H.264 MPEG-4 Support

[gwolfgang]

When will VideoStudio include full support for MPEG-4 H.264 ?

For MPEG-4 newcomers: H.264 is the same as the international standards "AVC" and "MPEG-4 Part-10", just different names for the same thing depending on the standardization body. The H.264 format has been defined to be one of the obligatory MPEG-4 formats for upcoming Blue-Ray and HD-DVD electronic devices. H.264 is the most efficient variant of MPEG-4 due to the reduced file sizes it offers, about half the size of MPEG-2 files at equivalent or better quality. All new mobile phones are also H.264 compatible. H.264 is a format that is fully scalable, and thus can be used for any application, all the way from small mobile devices to full-sized HD movies. H.264 is the standard format for the future. QuickTime 7 is, for example, fully H.264 compliant and can thus play any file in that format.

Currently VideoStudio10 Plus seems to support the MPEG-4 SP codecs, which is about halfway between MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 H.264 regarding file sizes.

[jchunter]

Rumour has it that VS11 will support AVCHD, if not the whole H.264 spec. I doubt the latter because h.264 codecs seem to be not yet quite ready for prime time...