cce assist

CCE Assist is a little tool I wrote to assist in the MPEG-2 compression process with Cinema Craft SP2, but if you have an older version, it might also work for you. Its purpose is to encode a short part of video using 5 different CCE templates then present the results to the user so they can pick the best version, either with their eyes, or with the help of an SSIM rating. I've been using it for a while now "in house" and thought that, since the open source video world has given me so much, why not share it?

I don't normally code Windows programs and I can't guarantee this tool will work for you. It's obviously supplied without warranty. Also, I should note that this program is my own work and not that of Custom Technology Corporation or its resellers.

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Download

CCEAssist.zip (600kb)

Other programs you will need for CCE Assist to work:

Please read Getting Started, setup isn't obvious on its own.

Why I wrote this

Cinema Craft SP2 can produce gorgeous quality MPEG-2 video when it's correctly configured (it lowpass filters everything by default). However, it doesn't have any segment re-encode facility and furthermore, there is no live preview of applied filters (should you have to resort to using them). This can make the process of finding optimum encoding settings a lengthy trial and error process.

To counter this, I've often clipped small segments of video and encoded many different versions using different settings, then compared the results to figure out what the best parameters for specific problematic scenes are. CCE Assist automates this process to allow you to find optimum settings quicker. It doesn't re-invent the process and it doesn't necessarily do it in the cleanest way, but it does save a lot of clicking (once you've set it up for the first time).

Usage example (once set up)

  1. Run the program, give it the path of the source file, and tell it the range of problematic frames you want to examine. You can input an AVI file or AVISynth script.
  2. Click Start, wait for the encodes to run, then compare the results in a side-by-side view.

First-time setup

  1. Unzip the program to a folder on your hard drive (I use C:\Program Files (x86)\CCEAssist). Make a shortcut on your desktop if you like.
  2. Install AVISynth 2.5 on your system, if it isn't already. Much of the background dirty work is done with AviSynth scripts, so you need to install this. It's a fantastic framework, anyway.
  3. Download DGMPGDec and make sure that the supplied file, DGDecode.dll is in your AVISynth Plugins folder (C:\Program Files\AviSynth 2.5\Plugins\ on 32-bit systems). This will allow the generated MPEG-2 video files to be read and displayed side by side.
  4. Download Lefungus' AVISynth SSIM filter and place it in the AVISynth plugins folder.
  5. Download VirtualDub and install it somewhere. This is to allow you to compare the results and easily step through the frames. You could just as easily install any other program that can read .AVS scripts.
  6. Run CCEAssist and click the System Paths tab. Update the paths, if necessary (the defaults may work fine for you if you are also running a 64-bit OS and install everything to the default folders, like I do). Note: DGIndex is part of the DGDecode package so it should be sitting in the same folder. Note 2: you have to provide the paths to the FILES, that is, with the .exe part at the end. Don't simply provide paths to folders!

  7. Run Cinema Craft SP2 and import any video of your choice. It doesn't matter what, because you're not going to encode anything at the moment. Double click the video. Select some settings then press the Save button, and choose "<Create new template...>". You will now have to create five new templates with exactly these names: AuditionA, AuditionB, AuditionC, AuditionD, and AuditionE. Choose the settings you would like to compare in each of these templates. On the CCE Assist side, you can also assign labels to these templates (for example, "CG Preset, no filter", "CG Preset, dithered quantization", "Normal preset, Lowpass filter", "Low Bitrate Quantization Matrix", etc.)
  8. That's it! You can now (hopefully) close CCE and run (and use) CCE Assist for the first time. In the future, you can now simply choose Template > Setting, make changes to the templates, and run CCE Assist for quick comparisons.

Future improvements (if I get time) and current limitations

  • Running the program without clearing out the Temporary Working Folder sometimes gives problems. Future versions will do this automatically.
  • Draw graphs representing the generated SSIM data. Right now, the SSIM plugin dumps out .CSV files which can be turned into graphs by an Excel-like program. They're there in the temporary working folder you specify if you'd like to do this now.
  • Generation of Picture Quality List (.txt) file for direct import into CCE.
  • Ability to choose any number of comparisons to be generated instead of it being set at 5.
David Mackenzie, Independent Video Mastering