Last 5 mins from World Cup 2006, Italy vs. Germany Semifinals
Watching the first few matches of the 2010 World Cup made me think about the 2006 World Cup and that Italy v. Germany match. This was a great game. It was into double-overtime and it was just a marathon in Germany. Then, these last 5 minutes were great. Recorded off my Tivo back in July 2006...
Install and Run Handbrake on Ubuntu Lucid Lynx
I have been backing-up our DVDs to file recently and been using Handbrake a lot. Handbrake is a great tool and runs great on Windows and Mac OS X, but it also runs on Ubuntu. After encoding a few movies on our Macs and then transferring them to our storage location, I thought that it might just be best to encode the video on the linux server itself. Here is a quick guide if there is not one out there yet. Handbrake can be installed via the PPA structure in Ubuntu. Big ups to John Stebbins for working on this.
1. Login to your Ubuntu Linux 10.0.4 system. If your system does not have a GUI (Gnome) then you can use Handbrake via command-line , but not for the average user.
2. I would run a command that makes sure your system is up to date, package-wise prior to adding the PPA.
$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get upgrade
Then allow everything to be run and updated and reboot if needed.
3. Add the PPA for John Stebbins personal archive to your apt-get repository
$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:stebbins/handbrake-snapshots
4. Then run the update to get the apt-get available packages so you can get handbrake
$ sudo apt-get update
5. Then, since your system knows about John's archive and has the package for Handbrake, go ahead and run it.
$sudo apt-get install handbrake*
This will show you that you are going to install the command-line and the gtk (gnome) gui version. Screenshot shows the step 5 install process but I am root straight-out (the sudo stuff gets old when you have to just get stuff done so having a root password is important for me).
This sort of process is constantly changing and this is just want works at this point in time, so best to check this for new/better ways to get to the solution.
https://edge.launchpad.net/~stebbins/+archive/handbrake-snapshots
6. I would also make sure you have the latest version of vlc installed.
$ sudo apt-get install vlc
7. You will be able to run the GUI version of Handbrake via the Gnome menu structure under Sound & Video or just running this command via Terminal
$ ghb
Another nice way to run this on your linux box would be to just run it via VNC or X over SSH. Here is a screenshot running Handbrake on Ubuntu Lucid Lynx on X over SSH from my MacBook 10.6.3 with X11.
Handbrake on Ubuntu Lucid Lynx 10.04 run over SSH via X
More On FFMPEG Settings That Work For Me
After more and more testing off HD video, I am finding the best bang for the download speed buck is sticking with qscale 10 and chopping the frames to 15 while sizing the image size down to hd480. Here is an example -
ffmpeg -i 051810Perf1.m4v -qscale 10 -s hd480 -r 15 051810Perf1.flv
Using a standard resolutuon that is based on 16 seems to be the best way to go. There are so many intricate elements to encoding video to flv to try and make it decent quality, but still large while having it load quickly for people with various speeds of broadband!
Great solution instead of long VGA cable
We have a theater projector and have a long run to the control booth, but this is not optimal for a presenter on the stage since we don't have a VGA cable run to the stage that would allow the speaker to operate their laptop from the stage. After replacing the projector with a more modern one, I also really wanted to solve this.
Epson and some other manufacturers of projectors are putting wifi into the projectors themselves but that turns into a software and hardware solution which is not what I wanted either. Also, the projection software is only for Windows which is ridiculous not to mention the quality for anything beyond powerpoint slides is bad and the delay is distracting.
Enter a VGA to Cat5 solution. The TrippLite Cat5 VGA Extender (part B130-101) is the one I went with and the repeater aspect can dish a VGA signal quite a long way and more than enough for our run from the booth to the stage where we have network runs.
This provides a great solution for hitting a projector video source from a long way away while still keeping the system hardware only.