Converting proprietary audio/video formats to ogg vorbis/theora?

brynjarh · 05-22-2005, 08:02 PM

I have allot of video files in the WMV(Windows Media Video) and RM(Real Media) formats and I would like to convert them to OGG Theora if possible.

So I'm wondering if there are possible any tools that I could use on Linux, or even possible under WINE on Linux, to convert these files over to OGG Theora? If the tools are free software it would be a bonus but it's not necessary.

For those interested in converting MP3 files to OGG Vorbis can try out this useful script/software: http://freshmeat.net/projects/mp32ogg/

J_Szucs · 05-23-2005, 01:47 AM

I have read somewhere that it is not very vise to convert audio from one encoded format to another, because you loose on quality.
Each encoder throws away certain elements of the audio spectrum in order to reduce audio size. When you use two encoders subsequently, these losses may double at worst (because it may happen that wmv and ogg throw away different parts of the audio spectrum).

I doubt whether there is a converter from wmv to ogg, but you might consider to use mplayer plus oggenc for the purpose.

sdexp · 08-25-2006, 11:52 PM

You probably agree with me by now, but WMV was a ominously terrible choice.

To come back, you may have to use some special hardware to transfer the video analogously to another recorder.

If you can use any means to get .wmv that reencoded into .mpg, .mov, or .avi, then you can download and use ffmpeg2theora to make that a .ogg theora video.

http://www.theora.org/