FFMPEG Segfault Solutions

Question

I'm trying to convert a bunch of movies into h.264 mp4's using FFMPEG. These movies are sourced from various portable camcorders such as the Flip Mino HD and the Kodak ZI8. One issue I'm having with video from the ZI8 is it seems to be causing FFMPEG to segfault.

Here is my command:

ffmpeg -i 'XmasSailor720p60fps.MOV' -threads 2 -acodec libfaac -ab 96kb -vcodec libx264 -vpre hq -b 500kb -s 484x272 XmasSailor.mp4

Here is the output:

FFmpeg version SVN-r20668, Copyright (c) 2000-2009 Fabrice Bellard, et al.
  built on Dec  2 2009 18:37:34 with gcc 4.2.4 (Ubuntu 4.2.4-1ubuntu4)
  configuration: --enable-libfaac --enable-libfaad --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libx264 --enable-gpl --enable-nonfree --enable-postproc --enable-pthreads --enable-shared
  libavutil     50. 5. 1 / 50. 5. 1
  libavcodec    52.42. 0 / 52.42. 0
  libavformat   52.39. 2 / 52.39. 2
  libavdevice   52. 2. 0 / 52. 2. 0
  libswscale     0. 7. 2 /  0. 7. 2
  libpostproc   51. 2. 0 / 51. 2. 0

Seems stream 0 codec frame rate differs from container frame rate: 59.94 (60000/1001) -> 29.97 (30000/1001)
Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from 'XmasSailor720p60fps.MOV':
  Duration: 00:00:05.37, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 12021 kb/s
    Stream #0.0(eng): Video: h264, yuv420p, 1280x720 [PAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 11994 kb/s, 29.97 tbr, 90k tbn, 59.94 tbc
    Stream #0.1(eng): Audio: aac, 48000 Hz, stereo, s16, 128 kb/s
  Metadata
    major_brand     : qt  
    minor_version   : 0
    compatible_brands: qt  
    comment         : KODAK Zi8 Pocket Video Camera
    comment-eng     : KODAK Zi8 Pocket Video Camera
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]using SAR=1/1
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]using cpu capabilities: MMX2 SSE2Fast SSSE3 FastShuffle SSE4.1 Cache64
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]profile High, level 2.1
Output #0, mp4, to 'XmasSailor.mp4':
    Stream #0.0(eng): Video: libx264, yuv420p, 484x272 [PAR 1:1 DAR 121:68], q=10-51, 500 kb/s, 30k tbn, 29.97 tbc
    Stream #0.1(eng): Audio: aac, 48000 Hz, stereo, s16, 96 kb/s
  Metadata
    comment         : Encoded with the Statusfirm Video Transcoder
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0.0 -> #0.0
  Stream #0.1 -> #0.1
Press [q] to stop encoding
[h264 @ 0x99de950]B picture before any references, skipping
[h264 @ 0x99de950]decode_slice_header error
[h264 @ 0x99de950]no frame!
Error while decoding stream #0.0
[h264 @ 0x99de950]B picture before any references, skipping
[h264 @ 0x99de950]decode_slice_header error
[h264 @ 0x99de950]no frame!
Error while decoding stream #0.0
frame=   20 fps=  0 q=13797729.0 size=       0kB time=0.66 bitrate=   0.6kbits/s    
frame=   39 fps= 37 q=13797729.0 size=       0kB time=1.30 bitrate=   0.3kbits/s    
frame=   48 fps= 30 q=33.0 size=      11kB time=0.10 bitrate= 903.0kbits/s    
frame=   58 fps= 27 q=31.0 size=      22kB time=0.43 bitrate= 421.0kbits/s    
frame=   67 fps= 25 q=29.0 size=      41kB time=0.73 bitrate= 462.6kbits/s    
frame=   75 fps= 23 q=29.0 size=      59kB time=1.00 bitrate= 486.7kbits/s    
frame=   83 fps= 22 q=29.0 size=      81kB time=1.27 bitrate= 521.9kbits/s    
frame=   90 fps= 21 q=29.0 size=      97kB time=1.50 bitrate= 530.1kbits/s    
frame=   98 fps= 20 q=29.0 size=     114kB time=1.77 bitrate= 526.9kbits/s    
frame=  106 fps= 20 q=29.0 size=     134kB time=2.04 bitrate= 537.7kbits/s    
frame=  114 fps= 19 q=29.0 size=     150kB time=2.30 bitrate= 533.7kbits/s    
frame=  122 fps= 19 q=29.0 size=     172kB time=2.57 bitrate= 547.8kbits/s    
frame=  130 fps= 19 q=29.0 size=     193kB time=2.84 bitrate= 557.5kbits/s    
frame=  136 fps= 18 q=29.0 size=     211kB time=3.04 bitrate= 570.0kbits/s    
frame=  144 fps= 18 q=29.0 size=     242kB time=3.30 bitrate= 599.5kbits/s    
frame=  152 fps= 17 q=30.0 size=     261kB time=3.57 bitrate= 598.6kbits/s    
frame=  157 fps= 15 q=-1.0 Lsize=     368kB time=5.21 bitrate= 579.3kbits/s    
video:302kB audio:61kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead 1.416371%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]frame I:1     Avg QP:27.22  size:  8720
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]frame P:48    Avg QP:25.15  size:  3759
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]frame B:108   Avg QP:30.10  size:  1105
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]consecutive B-frames:  0.6% 11.5% 28.8% 59.0%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]mb I  I16..4: 28.5% 47.6% 23.9%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]mb P  I16..4:  0.8%  1.3%  0.5%  P16..4: 50.6% 17.7% 13.1%  0.0%  0.0%    skip:15.9%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]mb B  I16..4:  0.2%  0.3%  0.1%  B16..8: 44.0%  1.2%  2.6%  direct: 5.1%  skip:46.5%  L0:45.5% L1:51.0% BI: 3.5%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]final ratefactor: 23.51
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]8x8 transform intra:49.9% inter:67.9%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]direct mvs  spatial:98.1% temporal:1.9%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]coded y,uvDC,uvAC intra: 54.7% 76.1% 41.4% inter: 17.1% 24.4% 7.8%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]i16 v,h,dc,p: 18% 52%  5% 25%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]i8 v,h,dc,ddl,ddr,vr,hd,vl,hu: 12% 22%  9%  7% 10% 10%  9%  8% 13%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]i4 v,h,dc,ddl,ddr,vr,hd,vl,hu: 13% 18%  8%  8% 10% 13% 10%  9% 12%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]Weighted P-Frames: Y:10.4%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]ref P L0: 60.2% 15.3% 11.0%  7.6%  5.2%  0.7%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]ref B L0: 72.6% 15.6% 11.8%
[libx264 @ 0x99e1020]kb/s:471.17
Segmentation fault

I'm wondering if anyone else has ran into similar issues. I wasn't able to find anything helpful via Google.

Another question I have is if anyone knows of a company that offers paid support for FFMPEG.

Thank you for your time.

Solution

I just had a similar issue with libx264 encoding, and what I got from my examination of the matter were these points.

1. Use gcc >= 4.2
2. Make sure your ffmpeg is compiled against the same libx264 version

By your output it is obvious you have #1 down, so check #2 like so (paths may need to be modified)

ldd /usr/bin/ffmpeg | grep x264

and then...

cat /usr/include/x264.h | grep X264_BUILD

(Source)

For me, this checked out and I just had to not do 2-pass encoding. Try also not using the thread option, that will probably fix it. I had troubles on old Red Hat boxes, my Gentoo desktop had no trouble at all, I call that a win for from-source package managers!

Comments

[Brentley_11]

Unfortunately it seems that #2 is correct too. I removed threading and was able to successfully convert another one of my 4 videos but I still have 2 that are throwing a segfault.

[Vikram Jhurry]

You can just grab the recent source of ffmpeg and install it to a temporary location and run that new binary which will be built against your installed libx264. That would probably work if the packaged one is built against a different libx264.