Webcast Software Encoder Pre-Processing Settings

I built a new computer specifically for our stake to use with the metinghouse webcast software. The audio quality is excellent but the video is badly interlaced (lined effect when something in the video moves).

Microsoft Expression Encoder has a Pre-Processing setting called Deinterlacing that allows deinterlacing to be forced which fixes the problem with the video. However, I haven't been able to find a way to enable this setting from within the webcast software. The encode profiles don't seem to be able to change this setting.

Is there a way to change the MS Expression Encoder pre-processing deinterlacing setting for the webcast software?

Thanks.

Core i5-2500K 3.30 GHz Quad Core
4 GB DDR3 1333
Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit
Aver Media AVerTV HD DVR capture card PCIe x1

Did you solve this issue? I just bought the Roxio USB Easy VHS to DVD and tried it out on my home camera, and saw a lot of interlacing during motion. I don't know if it's a problem of the signal coming from the camera, and maybe it works fine with the Sony EVI-D70. Can anyone confirm if they have the interlacing problem, and if you've been able to fix it?

I think this might only be an issue with the Roxio USB method, since a brief search of Osprey stuff seems to show an option to deinterlace.

I've used the Roxio Easy VHS to DVD dongle with all sorts of video sorces, and on various computers and laptops, including the EVI-D70 without any interlacing problems. This sample video was captured using the Roxio Easy VHS to DVD dongle and captured to the computer's HD (http://youtu.be/uVXU-K_w8GQ).

Perhaps you could deterimine possible causes of the problem by eliminating everything and going step by step. For instance, view the source on your computer's monitor with nothing else connected to the camera (are you splitting the video?), then capture and play back on the PC (Have you tried a differenct PC?). Try playing on a TV montor, then streaming using VLC or other, and finally stream with webcast. Hopefully the problem will surface and solutions can be targeted.

Experiment with different configuration settings and inputs (Composite, S-Video, NTSC_M, NTSC_433). My capture settings are Composite, NTSC_M.

phew! I'm glad you can confirm it works. Thanks for the suggestions and video. I'll restart from scratch to try it. I'll try another camera, too. Hopefully I can report back success like you did.

Regarding drivers for Roxio, did you just use the CD including in the package? Any updates from online?

rgme wrote:Regarding drivers for Roxio, did you just use the CD including in the package? Any updates from online?

Drivers were installed with the original CD, but whenever I have problems, the first thing I try are updated drivers.

Thanks for the ideas but I have already been through all the debugging you suggest. The problem is in the software. The church webcast software has been optimized for very few, specific devices and the rest have been ignored. If they had exposed the pre-processing settings in the church webcast software I could tune it myself. Sadly they did not and I have not found an alternate way of configuring them.

If anyone from the webcast software team happens to read this, consider this a feature request. I would really appreciate it if you would add some more (advanced?) functionality to enable more than 3 capture devices. I'm sure others would appreciate this too.

I believe the church's narrow hardware selection initially stems from the Microsoft Expression Encoder that the church's software takes advantage of. From the Microsoft Expression Encoder website...

For live encoding, the following hardware capture devices have been tested as live sources, however this list is not a recommendation or endorsement of any product:

• Black Magic Intensity
• Black Magic Intensity Pro
• ViewCast Osprey 230
• ViewCast Osprey 530
• ViewCast Osprey 450e
• ViewCast Osprey 700HD
• Winnov Videum 4000
• WinTV HVR-950

I think the church has only approved those capture devices they have actually tested with their software, including some not on the above list, like the Roxio USB device mentioned. The above list does NOT guarantee it will work in our application. For example, my Winnov Videum capture card failed miserably with the Webcast software. It's not easy to thoroughly test each piece of hardware (and probably tweak the software to fit), but I'm sure over time the church's approved list will grow to include more products.

I see you built a custom PC for webcasting and chose the AVerTV HD card, which is a nice card, but not on either list. How did you come by selecting that particular card?

I chose the AverTV HD card because it is a reasonably priced PCI Express capture card that supports analog and High Def inputs.

I tested this card with Microsoft Expression Encoder (MEE). It works great at full resolution. However when the video is scaled down for medium and low upstream bandwidth it introduces the interlace effect I mentioned. If the pre-processing settings in MEE are adjusted to eliminate the interlace, the video looks just as good scaled down. I did this all with the MEE which the webcast software is built on.

To be clear, I'm not asking the webcast software team to validate more capture cards. I'm asking them to make the pre-processing settings that exist in the Microsoft Expression Encoder available in the webcast software. A simple, editable settings file in the program directory would work just fine and avoid any messy GUI changes.

I have no problem making the change myself if they would be willing to share the source code.

After many hours trying this, I second wisewoof's request. I've reinstalled the Roxio USB software from scratch. I've tried capturing from DVD through composite and S-video. Both ways I get interlacing, just like when I used my home digital camera as well as the stake's video camera (on a separate PC). If I use Microsoft Expression Encoder, and force the pre-processing deinterlacing off, then I see the same results I would through Meetinghouse Webcast. If I turn on the deinterlacing, it is removed to varying degrees (depending on the method). Below, I've attached two screenshots representing no deinterlacing and "Force bob" deinterlacing. They are representative of what happens with camera capture, although they are only a mild-to-moderate example.

I feel like this is something on the encoding part of Meetinghouse Webcast. It doesn't seem to be (and wouldn't make sense to be) related to the receiving end. While there options to deinterlace in media players (VLC comes to mind), I a) don't know if we can receive the stream in VLC, and b) think that best picture comes when the optimization is done earlier in webcast process.

For what it's worth, using Roxio USB device inside Vidyo works, but has the same interlacing problem.

Can we get the encoding to include an option for deinterlacing?
If I'm totally missing the boat on this, can someone explain?

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your comments – good discussion and feedback. We’ll certainly take your advice on including access to the interlace settings in the future if we do another release of the Meetinghouse Webcast Software in its current state (we are still working on our strategy).

However, in the meantime, there is a fairly simple workaround. As you’re obviously already aware, Meetinghouse Webcast Software basically sits on top of Microsoft Expression Encoder, which performs all of the actual encoding. During the process of the two pieces of software interacting together, an Encoder job file is created, which contains the settings for your webcast. Even though the interlace setting is not available in the Webcast software, you can make the change directly from within Expression Encoder. Do the following:

·Open Windows Explorer, click on Organize/Folder and Search Options/View, and make sure that "Show hidden files, folder and drives" is checked on.
·Launch Microsoft Expression Encoder.
·Open the job file already created by using Meetinghouse Webcast Software:
oC:\users\{your username}\AppData\Local\Meetinghouse Webcast
oFile should be named Broadcast.job.xej.
·Make the desired interlace setting change on the Encoder interface screen.
·Save the Broadcast.job.xej file with the same name into the same location.
·Meetinghouse Webcast Software will then utilize that job file with the settings you have specified.

Let us know how it works. Thanks.

It's so great to have a forum and programmers monitor and assist us with our problems. Thanks for all your efforts and responses. I'll keep this in mind if we have problems.

Mike

Thank you so much!
Your solution worked for me. The interlacing issues were solved by changing the deinterlace method in the Broadcast job file.

This is great news. I did a search for a deinterlace option with the hardware Meetinghouse Webcast Communicator and could not find one. Does anyone know if there are any options?

rgme wrote:Thank you so much!
Your solution worked for me. The interlacing issues were solved by changing the deinterlace method in the Broadcast job file.

rgme, which of the deinterlacing options did you choose?

Honestly, I don't remember, and I won't be able to look it up for a week or so. The real solution for my stake was PVC. We're going to use it for a two-way training and two-way conference session this weekend. We plan to have prayers and talks from a place two hours away...it's a great blessing to have this technology.