On 3/4/26 15:44, Elliot Smith via ffmpeg-user wrote:
Hi Nicolas, Thank you for your replies. I have finally been able to
successfully use the freezedetect command. With a little bit of google
searching, I was able to find examples that allowed me to make some
limited use of freezedetect, even though I still do not understand some
of the options. For me, the freezedetect documentation is frustrating
because some of the command flags or options are not documented. Also,
the data types and data formats are not documented.
These flags or options have very limited documentation. Some have no
documentation.
-i
-vf
metadata=
mode=
file=
-map
-f
n=
d=
Using only the ffmpeg documentation on the website and in the --help
file, most users will not be able to successfully use the freezedetect
command. For example, I would never guess that the n= option can accept
as input two different data formats. The user can specify noise in
decimal, i.e. n=0.0001. The user can also specify noise in db, i.e.
n=-50dB. In addition, most users would never be able to guess how to
construct the command. The documentation does not explain which options
should be enclosed in quotation marks, or which options should be
separated by a comma, and which options should be separated by a colon.
The meaning of the trailing dash is not explained.
ffmpeg -i input_file.mp4 -vf
"freezedetect=n=0.0001:d=0.05,metadata=mode=print:file=output_file.txt"
-map 0:v:0 -f null -
Using ffmpeg is not as difficult as reverse engineering thousands of
years old Egyptian hieroglyphics, but some more complete documentation
would still be helpful for many users.
Thanks for considering my feedback.
-Elliot
Hi Elliot,
First of all, there is a low level of activity on this list these times,
and it is too bad. Of course "it is ok to have questions", it is ok if
the documentation looks unclear to you, so please ask.
Ideally, the documentation on the website, including its linked
ressources (wiki and old bug tracker https://trac.ffmpeg.org/, new forge
https://code.ffmpeg.org/FFmpeg/FFmpeg/issues, ml archive
https://lists.ffmpeg.org/pipermail/ffmpeg-user/) should be enough for
most users. But this is a lot of data and command lines can be very
complex... So IMO, one can only expect a user to spend reasonable time
looking at the doc, do its best, and then ask here.
There certainly are some gaps and unclear aspects in the documentation,
but I won't say it is not complete - far from it. I think the opposite:
it is that overwhelming that you got lost.
Here is some advice to help you find where to look for what you mentioned.
> -i and -f
https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-all.html#Main-options
> -vf
https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-all.html#Video-Options
> metadata filter and its parameters (mode/file)
https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-filters.html#metadata_002c-ametadata
> -map
https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-all.html#Stream-selection-1
> n and d (freezedetect parameters)
https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-filters.html#freezedetect
[please check: <<Can be specified in dB(..)>>]
The trailing dash is from the OS, not an ffmpeg feature.
In your case, I think the best ressource to start with would have been
the wiki, typically:
https://trac.ffmpeg.org/wiki/FilteringGuide
Given all that available documentation, I don't think googling is the
best option, as for almost anything: it may be the shortest way in the
short term, but some more time to acquire some knowledge is really much
more gratifying and better in the long run.
Nicolas
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