Intel Core 2 duo 2.2 GHz,
- 2 GB RAM.
The recommended hardware requirements are:
- Intel Core i5 2GHz,
- 4 GB RAM.
1.3 Supported Operating Systems
XFConverter runs under Microsoft Windows operating systems starting with Windows XP. XFConverter is a 32-bit application which can be installed on both a 32-bit and 64-bit OS. It can be executed without administrative rights.
To use the XFConverter Quicktime plug-in, the Quicktime Player from Apple must be installed on the computer.
1.4 XFConverter Installation
If you received a CD version of XFConverter, browse down to the “XFConverter-Setup.exe” program in the Windows directory. During the installation procedure, your antivirus software may warn you about the execution of Windows scripts. You may safely ignore these warnings.
XFConverter is a plug-in based application. Each plug-in requires a special license file in order to be activated. Temporary license keys for evaluation purposes are available from the OpenCube Technologies website (http://www.opencubetech.com). After you create an account, you are given access to a download area where you can retrieve a one-month license key file. If you purchased XFConverter, you will have received a permanent license key file (*.lcs). The first time you launch the program, XFConverter will open the About dialog box so that you can load your license file.
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Figure 1: About dialog box (without license)
The plug-ins listed in red are not activated and require a valid license. You must provide a license for each of the plug-ins so that the corresponding formats can be supported by XFConverter. In order to activate the plug-ins, click on the button located at the bottom of the dialog box and select a valid .lcs file. After you load a license, the display will change, showing the new status of the plug-in.
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Figure 2: About dialog box (with examples of license files)
Please note that a copy of your license is available in the XFConverter program data directory if you happen to lose it.
If you buy an XFConverter license, the product must be connected to the Internet so that the license can be activated. If your computer does not have an Internet connection or uses a proxy, please contact the XFConverter support team (support_xfconverter@opencubetech.com).
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2 XFConverter in Practice
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2.1 Overview
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Figure 3: XFConverter main window
The main window is displayed above. The left part of the window is used to configure and display the source directory in which the media files to be processed are located. The Explorer view (4) displays the list of files stored in the current directory and ready for conversion. The right part of the window displays the past, current and scheduled conversions as well as their status (8). The progress bar (6) shows the current progress and the Pause and Cancel buttons (11) which can be used to control the process. The menu (1) can be used to load and save projects as well as to configure them. The toolbar (2) offers easy access to the most commonly used actions.
2.1.1 Source Directory
If you click on the folder icon located in (3), it will open a browser window where you can select a directory containing the media files you want to convert. After you select the directory, the source file list (4) is automatically refreshed to reflect the content of the directory. The view is also updated to insert/remove the new/deleted files. Only the files matching the input plug-in’s settings will be displayed; other files will be filtered.
When multiple input files following a source filename pattern are required (wrap plug-in, see section 4.6), a single entry for the entire set is displayed. Note that if one or several files is (are) missing or do not have a name following the pattern, the whole set of files will not be displayed. Clicking on the “Multi-selection” icon (5) will disable the pattern-matching feature and display each file individually. By using that mode, you can select several files to convert even if they do not share the same pattern naming convention.
If an entry of the list appears with a yellow background, it means that the corresponding file is currently opened in another application or being copied or created. As XFConverter cannot process files opened in another application, you must close the file first in order to proceed.
If you want to play a source file in a third-party application you can do so either by selecting the play icon in
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the toolbar (2) or by right-clicking on the file name and selecting Play. The playback will start only if you have installed the appropriate player. To playback MXF and GXF files you can download OpenCube’s XFReader application from www.opencubetech.com. Apple’s Quicktime Player can be downloaded at www.quicktime.com. Most AVI files will play directly with Microsoft’s Windows Media Player; however you may have to install third-party codecs.
2.1.2 Destination Directory
If you click on the folder icon located in (9), a browser window will pop-up enabling you to select a directory in which to create the files. The log view (8) will contain the list of past, current and future conversion processes. Past conversions are listed in green if successful or in red if an error occurred (usually when the source file(s) do not match the current configuration). To remove a process from the list, you can select it with the mouse and click on the cross
icon located in (10).
To playback a newly converted file, select an entry in the list and click on the play icon in the toolbar (2) or right-click on the entry and select Play. The playback will start only if you have installed the appropriate player.
2.1.3 Launching the Process
To start a conversion, select one or several source files in the list (4) and:
o Drag and drop them in the log window (8) or o Right-click and select Convert Selected or
o Click on the arrow icon located in (7).
All the files will be queued and the conversion of the first file will start. A conversion process can be paused, resumed or cancelled at any time by clicking on the buttons located in (11).
To start the watch folder process and the automatic conversion of source files, click on the dented wheel icon located in (7). Files from the source list will be processed one by one starting from the oldest to the most recent one. As soon as the conversion of a file is completed it is removed from the list and can no longer be converted. The conversion status of each file is stored with the project so that when you restart the application the files that still exist but that were converted earlier are no longer processed. These files will no longer appear in the interface. If you wish to clear the history and enable the conversion of older files, you can select Clear current directory or Clear all directories in the history menu (1).
The watch folder process can be paused, resumed or cancelled at any time by clicking on the buttons located in (11).
2.1.4 Projects
You can save the history of the conversions as well as the current conversion graph in a project file. Project management features are accessible through the File menu:
Figure 4: File menu
New Project: Close the current project and create a new empty one (with an empty graph). Load Project: Open an existing project. Save Project: Save the current project under the same file project name. Save Project As…: Save the current project as a new project file.
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Recently Opened Projects: Shortcuts to the most recently used projects. Quit: Quit the application
2.2 Conversion Graph
To open the Configure Conversion dialog box, click on the wrench icon located in the toolbar (2) of the main window. Or, you can open the configure menu (1) and choose configure conversion. It will open a graph view where you can define the conversion process in detail.
Figure 5: Configure conversion window
2.2.1 Input Plug-in Configuration
The first step consists in defining the source plug-in(s) either through an automatic or manual configuration:
Automatic Configuration: click on the folder icon located in (1). This will open a browser window where
you can select one or several files. These files should be in MPEG (Elementary, Program and Transport Stream), DV, WAV, AIFF, AVI, GXF, MOV or MXF format. If the files are recognized by XFConverter, the graph view will be initialized in (3) to reflect the content of the file(s) you selected. If the files are not recognized or you do not have a valid license to use the corresponding plug-in(s), an error message will be displayed.
Manual Configuration: In the drop-down box (1), select the input plug-in corresponding to the format of your
source file. If your conversion requires several source files, you should select “Wrap” in the drop-down box. Once you have selected the input format, you can access the plug-in’s settings by clicking on the wrench icon
located in (1). Note that some of the plug-ins are not configurable; in that case the wrench icon will not be displayed. Refer to the individual plug-in documentation in section 4 for a more detailed description of these settings.
The input plug-in view shows the current plug-in(s) configuration. In the case of wrapper formats embedding several streams, the input plug-in view (3) will display a brief description for each embedded video, audio, metadata or timecode stream. Each stream can be individually configured with the corresponding wrench icon. If you click on this
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button, it will open a new dialog box whose content will vary depending on the format. Refer to the section 4 for a more detailed description of these settings
2.2.2 Output Plug-in Configuration
When the input plug-in(s) is (are) configured, you have to define the outcome of the conversion by defining the output plug-in. There are three ways to perform this task:
Automatic Configuration: This is similar to the automatic input plug-in configuration. Click on the folder icon
located in (6). This will open a browser window where you can select one or several files. These files should be in MPEG (Elementary, Program and Transport Stream), DV, WAV, AIFF, AVI, GXF, MOV or MXF format. If the files are recognized by XFConverter, the graph view will be initialized in (8) to reflect the content of the files you selected. If the files are not recognized or you do not have a valid license to use the corresponding plug-in(s), an error message will be displayed.
Semi-automatic Configuration: In the drop-down box (6), select the output plug-in corresponding to the
format of your target output file format. Click on the three-arrow icon to launch the semi-automatic configuration. XFConverter will try to match the settings of your output plug-in with the settings of your input plug-in. However, this default configuration may not correspond to the exact format you want to output. In that case you can continue to adjust the settings of the plug-in or individual output streams.
Manual Configuration: In the drop-down box (6), select the output plug-in corresponding to the format of
your destination file(s). If your conversion requires the unwrapping of several files, you should select “Unwrap” in the drop-down box. Once you have selected the input format, you can access the plug-in’s
settings by clicking on the wrench icon located in (6). Note that some of the plug-ins are not configurable; in that case the wrench icon will not be displayed. Refer to the individual plug-in documentation in Section
2.2.5 for a more detailed description of these settings.
The output plug-in view shows the current plug-in(s) configuration. In the case of wrapper formats embedding several streams, the output plug-in view (8) will display a brief description for each embedded video, audio, metadata or timecode stream. Each stream can be individually configured with the corresponding wrench icon. If you click on this button, it will open a new dialog box whose content will vary depending on the format. Refer to the Section 4 for a more detailed description of these settings.
2.2.3 Plug-in Connections
After you configure the input and output plug-in(s), each of the individual media streams has to be connected. Each stream is represented by a pin (7) and a connection is represented by a segment from an input plug-in’s pin to an output plug-in’s pin. You can dynamically change the connections by clicking on a pin and holding the mouse button down. Then draw a rubber band towards another pin and release the mouse. If both pins can be connected then a new line will be drawn between them. Note that if two pins cannot be connected, the mouse cursor will switch to a forbidden signal icon. More information on the reason for this incompatibility can be obtained by checking the message displayed on the status bar (4).
XFConverter includes a tool to help you connect the input and output plug-ins’ pins automatically. If you click on the “Auto Connect” button (5) , XFConverter will find the pins that are the most compatible and then connect
them.
XFConverter also permits DV and audio streams (de)multiplexing. When manipulating a DV stream with embedded audio or an audio stream with multiple channels, you are given the opportunity of splitting each individual channel into separate ones (the most common case is to switch from a single stereo channel to two mono channels, for
example). In order to activate the multiplexing/demultiplexing feature, click on the icon (2) . If you click repeatedly on this icon, it will cycle through all the demultiplexing options. When you demultiplex a plug-in pin, it will be split into several smaller pins containing the channel index (es) or “v” if it is a video channel.
The status bar (4) indicates the current validity of the graph. XFConverter will not be able to process conversions unless the status is set to “Graph successfully constructed”. A graph is valid when all its output plug-in pins are connected; note however that all the input plug-in pins do not necessarily have to be connected.
The “Reset” button (9) clears the windows.
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