The current situation is far from ideal regarding free tools and AVCHD .mts/.m2ts files. FFmpeg has bugs with these files (it creates files that have double the frame rate), while Mencoder’s official release crashes (SVN version is somewhat fixed though).

Vimeo user Aranya linked for me to a Windows-based guide that has all the needed tools to take apart AVCHD and create .avs files out of it. I have modified that original tutorial to include the freeware transcoding utility “SUPER”, which has more exporting abilities than the suggested ones in the original tutorial. Here’s how:

1. Install the stable 2.5.7 version of the AVISynth application. Follow the default options during installation. Once it’s installed, you can safely delete its downloaded installation file.

2. Download Soopafresh’s AVCHD_CONVERT package. Create a folder for it somewhere called “avchd-convert” and unzip all the files in that newly created folder.

3. Using a text editor, e.g. notepad.exe, edit the file “_multi_demux_mts_HQ.bat” if you are using an NTSC camera, or “_multi_demux_mts_HQ__PAL.bat” file if you are using a PAL camera. In it, add a “rem ” word (without the quotes) in front of the line:
for %%a in (“*.dga”) do @echo Lanczos4Resize(…………
This “rem ” word will make that line a comment and won’t be taken into account when executing the .bat file.
If your camera saves files as .m2ts instead of .mts, also change the part that reads like “for %%a in (“*.mts”) do…..” and make it: “for %%a in (“*.m2ts”) do……”
Then click to “save” these .bat files. This step needs to only be done once.

4. Place the .m2ts or .mts file(s) on the same folder as all the above, and run by double-clicking either the _multi_demux_mts_HQ.bat file for NTSC, or the _multi_demux_mts_HQ__PAL.bat file for PAL. This will create five new files for each .mts/.m2ts file: an .avc file, an .ac3, a .dga, a .wav and an .avs file.

5. Download SUPER from here (prefer the RO mirror) and install it. Load it. Right click on the application and set the “Output File Saving Management” to a folder that you would like to save your files to. This step needs to only be done once.

6. Take the .avs file(s) (make sure it’s the .avs ones) that was created on step #4, and drag n drop it to SUPER’s file area. Then, make everything to look like this, and of course use the right frame rate each time (e.g. 29.97 for NTSC, 25.00 for PAL, 23.976 for true 24p). Then, press “encode” and after a while you will be having a 720p MP4 file that is compatible with Vimeo, XBoX360, PS3 (and AppleTV for 24p files). SUPER can also export to many other formats, e.g. DVD formats, XVID AVI, WMV etc, and of course, it can export in full 1080p if desired too (just change the resolution to 1920×1080 and the bitrate to about 12mbps).

7. After the conversion is done, you can keep your original .mts/.m2ts file(s) and the newly created MP4 file(s), but you can safely delete the five kinds of files that were created in step #4.

This just in. For the sequel of “Crank“, titled “Crank: High Voltage“, the director is not using the RED cameras that he already used on his previous movie. He’s going even lower in price. He will be using a number of XH-A1s and HF10s from Canon. The HF10 is a $900 AVCHD consumer camera (a bit worse in quality than the HV20). The idea is to use these cameras in places where the big Hollywood cameras just don’t fit, or if they do, they fit after a lot of work of re-arranging the set.

To the directors: good luck removing the pulldown out of the HF10. It will piss your editors off.

An amazing song. Why these guys are still without a contract, no one knows about them, and according to their blog they only have money to buy tour vans that break down in the middle of nowhere?

Ratings just don’t make sense. You have stupid shows like the slut drama “Grey’s Anatomy” supposedly watched by at least 16 million viewers per week, and “Lost” only got this week 11.14 million viewers, the lowest performance ever for the show. And that, followed by a very good episode last week. That doesn’t make sense, right?

The interesting thing about “Lost” is the fact that it’s the most recorded live action series in the world, as nearly 35% of its additional viewers are DVR users (making it 15+ million viewers overall, plus it’s the most popular illegally downloaded show). Secondly, it’s the show with the most 18-49 year old viewers, which is a key demographic for advertisers. In other words, the kind of people who watch CSI and Grey’s Anatomy are mostly old (or plainly put, boring) people who like old-style TV shows.

The conclusion I draw from the above, is that “Lost” is created for the kind of people who don’t sit in front of a TV to watch it. Not the traditional kind of viewer, but the geek one. The “Lost” viewer is more likely to TiVO the show, download it off iTunes, or download it off Bittorrent, or simply go to ABC’s site and watch it in HD — almost without any ads at all.

Personally, I see “Lost” falling below 10 million viewers by the 6th and final season, but its star among its fans will continue to be as bright as it is now. Thankfully, ABC knows all that so there is not the slightest chance for the show to get canceled.

Today isn’t my lucky day.

1. Friends came by to take me to lunch over at Google, while I was 100% sure that our rendezvous was for tomorrow, Friday. Not only that, but I had told JBQ that it would be Friday, so he was not expecting us at work until tomorrow! Sorry Brent, Amy! I screwed up, I really need to read emails more carefully!

2. A reader asked me if he can license one of my articles (which he linked to his email to me) for his newsletter, and I gave him authorization for a completely different article! Again, I didn’t read my email straight.

3. There’s a good chance I am going to shoot a music video clip for a local indie band soon, and I made some tests locally. The idea was to have the audio sped up 25%, shoot a video lip-syncing to the sped up audio, bring the video to Vegas and slow it down to the point that it lip syncs to the original non-sped up version of the audio. Thing is, when I told Vegas to slow-down the video, I told it to do so at 0.750 rate (75% of the 1.000 playback rate, right?). Well, it wouldn’t sync. I emailed Vegas support, only to come back to me, looking like a buffoon to them, and reply to me the obvious: that the video rate should be 0.800, not 0.750. I suck at calculations.

I was watching “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” tonight, and there is almost no background blur in the movie. At least, not more than the HV20 can deliver without any extra 35mm adapters. The magic is all in the color (easily reproduced with Cinemode/Neutral, and color grading), lighting (that’s where your money should go), and composition (only your artistic genes can help you here). I don’t think the camera they used had much more dynamic range than the HV20 either. The lack of background blur didn’t stop the movie to be voted the 4th best movie of all times on IMDb.

There was this live Madonna show I wanted to see, a early peek on her new tour. MSN was broadcasting it live, online.

So I go to the main page, which had a big Madonna picture in there, and a countdown counter to the show. So I go there 5 minutes before the show starts, just in case there was a limit of how many people can watch at the same time.

So the countdown goes to 0, and it resets to the NEXT show. But on the big Flash placeholder there is no show showing. Apparently, I have to press “watch now” (bad usability). So I press “watch now”, and I gets me to another page that resizes my browser. God how I hate that.

So, I watch the 32 second ad, but then nothing loads. It says that the broadcast is not available to watch. I thought, I was too late, too many people are logged in for that shit. However, the ads were keep loading one after the other, but the concsert was a no-show.

Then it hit me. I should try to watch that with IE instead of Firefox. And then it worked! But I already lost 5 minutes of it.

Excuse me, but if you are not going to support Firefox, at least give an error message that makes sense and instructs us what to do instead of saying that the “broadcast is not available”. Besides, all ads worked perfectly with Firefox! So why not the show?

And to top all of that, there is a 1 second delay between video and audio, making it unwatchable. IE or not.

I hate these modern bras that you now find everywhere in the market. They have this, I don’t know, piece of metal around them that HURTS. Sure, it makes your breasts look like floating devices, but that’s just too much. I am not willing to put up with the pain associated with it. So in the past few years, each time I would buy a bra, I would remove that metal from inside it.

I feel the same way about stiletto high heels. I don’t mind to have some heels on my shoes, but I don’t see the point of the stilettos. I find them laughable, along with the women who try to look ultra sexy for no apparent reason — especially when they are already married.

And what’s the point of wearing $10k earrings either? You can buy a car with that money. Or help your less fortunate distant family members.

There’s a point where someone could look good and sexy and comfortable, and I like that and I am sure more husbands would like that too. But look-modification via painful bras/stilettos/piercing/mud-baths and expensive jewelry is not something I support because I don’t see the point of it.

Yup, as a teenager, my girlfriends stopped asking me to go shopping with them because I was their worst nightmare. I have had these opinions since I remember myself, not because I am older now or try to excuse myself. I am a pragmatist to the bone. I always was.

Or party-pooper. Depends how you see it.

* Some Lesbos residents are suing a gay group for using the word “lesbian”. How pathetic and stupid. Someone needs to teach these people about how language evolves.

* Pidgin is getting forked for not listening to the users. I thought that this was long overdue. I never liked that project and the way it ran. Its main developer had the audacity once to tell me that no one cares about video IM and video iChat support. A few years later, and Adium (which sprang out of Pidgin) is actively work on it.

* Are you into a new PC for your video editing needs? Here’s a good deal (ends soon). Just make sure you spend the extra $20 to get the faster 800 Mhz RAM, and add $30 for the firewire port if you own an HDV firewire camera.

* Five nice, free, and legal, mp3 songs:
– “Fire” by AlibiTom (amazing song)
– “Beyond the Door” by 13ghosts
– “To Be Gone” by Anna Ternheim
– “C’mon Baby Say Bang Bang” by Jane Vain and the Dark Matter
– “Oh Yeah” by Morning State
– More legal downloads here (“Cat Swallow” by Royal Bangs found there is great).

* A sneak peek from the new “Lost” episode tomorrow.