ffe
ffe is a simple Windows® front-end for ffmpeg, designed for rapid testing of its various multimedia conversion parameters, enabling you to save lots of slightly different versions of a file very, very quickly; in other words, "finding the best settings".ffmpeg, by Fabrice Bellard, et al., is a quite incredible multimedia converter, capable of converting a vast number of input and output media formats, and depending on which binary you use, supports either a HUGE number of control parameters, or a REALLY HUGE number of control parameters.
ffe uniquely uses MATOF technology to automatically update output filenames to match your encoding parameters; you can tweak-and-go without worrying about obliterating your previous tests.
You can basically convert anything to anything, whilst doing crazy stuff like mixing MP3 audio tracks with H264 video, and adding ID3 tags to AVI files. Big fun. Of course, it allows you do do things the correct way, too. No limits. I find it very handly for converting FLV files, and the raw video from my camera.
While converting, the output from ffmpeg can be viewed live inside ffe, and when complete, the entire process log is available for viewing/searching.
That's about it. I admit, ffe doesn't have much of a web page, but it is free (though probably not bug-free!) and can be download as a ready-built exe, or full source pack with icons, includes, all that stuff, here. If you want to view the source directly, do that here. And that's all you need, right?
Oh! That and an ffmpeg binary, of course. It's free, open-source software, and there are quite a few different versions kicking around. Here's how to get one..
- If you have some developer tools onboard, checkout the source and build it yourself.
- Google and take your pick.
This is generally reliable.
Version SVN-r9079 is known to work with ffe (I used that binary whilst building it). All versions should work fine, though available options/codes sometimes change between version; simply add/remove strings from your prefs, easy to do.
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ps. if you have any problems, leave a comment..
Awesome! That MATOF is WILD! hahahah
Good work.
:RG
Heh, I'm glad you like it! It saves a lot of messing about, that's for sure.
Btw, I'd have replied earlier, but I've recently introduced a bug into my comment script, more like a "personality". When it feels like it, it mails me new comments. It must have been in a mood!
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I really love this tool, makes working with ffmpeg so much easier!
Thank you for your time making it!
http://corz.org/engine?download=menu§ion=windows
FFE zip no download!!! help
Hi
ser, that's a not a real link!
Just head to the /engine, and you'll have no troubles downloading.
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Cool Thanks
Very interesting program. Do you know how to build a gui for FFplay by any chance?
Yes.
But I have no need for such a thing. There are certainly MPlayer front-ends out there, though for actual playing movies, I prefer Media Player Classic.
You obviously prefer a GUI, too, so why not just go all the way and use a fully-featured media player? There are dozens of good ones.
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THE BEST
nice software
sweet
Well, the binary downloads link shows 11 files and there's no explanation as to what files are what. Then there's a link to download ffmpeg saying "this is a good, stable version" but the link lists like 20 versions. I'm a windows guy, still, regretfully; and I'm looking for some way of making a movie out of a bunch of jpg's; but after half a day of googling already can't seem to find one piece of open source software clearly documented and stating that it can do the job. Am I in the right place?; and if so, could I have some directions how to install this?
Well, the download link leads to a folder in my downloads archive, and each download comes with full documentation, where applicable. "What file is what" is obvious, isn't it? If you want Batch Runner, download Batch Runner.zip, if you want ffe, download ffe.zip, and so on.
The ffmpeg page, which has nothing to do with me, has many versions of the ffmpeg software, and is always growing. Either grab the latest version, or grab the one I recommend here on this page (because I'm 100% certain it works 100% with ffe - ffmpeg is continuously evolving, whereas I have no immediate plans to revisit the ffe source, which is open, so feel free to do that yourself).
What perhaps isn't clear to you, is that ffe is no more than a "front-end" for ffmpeg. It provides a convenient way to get to ffmpeg's features without having to use the command-line; as well as add some features of its own, things designed to make multiple tests quick and painless. ffe does no video processing itself; it simply passes your commands to ffmpeg, and displays the ffmpeg console output, live in the ffe GUI.
There is no installation for ffe; you simply drop it into wherever you have already installed ffmpeg. And the installation of ffmpeg is simply dropping it (and its dll, basically the contents of the ffmpeg archive) into a folder somewhere; you're done.
As to your task of converting jpeg images to video, I didn't realize that ffmpeg could do that, at least, I've not used it this way; but after a couple of minutes Googling, I see that it can. Though there's nothing in the ffmpeg documentation (being a volunteer project, I'm sure they would welcome any help improving that), with but the following two caveats, the process is fairly straightforward..
Firstly, you will need to ensure that all the jpeg files are named correctly, that is; a numerical sequence, all using the same number of digits. In other words, if you have 200 jpegs, begin with "001.jpg", not "1.jpg".
To feed an entire sequence of images to ffmpeg, you need to use C printf syntax (the ffmpeg documentation section about converting avi to jpeg has more details - we are simply reversing the process). Sticking with our imaginary series of jpegs, the input would be %03d.jpg, the first part basically means, "three digits padded with zeros". If your images are named "pic001.jpeg" -> "pic200.jpeg", for the input format, you would use pic%03d.jpeg. If none of this makes any sense, check out the documentation for printf.
That's all there is to it. You will likely want to add other parameters, frame rate, output format, etc, and do some experimentation; but so long as you get those two things correct, it should all work beautifully. My own test just did.
If you want to skip ffe, and interact directly with ffmpeg on the command-line, use something like this..
ffmpeg -r 12 -i %03d.jpg -vcodec xvid -qmax 6 -y video.avi
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FAantastic addition to the world o' convenience!!!
Tanks
ffe is an excellent solution to using FFmpeg with a GUI, and is easy to use. It is a good compromise between the overly-simplified and the insanely-complex. The source code includes ffe-default.ini with instructions on altering/augmenting the settings.
BUT - where does ffe.exe look for the .ini file? It doesn't seem to want to read it.
ffe was coded prior to my "Drop-in and make portable" convention, which means ffe's ini file is always in your user data folder. Assuming you are using XP, and your system drive is drive C, that would be..
C:\Documents and Settings\<your-user-name>\Application Data\corz\ffe
On Vista, it would be..
C:\Users\<your-user-name>\AppData\Roaming\corz\ffe
If you are playing with the source, its location is the variable $ini_path, which is set very near the top of the code - you can set it to whatever you like. For example; to run in a portable state, with the ini file right next to ffe.exe, you could change that line to something like..
$ini_path = @ScriptDir & "\ffe.ini"
These days, my apps generally first look for the ini right next to the app itself, and then, if there's not one there; fall-back to the user's data folder. If I ever go back to "do stuff" to ffe, I'll likely add in this capability.
Thanks for your comments.
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Thanks for the reply. Your approach to .ini files is quite useful.
Thanks.
I have to agree with Rich: other frontends I've tried have been either too complicated, or too simple. ffe seems to strike a perfect balance, simple and easy-to-use, yet with the ability to get complex if you need to. Being able to see what ffmpeg is actually doing all the while is also a great feature.
I've been using it to convert a pile of FLV videos (from utube), and particularly in finding the ideal settings, ffe is perfect for the task. The auto-rename-on-settings feature is especially useful and saved me a lot of time messing around. Good work, and thank you for making it free!