Introduction
A set of command lines examples to help debugging video streaming files like mp4, ts ,fmp4 in Dash, HLS, or MSS, with or without DRM.
The tools
- FFprobe - A generic tool for media streaming debug
- Mediainfo - A generic tool for media streaming info
- TSDuck - A tool more specific for TS (MPEG-2 Part 1)
- Bento4 - A tool more specific for MP4 (MPEG-4 Part 14)
Overview of the streams
ffprobe -i file.extension
# trace will output like a parser, it's useful for learning also check container structure such as fragmented mp4, mpegts programs...
ffprobe -v trace file.extension
mediainfo file.extension
tsdump file.ts
tsanalyze file.ts
tstables file.ts
# .. tsXXXX
mp4info file.mp4
mp4dump # this is useful for fragmented mp4
# mp4XXXXX
Specific info from the streams
# -select_streams v is filtering only video streams
ffprobe -loglevel panic -select_streams v -show_entries "stream=start_pts,start_time,avg_frame_rate,r_frame_rate,codec_time_base" file.extension
# logging/printing HDR metada information from FFmpeg
# source: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffmpeg/comments/qidrc8/comment/i9lrj9u/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
ffprobe -loglevel quiet -read_intervals "%+#2" -select_streams v:0 -show_entries side_data "input.mkv" | egrep -m 1 -A 10 'Mastering display metadata' | grep -v 'Mastering display metadata' >/tmp/variables.txt
ffprobe -loglevel quiet -read_intervals "%+#2" -select_streams v:0 -show_entries side_data "input.mkv" | egrep -m 1 -A 2 'Content light level metadata' | grep -v 'Content light level metadata' >>/tmp/variables.txt
cat /tmp/variables.txt
Specific info from some frames
ffprobe -loglevel panic -select_streams v -show_entries "frame=pkt_pts,pkt_pts_time,pkt_duration,best_effort_timestamp,best_effort_timestamp_time" -read_intervals %+#5
Codec/Container parsing-like info from the stream
mediainfo --Details=1 file.extension