Video player (software)
Encyclopedia
A video player is a kind of media player for playing back digital video
data from media such as optical disc
s (for example, DVD
, VCD
), as well as from file
s of appropriate formats
such as MPEG, AVI
, RealVideo
, and QuickTime
.
In addition to VCR-like functions such as playing, pausing, stopping, rewinding, and forwarding, some common functions include zooming/full screen, audio channel selection, subtitle selection, and frame capturing
.
Many of the video players also support simple playback of digital audio
and 3D playback of 2D video.
A high-quality three-dimensional video presentation requires that each frame of a motion picture/video be embedded with information on the depth of objects present in the scene. This process involves shooting the video with special equipment from two distinct perspectives or modelling and rendering each frame as a collection of objects composed of 3D vertices and textures, much like in any modern video game, to achieve special effects. Tedious and costly, this method is only used in a small fraction of movies produced worldwide, while most movies remain in the form of traditional 2D images.
It is, however, possible to give an otherwise two-dimensional picture the appearance of depth with a much more simple approach. Using a technique known as anaglyph processing a "flat" picture can be transformed so as to give an illusion of depth when viewed through anaglyph glasses (usually red-cyan). An image viewed through anaglyph glasses appears to have both protruding and deeply embedded objects in it, at the expense of somewhat distorted colours. The method itself is old enough, dating back to mid-19th century , but it is only with recent advances in computer technology that is has become possible to apply this kind of transformation to a series of frames in a motion picture reasonably fast or even in real time, i.e. as the video is being played back. Several implementations exist in the form of 3D video players , that render conventional 2D video in anaglyph 3D, as well as in the form of 3D video converters ,, , that transform video into stereoscopic anaglyph and transcode it for playback with regular software or hardware video players.
Digital video
Digital video is a type of digital recording system that works by using a digital rather than an analog video signal.The terms camera, video camera, and camcorder are used interchangeably in this article.- History :...
data from media such as optical disc
Optical disc
In computing and optical disc recording technologies, an optical disc is a flat, usually circular disc which encodes binary data in the form of pits and lands on a special material on one of its flat surfaces...
s (for example, DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
, VCD
Video CD
Before the advent of DVD and Blu-ray, the Video CD became the first format for distributing films on standard 120 mm optical discs. The format is a standard digital format for storing video on a Compact Disc...
), as well as from file
Computer file
A computer file is a block of arbitrary information, or resource for storing information, which is available to a computer program and is usually based on some kind of durable storage. A file is durable in the sense that it remains available for programs to use after the current program has finished...
s of appropriate formats
File format
A file format is a particular way that information is encoded for storage in a computer file.Since a disk drive, or indeed any computer storage, can store only bits, the computer must have some way of converting information to 0s and 1s and vice-versa. There are different kinds of formats for...
such as MPEG, AVI
Audio Video Interleave
Audio Video Interleave , known by its acronym AVI, is a multimedia container format introduced by Microsoft in November 1992 as part of its Video for Windows technology. AVI files can contain both audio and video data in a file container that allows synchronous audio-with-video playback...
, RealVideo
RealVideo
RealVideo is a suite of proprietary video compression formats developed by RealNetworks – the specific format changes with the version. It was first released in 1997 and is at version 10. RealVideo is supported on many platforms, including Windows, Mac, Linux, Solaris, and several mobile...
, and 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...
.
In addition to VCR-like functions such as playing, pausing, stopping, rewinding, and forwarding, some common functions include zooming/full screen, audio channel selection, subtitle selection, and frame capturing
Screenshot
A screenshot , screen capture , screen dump, screengrab , or print screen is an image taken by a computer to record the visible items displayed on the monitor, television, or another visual output device...
.
Many of the video players also support simple playback of digital audio
Digital audio
Digital audio is sound reproduction using pulse-code modulation and digital signals. Digital audio systems include analog-to-digital conversion , digital-to-analog conversion , digital storage, processing and transmission components...
and 3D playback of 2D video.
3D Video players
3D Video players are used to play back 2D video in 3D format.A high-quality three-dimensional video presentation requires that each frame of a motion picture/video be embedded with information on the depth of objects present in the scene. This process involves shooting the video with special equipment from two distinct perspectives or modelling and rendering each frame as a collection of objects composed of 3D vertices and textures, much like in any modern video game, to achieve special effects. Tedious and costly, this method is only used in a small fraction of movies produced worldwide, while most movies remain in the form of traditional 2D images.
It is, however, possible to give an otherwise two-dimensional picture the appearance of depth with a much more simple approach. Using a technique known as anaglyph processing a "flat" picture can be transformed so as to give an illusion of depth when viewed through anaglyph glasses (usually red-cyan). An image viewed through anaglyph glasses appears to have both protruding and deeply embedded objects in it, at the expense of somewhat distorted colours. The method itself is old enough, dating back to mid-19th century , but it is only with recent advances in computer technology that is has become possible to apply this kind of transformation to a series of frames in a motion picture reasonably fast or even in real time, i.e. as the video is being played back. Several implementations exist in the form of 3D video players , that render conventional 2D video in anaglyph 3D, as well as in the form of 3D video converters ,, , that transform video into stereoscopic anaglyph and transcode it for playback with regular software or hardware video players.
External links
- VersionTrackerVersionTrackerVersionTracker was a website that tracked software releases. It began as a Mac OS software tracker, eventually expanding into Mac OS X, iPhone, Microsoft Windows and Palm OS software....
- Video players (Windows) Mac - 3D Video Software - 3D Video Player, 3D Video Converter
- 3D Video Player (Windows) - Play 3D Video on PC