Dav files. Any way to record standard h264 or h265? Or a good converter?

runraid

runraid

Getting the hang of it
May 22, 2020
158
86
Seattle
I love my dahua cams but the dav files are are pain to deal with. Is there any way to just write out standard mp4 files?

If not, is there a good command line converter?
 
What I do is export the video from smartPss in .avi format, then use handbrake to convert it to mp4. No claim that this is the best way. It's just what I've found that works. The resulting mp4 files are horribly large IMO.
 
I log into the camera gui or nvr gui and download videos from there. It has the option to choose .dav or .mp4 in a dropdown menu before you download. I know not all camera firmwares are the same but that's how I do it.
 
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The Issue us that I record on motion. I already have .dav files and they are a pain to work with. I can’t forward them to anyone first, as they need to be converted.
 
It sounds like he isn't using SmartPSS which, I can't blame it. Its a bloated piece of code for just viewing videos.
 
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Yes, I don’t want to open a bloated app. I want to convert videos on the cli and send them to my phone. Looks like I can use ffmpeg. I converted a video and it loses some quality and the file size is larger. I need to tune it correctly.
 
Smartpss doesn't feel bloated to me. It loads up in about 3 seconds for me and I can view live video or playback instantly without typing my login and password. But hey if you want to spend extra work on converting videos props to you.
 
Ok. And how would build automations on top of that Levin? More importantly on Linux? Weird that your are being hostile towards people who looking for alternative solutions.
 
runraid said:
Ok. And how would build automations on top of that Levin? More importantly on Linux? Weird that your are being hostile towards people who looking for alternative solutions.
Click to expand...


??? How am i being hostile??? I orignally commented on your post because your first post said "I love my dahua cams but the dav files are are pain to deal with. Is there any way to just write out standard mp4 files? " I replied that smartpss does write out standard mp4 files. Nowhere prior to that had you mentioned anything about linux and automations. My undersrtanding of your original question was you just wanted a way to get mp4's directly from your cameras.
 
Levin83 said:
I replied that smartpss does write out standard mp4 files.
Click to expand...
I would like to take issue with "standard" mp4 because the mp4 files from smartPss do not play on either my win7 or win10 system. Audio is ok, no video. The smartPss mp4 does play on my linux box. This is why I go from dav->avi>mp4 (via handbrake) because those files do play on windows. Is there some nonstandard codec that windows needs?
 
I really wish we could petition dahua to offer a firmware update to write out proper h264 files as an option. Looks like the best way forward for me is to convert the files with ffmpeg. There are closed sourced apps that convert the files seemingly perfectly, but they are GUI apps.
 
tigerwillow1 said:
I would like to take issue with "standard" mp4 because the mp4 files from smartPss do not play on either my win7 or win10 system. Audio is ok, no video. The smartPss mp4 does play on my linux box. This is why I go from dav->avi>mp4 (via handbrake) because those files do play on windows. Is there some nonstandard codec that windows needs?
Click to expand...

Ok i'll take back my comment about "standard" mp4s. I'm not 100% on what codec dahua uses for their files but using VLC to playback the mp4 works fine on my computers. I set my cameras to record with h265 and i decided to grab a short clip from my camera and take a look at it with media info and this is what it says

Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : Base Media
Codec ID : isom (isom/iso2/avc1/mp41)
File size : 19.4 MiB
Duration : 39 s 867 ms
Overall bit rate : 4 089 kb/s
Encoded date : UTC 2020-05-25 00:03:12
Tagged date : UTC 2020-05-25 00:03:12

Video
ID : 1
Format : HEVC
Format/Info : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile : Main@L5@Main
Codec ID : hev1
Codec ID/Info : High Efficiency Video Coding
Duration : 39 s 867 ms
Bit rate : 4 088 kb/s
Width : 3 840 pixels
Height : 2 160 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 15.000 FPS
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.033
Stream size : 19.4 MiB (100%)
Encoded date : UTC 2020-05-25 00:03:12
Tagged date : UTC 2020-05-25 00:03:12
Color range : Full
Color primaries : BT.709
Transfer characteristics : BT.709
Matrix coefficients : BT.709
Codec configuration box : hvcC

So from that it seems dahua uses either isom or hev1 codec? Also i have the klite codec pack installed too and the videos play fine on windows media player and i'm able to edit the videos in video editors.
 
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Looks like it should be easy enough to add a codec to windows. What stops me is I occasionally send video clips to others and if I tell them they have to add a codec I'll get figurative blank stares in return. What would be nice is a way to change the encoding in smartPss.
 
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I have used both smartpss and smartplayer to export dav files. There appears to be a 30 minute record limit in smartpss and a 15 minute export limit in both programs. Has anyone figured out how to exceed these limitations? My application is editing the Meteor Shower clips I have.

Another difficulty is I have been using h265. Cleaner, less blocky, and 264 has a shift every second. But 265 is harder to work with, sigh...
 
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I recently exported a 49 minute .dav from smartPss, then exported it as a .avi from smartplayer. No length problems were encountered. The.dav file is 784 megabytes, and the .avi file is 801 megabytes.
 
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