STV: OriginalV2 with Comskip added

[Jere_Jones]

Originally Posted by jbromwich

2) The commercial marking is accurate to about 70%. Some commercial blocks are missed completely, some program blocks are incorrectly marked as commercial. (I'm using comskip with dirMon). How does one go about "tweaking" the detection settings? Any techniques anyone has to assertain *the reason* behind each mistake made by comskip?

There is a wealth of information in the Commercial Advance Beta thread. However, it's a little long, so here's a quick primer.

Step 1) Turn logging on.
Step 2) Find the framenumbers that the commercials begin and end on. You can do this with VirtualDubMod, VideoRedo, or Sage and a calculator.
Step 3) Run comskip.
Step 4) Analyze the log.

Step 4 can get a little tricky. Here are some useful questions to ask while you're looking at the log:
1) Did comskip find a black frame at the start (or end) of the commercial?
2) Did comskip think there was a logo during the commercial?
3) Do all the commercial segments have higher scores than the show segments?
4) Was the threshold incorrect?

If none of that helps, do steps 1-3 and then email me the log and I'll take a look at it for you.

Jere

[spacecadet]

Originally Posted by jbromwich

2) The commercial marking is accurate to about 70%. Some commercial blocks are missed completely, some program blocks are incorrectly marked as commercial. (I'm using comskip with dirMon). How does one go about "tweaking" the detection settings? Any techniques anyone has to assertain *the reason* behind each mistake made by comskip?

Everything said previously is good info. Also make sure that you are using the latest version of comskip,exe (which I believe is 0.64). I started out using an older version (0.21?) that I had downloaded from these forums and now get much better results since upgrading to version 0.64.

In addition, it's probably worth pointing out the ComSkip project's web site (http://www.sage-community.org/index.cgi/wiki/ComSkip) which has good information. You might want to check out the "Initialization file information" which describes the options available in the .ini file.

[ToxMox]

Originally Posted by jbromwich

I've now been running "OriginalV2Comskip.stv" for almost a week and am quite impressed. The WAF is also very high. However, I have had some issues:

1) Was this functionality added to the absolute newest version of the Original STV? I've always used a "Windows Scheduled Task" to automatically reboot my machine once a day and have never had any adverse side affects from this. However, the OriginalV2Comskip.stv has introduced a very consistent bug such that after a reboot my sage.properties and my wiz.bin files both get reset to their "out-of-box" state. (I have to restore them from backup after any reboot). This kinda sucks. Any ideas why this is happening with this STV?

Yes it was based on the latest OriginalV2 STV.
Are you using the built in Background Commercial Processing in the STV to scan your files or are you using something like DirMon. If it is the former then maybe the reboots are occuring during a comskip and perhaps you need to schedule a close on the sage application and perhaps even force quit the current comskip.exe running. I don't know if that would cause this behaviour as I always quit Sage manually before I reboot.

[jbromwich]

Originally Posted by ToxMox

Are you using the built in Background Commercial Processing in the STV to scan your files or are you using something like DirMon.

I'm using the latest DirMon, not the built-in monitor in the STV.

Originally Posted by ToxMox

If it is the former then maybe the reboots are occuring during a comskip and perhaps you need to schedule a close on the sage application and perhaps even force quit the current comskip.exe running. I don't know if that would cause this behaviour as I always quit Sage manually before I reboot.

Good idea. Just to eliminate the variables, I might try scheduling an automatic shutdown of Sage (front end), Sage (back end), DirMon, and Comskip just before the reboot task runs.... Any idea how to shutdown these 4 guys from the command line?

[jlindborg]

Possibly a rookie question here - I have DirMon flying on the server and it's generating the files for ComSkip properly - shows I play off the server using Cyars17 show the commercials and advance just dandy.

However I have two clients running (one MediaMVP and one normal PC running the standard SVT with commercial skip posted in this thread). Neither of the clients show the commercial information - am I missing something obvious in the setup here? Or does this just not work?

thanks

[Wheemer]

all the paths to you media files/comskip files must be the same on the server and clients. I use unc paths to get around this, such as: //server/c/media

[jlindborg]

Hmmm... not sure I get this - where do I setup the paths as UNCs? Is this in the ComSkip settings for the SVTs somewhere?

[Wheemer]

That would be your video recording directories, under sage's config screen...

[jlindborg]

Ah, I see - OK, I just mapped drives on the client to be the same as the server (D/E/F) and all is well in comskip land.

thanks

[thborchert]

Hi,

first, thanks for the effort! Now, two dumb questions:

1. I am also using Nielm's default padding STV add-in. That puts its setting options in Detailed Setup>Enhancements. However, that isn't shown anymore since "Comskip" options takes its place. Any way to have both?

2. Maybe I am dense, but I thought there had to be a way to invoke running Comskip on a recorded file through the options menu as in Malore's STV.

Thanks!

[ToxMox]

It should still be there but just out of sight on your display. Should still be selectable. I know it doesn't look pretty but it should work.

[thborchert]

You're right. It's there. What about 2.? If the only way is background, what is the order Comskip uses there? By date/time? Everything that'S new and doesn't have a TXT with it?

Thanks again,

[ToxMox]

I believe the order is oldest file to newest file that doesn't have a txt with it.
As for 2. I didn't put any advanced stuff like that in there.

[vuego]

I found a minor issue.

When starting Sage I see two comskip.exe processes starting in Task manager. If I close Sage at this point it won't be able to start up again until comskip is finished, which may take a looong time.

[ToxMox]

This is a known issue and the only way around it is to end the comskip process or wait it out.

[dZeus]

hmm this STV seems to assume that the framerate of the captured video is 29,97 (NTSC) instead of 25 for PAL that I use. Framenumber to timestamp conversion is messed up because of this...

Could the author of the STV please, please fix this? What about basing the framerate of the video either on the setting in sage.properties file (see the documentation for mmc/video_format_code), or maybe there's a way in Sage to determine the framerate of the video itself? Or make it an adjustable setting...

Many thanks in advance!

[JasonJoel]

If you are saying that the resulting COMSKIP file si being showsn at the wrong locations, I guess I would ask if you have COMSKIP itself to output in PAL?


There is a settings in the INI file to specify NTSC or PAL framerates. Could that be the issue?

Jason

Originally Posted by dZeus

hmm this STV seems to assume that the framerate of the captured video is 29,97 (NTSC) instead of 25 for PAL that I use. Framenumber to timestamp conversion is messed up because of this...

Could the author of the STV please, please fix this? What about basing the framerate of the video either on the setting in sage.properties file (see the documentation for mmc/video_format_code), or maybe there's a way in Sage to determine the framerate of the video itself? Or make it an adjustable setting...

Many thanks in advance!

[dZeus]

no, the issue is with how SageTV with the 'originalV2Comskip' STV interprets the framenumbers that are in the comskip generated .txt file. They are converted to timestamps by dividing the framenumbers by 29.97 (NTSC framerate) instead of 25 (PAL framerate). Hence the timestamps are incorrect, while the framenumbers are matching the exact places where the commercials have been detected.

[ToxMox]

Does setting commercial_fps=25 in the appropriate Sage properties file fix this?

[dZeus]

sure does... thanks a lot!!!!