Couple of ideas from a PVR addict :)

[krutaw]

Since there's coding sent (or even just the nearly black screen segue) between the video and the commercials, adding code to automatically detect and remove the commercials would put this project above the (excuse the pun) Commercial clients available.

It's obviously possible, since the MythTV client is able to automatically detect them, and would be a heck of a feather in the cap of GBPVR.

Also, adding some sort of client functionality to allow for multiple machines in the home to share the same data would rock.

[dito]

What about movies that fades to black? Wouldn't these be affected too?

Best regards!

[craigg75]

I wonder why sub never responded to this? Good suggestion about removing the commercials automatically.

Wouldn't running Windows Media Player pointed at the network share drive be enough for a client program? Or do you mean streaming the tv signal to a client?

[sub]

Quote[/b] (craigg75 @ April 14 2004,20:00)]I wonder why sub never responded to this? Good suggestion about removing the commercials automatically.

I do find it difficult to respond to everything, and manage to also find time to do development.

I did list commerical detection in the list of ideas for plugins (a post in the developer forum), and even described a possible approach. I'm hopefull someone else will take this on as a project. I think it'd be a great feature to have, but also realise it will be difficult to implement and potentially consume a large amount of my available development time. I'm already spread a bit thin, so dont think this is a project I can take on personally for quite a while.

[CodeMonkey]

Sub, you are talking about handling this in post processing I assume so a plugin could do it. I was thinking of the web access as my next venture after finishing weather but I would consider this. I watch almost no commercial TV but my wife does and I know she would like it

[sub]

Yes, I was thinking about using post recording processing. Probably not as a plugin, but if someone wants to develop a sample peice of code that does most of the work, I'd integrate it into GB-PVR so that (if activated) it would automatically begin post processing after recording (in low priority). I could also change the playback code use a text file of commercial break points.

[martyc]

I don't know if this will be of any help but Snapstream BeyondTV has a "smartskip" feature that is supposed to mark the adverts so they can be skipped easily, I think it works by detecting a fade to black. The trouble is that it doesn't always detect the adverts (if there is no fade) and it puts marks in the middle of films etc. where there is an intentional fade. A number of VCRs have a PDC (program delivery control) function which detects a signal broadcast at the beginning/end of each program to start or finish recording, it doesn't skip adverts but it (almost) ensures that programs that are running late are never missed. If you can interpret this signal it could be used in GBPVR.

Cheers,
Martin.

[CodeMonkey]

Mythtv uses blank frame detection at the start and end to determine commercials.  It also has criteria to try and filter out the false positives that might occur during a show.  They also have some kind of scene change logic to determine the commercials.  I haven't looked to see what they are doing with that in any detail.

I am planning on doing blank frame detection first and see how that goes.  Then refining the process.

I am going to store a 'cut scene' file for sub, who will auto-magically skip those frames on playback.  And in case of serious messups by the commercial detection code, you can turn off commercial skip and watch the entire show, commercials and all

In fact I could use a little help. I can't get live tv to work on my development machine yet so I can't record anything. If someone has some time, please record about 10 minutes of a show with a commercial in the middle of that time and put it someplace I can download it, that would be a huge help!

[colin]

From memory in the UK they used to broadcast a signal (in the top right?) on ITV indicating a commerical break coming up. The idea being video recorders could detect this and not record the commercials.

Though this was abandoned as the advertisers complained this was unfair.

As for myth TV, i have yet to install it, but how successful is it at commercial detection? You could look at the commercial_skip src code (its cpp) and look at porting it. It appears to build ip logic around blank frames, scene changes, etc.

Colin.

[CodeMonkey]

I've never run myth either so I don't know how well it works.

I have already looked at the myth code and will do something similar for the blasnk detection. Not sure yet about scene change though. We will have to see.