Sorenson codec
Encyclopedia
Sorenson codec may refer to either of three proprietary
video codec
s: Sorenson Video, Sorenson Video 3 or Sorenson Spark. Sorenson Video is also known as Sorenson Video Codec, Sorenson Video Quantizer or SVQ. Sorenson Spark is also known as Sorenson H.263 or FLV1 (and it is sometimes incorrectly named as Flash Video (FLV), which is the name of Adobe Flash container format).
Both codecs were devised by Sorenson Media Inc. (formerly Sorenson Vision Inc.). Sorenson Video is used in Apple's QuickTime
and Sorenson Spark in Adobe Flash
(formerly Macromedia Flash).
3 on March 30, 1998. It was available in two versions: the Basic Edition encoder/decoder built into QuickTime 3 and Developer Edition which enabled advanced encoding features and two-pass variable bitrate. With QuickTime 4, it was given wide exposure for the release of the teaser trailer for Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
on March 11, 1999.
The Sorenson Video 3 (SV3) Pro Codec for QuickTime video is offered as a separate software product, but comes standard with the commercial encoding software Sorenson Squeeze
.
and move away from other proprietary codecs, Sorenson Media licensed a new video codec to Macromedia
as Sorenson Spark (Sorenson H.263), released with Macromedia Flash 6/MX on March 4, 2002. Sorenson Spark is the required video compression format for Flash Player 6 and 7.
Macromedia later tried to find a better video codec. Starting with Flash Player 8 (released in September 2005), the preferred video codec is VP6
. The Sorenson Spark can be still used in the Adobe Flash CS4 Professional (2008) for Flash Video FLV files as one of three video compression formats (alongside H.264 and On2 VP6
). Sorenson Spark is an older codec but it is also a widely available and compatible one, when used in Flash Video. According to an Adobe engineer Tinic Uro, it is considered as an incomplete implementation of H.263.
player, or the MPlayer
for Unix/Linux, which in turn piggy-back
ed DLL
-files extracted from Apple's player for Microsoft Windows
.
According to an anonymous developer of FFmpeg
, reverse engineering
of the SVQ3 codec (Sorenson Video 3) revealed it as a tweaked version of H.264. (It is considered as based on an early H.264 draft.) The same developer also added support for this codec to FFmpeg, making native playback possible on all platforms supported by FFmpeg. FFmpeg supports decoding of "Sorenson Vector Quantizer 3" (fourcc
SVQ3) and Sorenson Vector Quantizer 1 (fourcc SVQ1) starting with version 0.4.7, released in 2003.
The Sorenson Spark is sometimes defined as "almost H.263" or as "an incomplete implementation of H.263". These compression formats differ mostly in header structure and ranges of the coefficients.
Proprietary software
Proprietary software is computer software licensed under exclusive legal right of the copyright holder. The licensee is given the right to use the software under certain conditions, while restricted from other uses, such as modification, further distribution, or reverse engineering.Complementary...
video codec
Video codec
A video codec is a device or software that enables video compression and/or decompression for digital video. The compression usually employs lossy data compression. Historically, video was stored as an analog signal on magnetic tape...
s: Sorenson Video, Sorenson Video 3 or Sorenson Spark. Sorenson Video is also known as Sorenson Video Codec, Sorenson Video Quantizer or SVQ. Sorenson Spark is also known as Sorenson H.263 or FLV1 (and it is sometimes incorrectly named as Flash Video (FLV), which is the name of Adobe Flash container format).
Both codecs were devised by Sorenson Media Inc. (formerly Sorenson Vision Inc.). Sorenson Video is used in Apple's QuickTime
QuickTime
QuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
and Sorenson Spark in Adobe Flash
Adobe Flash
Adobe Flash is a multimedia platform used to add animation, video, and interactivity to web pages. Flash is frequently used for advertisements, games and flash animations for broadcast...
(formerly Macromedia Flash).
Sorenson Video
The Sorenson Video codec first appeared with the release of QuickTimeQuickTime
QuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
3 on March 30, 1998. It was available in two versions: the Basic Edition encoder/decoder built into QuickTime 3 and Developer Edition which enabled advanced encoding features and two-pass variable bitrate. With QuickTime 4, it was given wide exposure for the release of the teaser trailer for Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a 1999 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the fourth film to be released in the Star Wars saga, as the first of a three-part prequel to the original Star Wars trilogy, as well as the first film in the saga in terms...
on March 11, 1999.
Sorenson Video 2
Sorenson Video 2 was released in March 1999; however, it mainly included minor improvements and optimizations to the Developer Edition of the encoder, as movies encoded with it were backwards compatible with the Sorenson Video decoder.Sorenson Video 3
An improved Sorenson Video 3 codec debuted with the release of QuickTime 5.0.2 on July 1, 2001. It was available exclusively for QuickTime. Apple QuickTime later focused on other compression formats and moved Sorenson Video 3 to a separate group called "legacy encoders".The Sorenson Video 3 (SV3) Pro Codec for QuickTime video is offered as a separate software product, but comes standard with the commercial encoding software Sorenson Squeeze
Sorenson Squeeze
Sorenson Squeeze is a compression suite for video. It encodes to multiple formats including QuickTime, Windows Media, Flash Video, Silverlight, WebM & WMV. It uses multiple codecs, including the Sorenson codecs SV3 Pro and Spark, H.264, H.263, VP6, VC1, MPEG2, and many others. Squeeze operates on...
.
Sorenson Spark
As Apple began to embrace MPEG-4MPEG-4
MPEG-4 is a method of defining compression of audio and visual digital data. It was introduced in late 1998 and designated a standard for a group of audio and video coding formats and related technology agreed upon by the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group under the formal standard ISO/IEC...
and move away from other proprietary codecs, Sorenson Media licensed a new video codec to Macromedia
Macromedia
Macromedia was an American graphics and web development software company headquartered in San Francisco, California that produced such products as Flash and Dreamweaver. Its rival, Adobe Systems, acquired Macromedia on December 3, 2005 and controls the line of Macromedia...
as Sorenson Spark (Sorenson H.263), released with Macromedia Flash 6/MX on March 4, 2002. Sorenson Spark is the required video compression format for Flash Player 6 and 7.
Macromedia later tried to find a better video codec. Starting with Flash Player 8 (released in September 2005), the preferred video codec is VP6
VP6
On2 TrueMotion VP6 is a proprietary lossy video compression format and video codec. It is an incarnation of the TrueMotion video codec, a series of video codecs developed by On2 Technologies. This codec is commonly used by Adobe Flash, Flash Video, and JavaFX media files.- Overview :The VP6 codec...
. The Sorenson Spark can be still used in the Adobe Flash CS4 Professional (2008) for Flash Video FLV files as one of three video compression formats (alongside H.264 and On2 VP6
VP6
On2 TrueMotion VP6 is a proprietary lossy video compression format and video codec. It is an incarnation of the TrueMotion video codec, a series of video codecs developed by On2 Technologies. This codec is commonly used by Adobe Flash, Flash Video, and JavaFX media files.- Overview :The VP6 codec...
). Sorenson Spark is an older codec but it is also a widely available and compatible one, when used in Flash Video. According to an Adobe engineer Tinic Uro, it is considered as an incomplete implementation of H.263.
Other Sorenson codecs
The Sorenson Media, Inc. offers Sorenson Squeeze, which can encode video to proprietary Sorenson formats, but also to standardized video compression formats, such as H.264, MPEG-4 Part 2, MPEG-2 and others. There is also Sorenson H.264 and Sorenson MPEG-4 codec, which are one of many existing implementations of international standards and should not be confused with Sorenson proprietary codecs.Sorenson Video
For a long time the only way to play back Sorenson Video was to use Apple's QuickTimeQuickTime
QuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
player, or the MPlayer
MPlayer
MPlayer is a free and open source media player. The program is available for all major operating systems, including Linux and other Unix-like systems, Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. Versions for OS/2, Syllable, AmigaOS and MorphOS are also available. The Windows version works, with some minor...
for Unix/Linux, which in turn piggy-back
Piggy-back
Piggy-backed is riding on the back of something else. To piggy-back is to ride on someone's back or shoulders or head.-Etymology:...
ed DLL
Dynamic-link library
Dynamic-link library , or DLL, is Microsoft's implementation of the shared library concept in the Microsoft Windows and OS/2 operating systems...
-files extracted from Apple's player for Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
.
According to an anonymous developer of FFmpeg
FFmpeg
FFmpeg is a free software project that produces libraries and programs for handling multimedia data. The most notable parts of FFmpeg are libavcodec, an audio/video codec library used by several other projects, libavformat, an audio/video container mux and demux library, and the ffmpeg command line...
, reverse engineering
Reverse engineering
Reverse engineering is the process of discovering the technological principles of a device, object, or system through analysis of its structure, function, and operation...
of the SVQ3 codec (Sorenson Video 3) revealed it as a tweaked version of H.264. (It is considered as based on an early H.264 draft.) The same developer also added support for this codec to FFmpeg, making native playback possible on all platforms supported by FFmpeg. FFmpeg supports decoding of "Sorenson Vector Quantizer 3" (fourcc
FourCC
A FourCC is a sequence of four bytes used to uniquely identify data formats.The concept originated in the OSType scheme used in the Macintosh system software and was adopted for the Amiga/Electronic Arts Interchange File Format and derivatives...
SVQ3) and Sorenson Vector Quantizer 1 (fourcc SVQ1) starting with version 0.4.7, released in 2003.
Sorenson Spark
The next version of FFmpeg in 2003 also added encoding/decoding of Sorenson H.263 used in Flash (fourcc FLV1). Encoding of SVQ1 was added in 0.4.9-pre1.The Sorenson Spark is sometimes defined as "almost H.263" or as "an incomplete implementation of H.263". These compression formats differ mostly in header structure and ranges of the coefficients.
External links
- sorensonmedia.com
- Sorenson Video Codec, Version 3 - format description by the Library of Congress
- Sorenson Video 1 - MultimediaWiki
- Sorenson Video 3 - MultimediaWiki
- Sorenson Spark - MultimediaWiki