Questions about the FICV codec

[AnubisAkaLee]

I have what I hope is a very simple question. What color space is used in this proprietary FICV codec? I see we can choose out input color range, but this does not tell me how it is stored and delivered. The only information I could find in the forums is where one of the Mirillis support folks said that there is chroma sub-sampling. This indicates to me that it is probably in one of the YUV color spaces, but not if it is in 4:4:4, 4:2:2 or 4:2:0. Could someone please let me know? Not knowing this has my work flow at a stand still.

[Buffometer]

I compared it with YV24, because it is very similar to that, but it has a smoother gradients due to the fact that it is slightly smooths details, something likely to reduce the size of the video and bitrate.
.Ficv almost , but not visually lossless.

[AnubisAkaLee]

Yea, I was originally thinking it might be 4:4:4 as well. Hopefully someone will know for sure. Using YV24 might just have to be "close enough" for my export but I HATE moving videos between color spaces if I can avoid it. Bah, I am just not used to working with lossy codecs with no specifications/documentation. Action! is fitting my needs better than my other screen capture programs for what I am doing, but I really don't like not being able to pick my encoder.

[Buffometer]

Comparsion between .ficv YV 24 and MagicYUV YV24:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/115002

as I said, .ficv more smoother, but original YV24 more crisp/natural and bigger filesize.

[AnubisAkaLee]

Ah, I have not seen that comparison website before. That's really cool, thank you for that. I see what you mean with the smoothing. I had noticed a slight darkening of my footage with FICV as well, but I don't think any of my users would even notice while watching it. It still looks really good for a lossy codec, I have to admit. I don't mind large files, this is a dedicated video editing computer I work off of. I prefer having the very best quality possible to start with so that my final render will look it's best before uploading to companies media servers. Normally, I record using lossless RGB, but the current project I am working on revolves around recording the Windows desktop and my other program I normally use just hooks into AERO, so it is not well suited for what I am recording. When the mouse cursor hovers over hyperlinks and changes to the "finger" pointer icon and would disappear from the recording, also it would disappear from the recording while over certain application windows. Action! does not have any of those issues and keeps a constant framerate instead of the AERO variable framerate. I also like the built in "Show mouse clicks" option. I just really wish I could use a truly lossless vfw codec in Action!. That would really push this from being a good screen recorder to a great one. I have had my copy of Action! for nearly a year and only used it maybe twice because I am a bit spoiled . If I am honest I was even looking last night at alternative applications to add to my collection, but most dedicated desktop recorders only use proprietary codecs like Action! does, and the ones that do let you pick codecs are dedicated to video game recording with an AERO hook added as a kind of after thought.

My guess is that Action! will eventually allow you to select a vfw codec like most of it's competition, but by that time I will have completed my current project. I can't really complain, though. It will do what I need it to do. I just have to get over my OCD knowing that I am taking a lossy source video, running it though an NLE, transcoding to a lossless codec since FICV does not work as a vfw codec (it does not appear to have a configuration interface so there is no way to pass along to the codec your quality and color range configuration options that Action! passes along) that will probably be in a different color space from the original and then transcode to the final delivery format for the company media servers since I have never seen an NLE that has fine enough controls to get a truly good looking final product that doesn't involve "throwing" unnecessarily high bit rates at the file. *Starts to hyperventilate at the thought of all that unnecessary quality loss*

[Buffometer]

It much better than lossy codecs (no compression artifacts), but worse than true lossless.

[AnubisAkaLee]

Haha, yea I agree about bandicam. I tried that a long time ago and deleted it the same day I have a few applications I use now, but they are all paid licence applications. I'm not sure how picky this forum is about discussing other apps, so I won't mention the names. I have done a few tests zooming in really close to my Action recordings and you are right, I don't see any artifacting. Actually, I kinda like the smoothing with certain images. I don't see any issues with it making text blurry, either.

I usually encode using Lagarith in lossless RGB. It's not the best codec out there, but I like being able to record losslessly, then render out of my NLE straight back into Lagarith. It stays lossless quality and is super fast because there is no re-encoding (except at certain edited points) or transcoding and I stay in my original color space.

I only have 2 codecs can encode to the yv24 color space. One is proprietary so I cannot render out of an NLE with it and the other is MagicYUV. I actually really like MagicYUV, but have not found any way to transcode that to x.264 except frame serving or it would be my new love affair, lol. There SHOULD be no issue going to RGB for now if the colorspace is indeed yv24 from what I understand... but I won't know until I get to that point in editing and then get up close and personal with the images.