X264 Project Announces Blu-ray Encoding Support 139
Posted
by
timothy
from the news-from-mid-spectrum dept.
from the news-from-mid-spectrum dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The x264 project has announced the first free software encoder to be able to generate Blu-ray compliant video. In addition, the announcement comes with a torrent of an x264-encoded Blu-ray disc containing entirely free content, such as the Open Movie Project videos. While there are still no free software Blu-ray authoring tools, hopefully this will change now that video and audio are taken care of so that everyone will be able to make their own Blu-rays without expensive proprietary software. Additionally, it seems the Criterion Collection is a friend of free software, having sponsored the effort to confirm x264's compliance with the Blu-ray spec."
The first question that popped into my head (Score:5, Interesting)
Isn't x264 (heavily) patent encumbered? And does that mean that the makers(or distributers?) have to pay a licensing fee? I know that it makes me weary to roll this out in a setting other than my home computing enviroment.
Anyone to easy my mind/confirm my suspicions?
BD9 (Score:5, Interesting)
lame was created and is used (Score:4, Interesting)
Even though mp3 is patent encumbered. This project is along those same lines.
Re:The first question that popped into my head (Score:5, Interesting)
Forget about the patents. In order to publish any Blu-ray content, you have to encrypt it, which means buying a key from the AACS. Blu-ray players are not allowed to read unencrypted pressed BD discs (some will play unencrypted BD-Rs with a BD layout, though as I understand it that's increasingly rare.)
This project is about as useful to the free software movement as a "free software" iPhone development kit.
Re:The first question that popped into my head (Score:5, Interesting)
But what if I'm an independent filmmaker and want to make my high-def movies available in Blu-ray and let people download them online? I've already done this with standard hi-def, making a DVD image available via bittorrent.
I wonder if I'd need to pay any patent holders the vig? Because if I do, fuck it, I'm OK with my current formats.
Anybody got any idea?
Well if decryption has been broken ... (Score:2, Interesting)