[Bontz-team] mpeg

[Owen Swerkstrom]

If you feel like doing mpeg, do it.  You're right,
there's a bunch that needs doing, might as well dive
in wherever you're most interested at the moment.

Now, this mpeg library you've found, does it accept
any-old resolution mpeg, or is it strict enough to
only want a "real" 352x240 file?  I'd sort of been
envisioning a wide-screen for the game's cinematics,
and I wanted to keep as much detail as the rest of the
game, so I've been playing around with a 640x240
format.  The original mpeg spec doesn't support a
picture that wide.  But I see two options:  We can use
strict standard 352x240 mpegs and I can render
everything anamorphically, leaving it up to you and
your mpeg integration to stretch it out horizontally. 
Pixels become twice as wide and we sacrifice some
quality, but we use a standard file format and we save
a lot of space.  The other way is to use an SVCD-style
mpeg that doesn't care what resolution it is, and I
can produce an actual 640x240 image that all your
engine has to do is center on-screen.  As much as I
like extra- sharp detail, I'm actually liking the
sound of the former situation better.  Mpeg1 is heavy
enough that the space we'd save would be significant,
and I'm a sucker for sticking to standard formats,
even if it means playing it in windows media or some
other braindead program would make it look funny.

I think I'll be using film's 24 frames per second
instead of NTSC-style 30 or PAL-style 25.  Not that it
should matter.

If we moved to openDivx or Ogg Theora (formerly ogg
tarkin) as a video format, I'd be more easily
convinced to save full-resolution, since they're more
efficient (and look nicer).

I'll be happy to put together some test videos asap,
though they probably won't be very much like the final
game's cinematics yet.  But, I have been working on
the location of Furgason's lab where he does all his
experiments and invents his time machine, books,
scientific equipment, notes, etc... and drawing up
some storyboard-type stuff, trying to piece together
the opening cinema in my mind.  I don't know if I'll
be able to use "Cinematic Fantasy" in its entirity or
if we'll have to butcher it down a bit, but that's
definitely the song I want to open the game with.

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