[needs-packaging] mpg1394grab - DV Video (HD) Capture IEC 61883-4 from dv ieee1394 firewire port

[Tree MendUs]

URL:
http://www.kinodv.org/article/view/54/1/11

Description:

"mpg1394grab" is used for doing High definition DV Video (HD) Capture IEC 61883-4 from dv ieee1394 firewire port.
See wikipedia for information on High Definition Video http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-definition_video

Compile using the gcc compiler which is in most Linux distributions by default.

The program is simple. It looks to your /dev/raw1394 device (firewire device on linux) for a mpeg2 stream. If it sees one then it writes it to disk.

mpg1394grab > somempegfile.mpg

will start the program listening to the /dev/raw1394 firewire device on your computer. When you hit REC on your camera (or PLAY if you are in VTR mode) mpg1392mpg will start to write the file to your computer.

To Monitor:
mpg1394grab | mpeg2dec -t 4096

To Capture:
mpg1394grab > testfile.mpg

download from http://www.kinodv.org/filemanager/download/5/mpg1394grab.c

License:
GNU GPL
see inside the source code file

[Stefan Richter (stefan-r-ubz)]

dvgrab can capture MPEG2-TS too.

[Stefan Richter (stefan-r-ubz)]

I wrote:
> dvgrab can capture MPEG2-TS too
...(i.e. HDV) and can divert it into files or into stdout and hence to a pipe by using a - as trailing command line parameter. I.e. it can do everything which mpg1394grab can do and much more than that, is practically as simple to use, and is still maintained.

mpg1394grab on the other hand uses an old kernel interface which is no longer available in linux kernel 2.6.23 and later and has also been removed from libraw1394 v2.

Due to the kernel interface issue, mpg1394grab is unusable in Ubuntu 8.04 and later.

[Tree MendUs (tree-mendus-deactivatedaccount)]

Thanks Stefan,

That's good information.
It wasn't available at the site where I got the link from.

Do you have some links for this (kind of) good recent technical information - I like to keep up to date?

mpg1394grab was (as of 2007) said to be good for capturing Sony MV video, and using it in Cinelerra.

1) mpg1394grab recommended better than dvgrab for capture from Sony MV Mar 2007
http://www.kinodv.org/dcforum/dcforum?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=888&mesg_id=888&page=

2) Comparison with dvgrab Oct 2006
http://crazedmuleproductions.blogspot.com/2006/10/success-and-failure-in-land-of-dvhdv.html

3) Using mpg1394grab July 2007
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/archive/index.php/t-98082.html

[Stefan Richter (stefan-r-ubz)]

HDV (MPEG2-TS) support was added in dvgrab 3.0, released in August 2007. Before that, mpg1394grab or test-mpeg2 had to be used for HDV.

Information about mpeg1394grab's kernel interface issue is somewhat obscure, but would show itself at runtime on a new kernel or at compile time with libraw1394 v2. I found this information at http://ieee1394.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Utilities#mpg1394grab .

[Tree MendUs (tree-mendus-deactivatedaccount)]

Nice Link.
Thanks Stefan.

Does dvgrab work with previous version of Ubuntu before 8.04 or before kernel 2.6.23 ?

The reason I ask is that backports are only done "after" there is a version made for the recent versions of Ubuntu.
Backports (I am told by Launchpad) are not possible, if no package has been added in a more recent version.

So if mpg1394, does not work in recent versions (but does in previous versions), then it will not be allowed to be made as a backport.
But if dvgrab does not do the same job in previous versions, as mpg1394grab does, then previous version will miss out on the functionality.

Note
===
There are some other useful utilities on that link which I am making some package requests for - e.g. DV4L
I thought I had made a suggestion for a package that does something similar to this, but it doesn't show on a search of launchpad or ubuntu packages.
This will be very handy because tehre are a number of good programs that use v4l but don't have (till these utilities) any way of using DV video.

[Tree MendUs (tree-mendus-deactivatedaccount)]

I notice a few other utilities on that link at ieee1394.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Utilities#mpg1394grab
which are not in the Repos, which I have made package requests for at launchpad.
So hopefully this link is not ouit of date and all the other utilities can be added.

Utilities already requested include;

1) DVTS (firewire over IP protocol) at http://www.sfc.wide.ad.jp/DVTS/
a very useful function for making long distance firewire networks.
Bug #250416

2) ieee1394diag
http://ieee1394diag.sf.net/
Bug #274817

3) firecontrol (was ieee1394commander)
http://firecontrol.sourceforge.net/
Bug #249641

If you are interested, please check out my many other package requests (ie "[needs-packaging]") for multimedia related programs, and do feel welcome to comment.
I have made many submissions, which will hopefully get at least some added, to improve the multimedia usefulness of Ubuntu.

The following search should find most of them ;

https://bugs.launchpad.net/%7Etree-mendus/+bugs?field.searchtext=&orderby=-importance&search=Search&field.status%3Alist=NEW&field.status%3Alist=CONFIRMED&field.status%3Alist=TRIAGED&field.status%3Alist=INPROGRESS&field.status%3Alist=FIXCOMMITTED&field.status%3Alist=FIXRELEASED&assignee_option=any&field.assignee=&field.bug_reporter=&field.bug_supervisor=&field.bug_commenter=&field.subscriber=

[Stefan Richter (stefan-r-ubz)]

> Does dvgrab work with previous version of Ubuntu before 8.04 or before kernel 2.6.23 ?

Yes, dvgrab v2.x and dvgbrab v3.x (latest version is recommended) work with old kernels and new kernels alike. Ditto regarding libraw1394 version compatibility.