I don't know how popular Timebuster is, but since I don't know of other people who have made any patches dedicated to timelapses on AVCHD, I decided to post it here.

This is NOW a dedicated patch to 2.5fps AVCHD on 24p Mode or on HBR. On 24p it now uses GOP10 to synch I-Frames to 2.5fps, a Constant Quantizer VBR approach, minimum P/B-Frame size and quality. Will span and record for 24+ hours on ANY 64GB SD card. 1080i60 and 720p modes still operational. On HBR it uses GOP 12 synch I-Frames to 2.5fps and keeps 24p and 720p modes operational.

All discussion, bug reports and feature requests should please be placed at the relevant thread where you will also find all the latest versions: http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2135/gh2-2fps-avchd-timebuster-patch-the-day-is-not-over/p1 and not HERE!

VERSION HISTORY :

1 - TimeBuster 1 - First Release

• Based on Cake v1. It uses GOP13, a Constant Quantizer VBR approach without B-Frames, minimum P-Frame size and quality.

2 - TimeBuster 1.1 - with 2 significant changes:

• Now based on @balazer 's Cake 1.1, it has switched to use the Rate Control mechanism from @LPowell 's FlowMotion 100.

• 720p mode was broken due to use of a very low quantizer (12) which lead to skipped frames in 720p. It now uses QP=20 on both 720 & 1080 modes which will have an observable effect in both bitrate & quality even though it still gives you 24+ hours on 64GB.

3 - TimeBuster 1.2 - with 1 significant change for a fully featured 720p mode:

• Since @balazer 's Cake 1.1 is now heavily based on @LPowell 's FlowMotion 100, I decided to copy LPowells 720p settings since they will probably play better with the other modes. The only difference on 720p is a constant QP which had to be lowered yet from 20 to 21 because it still dropped frames on torture charts and/or sometimes present speed issues at very high ISO (>3200) on Class 10 SDs.

4 - TimeBuster 1.3 - with a lot of significant changes:

• Ported to PTTools 3.64d

• Savings on P-Frames is now accomplished by using a Scaling Table that is full of 0xFFFF for 1080p modes.

• Quantizer boundaries were removed since they are now much more dependent on the new Quantizer Tables.

• Redesigned for merging, these definitions try to be as independent as possible from their re-packaging definitions (in this case FlowMotion 1.1) and are published in two flavors: Timebuster 1.3 Base (for merging) and Timebuster 1.3 FloMo (merged with FlowMotion 1.1)

5 - Timebuster is now comprised of 2 main variants:

a) 24h Timebuster 2.0 - with the following changes (from TimeBuster 1.3):

• The GOP for 24p is now married to 2.5fps. The bitrate hit is a little above 20% but the recording length can be easily compensated by raising the QP. As a benefit it's still very close to 2fps and it's the closest to a 360º shutter we can get on 24p.

b) 24h TimeHBusteR 2.0 (NEW, uses HBR 30)

• Similar philosophy to 24h Timebuster 2.0 Base but as the name suggests, uses HBR mode instead of 24p. There is another difference, P-Frame quality is fully preserved as this kind of frames is used for one of the interlaced slices on Key Frames.

• GOP married to 1/2.5 on HBR 30p (NTSC) and to 1/5s on HBR 25p (PAL). The big benefit is that both are using a 360º shutter. Uncheck "1080i50 and 1080p24 GOP Size=5" before merging if you don't plan to use Shutter Speed (SS) =1/5s and want to better preserve the 24p mode and HBR 25.

Both variants are now:

• Using B-Frames. There is a 6% penalty in bitrate usage but this was necessary to make sure the QP was respected. I believe the gain from setting the QP at will is just too great to ignore, since not everyone wants to record for 24h straight. QPs as low as QP=16 were tested and theoretically it could go as low as QP=12 @ISO160 when merged with FlowMotion 1.11 on regular tripod mounted footage.

• GOP married to 2.5fps. The bitrate hit is a little above 20% but the recording length can be easily compensated by raising the QP. The reason behind this was getting as close as possible to 360º.

• User definable GOP - GOP can be set at will according to intended SS, use the attached "GOP-SS-table.png" to look up the right value. Defaults settings are SS=2.5fps and GOP 1080i=10 for 24h Timebuster 2.0 and SS=2.5/5fps and GOP 1080i50/i60=12/5 for 24h TimeHBusteR 2.0.

• User definable QP - QP can be set at will according to desired IQ/recording length. I've gathered quite an amount of information so that in the future I can make an Excel tool to estimate the best QP from Card Size/Footage Snapshot/Desired ISO/Recording Length. Default settings are Q24/23 for 24h Timebuster/TimeHBusteR.

As before, there is the Base Release to be merged at wish with popular settings (load Base first in PTTools and then "ALT+Click" your choice of merger) and there is also the FlowMotion Release (already merged with FlowMotion 1.11). I've merge tested against @lpowell 's FlowMotion 1.11, @balazer 's Cake 95, and @bkmcwd 's GOP3ZILLA and no undesirable effects were observed. The key is using a VBR settings definition with a very high "1080p24 Frame Limit", especially if you are going for a low QP (<22).

If you want to merge with Nick @driftwood 's settings, I recommend going for Cluster v1 as it shines in being both a long GOP set and also having the biggest "1080p24 Frame Limit" of all the sets I know.

The day is not over. :)

If I did a Long GOP patch it may look something close to this....

**** NEW **** Driftwood 'XDCAM' Long GOP patch 50M all round. Experimental. Whilst doing some research into AVC/HD and MPEG2 (in particular Sony's 50Mbps XDCAM settings), deblocking, raster sizes, and various Quant Matrixes it struck me how easy it should be to get that stuff stable on the GH2 - whilst keeping it pretty much vanilla to the GH2's inner workings.

Indeed, reading related stuff here;- http://www.avmb.biz/ConvergentDesign/CD_4.htm also led me to believe its ok for i/p/b frames to change in relation to qualative subject matter and that not all recordings will follow the 50% P frame size/30% B frame size ratio rule all the time - as their graphics half way down show. This patch uses B frames throughout then.

Note: As has been seen in the past using B frames on 720p, you will find you have to record a 1080i or 1080p clip first before using 720p mode. Weird bug!

Some of the ideas in this patch (in particular raster frame size and Luminance sampling frequency) were put to the test and I now want you to judge for yourself... Test this in real world situations as its early days yet. However, I think we have found a way to improve the initial video signal rasterisation. A new INTRA patch will also be up shortly using this theory. This could be a false positive, but let me know if you see anything different in using this patch. This looks even more impressive with deblocking off and some new quant matrixes, which you will see in a new version of ptools soon. :-)

Nick

**** NEW **** Driftwood Quantum X v1 (Incorporating The Driftwood Matrix)

Requires the new ptools v3.64D.

INTRA upto 154M on 1080p24 9 (+EX Tele may work)

INTRA upto 80M on 1080i and HBR (EX Tele may work)

upto 55-70M on 720p modes at GOP6. (EX Tele works)

A completely new matrix developed by myself for the main INTRA settings.

Undoubtedly its not going to please everyone (you just can't!) but for Low GOP fans here's the first of the INTRA hatchings under the Quantum X banner.

This patch is targetted at the normal recording modes only, Quantum 100 v4 released soon will deal with guaranteed EX Tele Mode and 80% Rec modes.

*** NEW *** Driftwood Stock Long GOP 66M/35M settings template for GF2 & GH2 cameras enjoying 720p B frames and HBR. This is a template only and should be used as a starting point for your own settings.

*** NEW *** Quantum v3 Rocket and v4 Orion plus Baby Quantum X - 'ß Pictoris' - Available on this link with info

http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2364/driftwood-quantum-x-v2-rocket#Item_44

*** NEW **** Driftwood Quantum X v5 'ß Pictoris' CBR and VBR versions NOW AVAILABLE from page one of the Quantum thread. Exciting new hybrid matrix of Panasonic's GH2 and PAnasonic's AVC-Intra. New GOP6 and GOP9 on 720p50/60 structures utilising B frames. Rebuilt 'GOP Related' settings for correct b frames under 720p with Encoder 1 720 =3 correlation. Looks good on initial test. All settings should work including EX Tele and spanning. multi-tested on @stray 's death colour chart.

NOTE: There are two versions available of this setting. One constant bitrate CBR style and the other VBR variable bitrate according to detail.

Find them here: http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2364/driftwood-quantum-x-v3b-rocket-v4b-orion-v5-%CE%B2-pictoris-out-now/p1

Driftwood Mysteron Series. 146M standard version on 24p OR the 900k i frames 'Burst version' 176M data rate. Plus experimental matrix set for 720p60 and HBR modes.

Link to Flow Motion v2 download page:

http://www.personal-view.com./talks/discussion/3337/gh2-flow-motion-v2-100mbps-fast-action-performance-reliability-for-all-class-10-sd-cards/p1

• Reliable 100Mbps peak performance in AVCHD 24H, HBR, FSH, SH, and MJPEG HD.

• Exclusive 140Mbps turbo mode boosts peak bitrate to handle 80% Slow-Motion 24H mode.

• Records reliably with all Class 10 SD cards, with 60Mbps file-spanning in 24L, FH, and H modes.

• 95MB/sec SD cards support file-spanning in all video modes (except NTSC HBR 30p and FSH 60i).

• Full support for all NTSC and PAL video modes and options, including ETC zoom mode.

• In-camera playback of all AVCHD video files. (MJPEG HD videos not playable in-camera.)

• Failsafe operation with any lens, in any video mode, under any type of shooting conditions.

• Consumer-friendly auto-exposure features fully supported in 60Mbps 24L, FH, and H modes.

• Fast Action 3-Frame GOP performance with B-frames visibly indistinguishable from I-frames.

• Optimal motion picture quality consistently maintained in underexposed low-light conditions.

More reliable new series is here. :-)

Please look at an applicable thread for details. http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2960/an-valkyrie-golgop3-13-gop3zilla-natural-super-reliable-all-round-gop3-settings-/p1

http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/5385/gh2-all-round-gop3-settings-series-2-an-valkyrie-golgop3-13-gop3zilla-natural-/p1

SANITY 5.1

Here is an update to SANITY 5. It fixes an infrequent problem where the picture would severly break up. This update is highly recommended.

Discussion is here: http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/comment/104024#Comment_104024

Exclusive 140Mbps turbo mode boosts peak bitrate to handle 80% Slow-Motion 24H mode Where is???GH2

@Saman you have to be logged in. I can download everything here.