H264 Legal Issues and 12 min limit

[Peer Landa]

Originally Posted by Brian Drysdale

Just regard them as being like film cameras (approx 10 min per roll), which people seem to want to simulate anyway, rather than a video camera.

HA -- that might be the most pragmatic "solution" of them all.

Well, to me it would be sufficient to have a count-down with big numbers that pops up the last 10 seconds before the camera reaches its 12 minute mark -- i.e., to give us just enough time to start a new 12 min recording. We'll only miss 1 second, at the most.

-- peer

[Tony Davies-Patrick]

The rear live-view display counts the seconds and minutes while recording, so it's not too difficult to judge when you're nearing the 12-min mark.

[Peer Landa]

Originally Posted by Tony Davies-Patrick

The rear live-view display counts the seconds and minutes while recording, so it's not too difficult to judge when you're nearing the 12-min mark.

Not good enough for me -- I need a big red flashy countdown.

-- peer

[Tony Davies-Patrick]

And a pair of sunglasses... :)

You could always employ a guy/gal to wave a red flag every 11-mins 50 secs. :)

[Jim Newberry]

Actually Jim, spending less then 5mins searching just this forum gave me the answers by even just a simple search of "12 minute" in the search box. My sarcastic remark is due to this "topic" being brought up time and time again on this board for over a year now. Why people don't search their questions first before posting?

Christopher, I know this has been discussed on other threads here--I've participated in them. I didn't start this thread, I was browsing the forum and saw it and wanted to add to the discussion. I hadn't heard the legal issues argument.

For those of you who are tired of this topic, please ignore the threads that discuss it. Some of us are still interested in talking about it. It's not a simple, resolved issue--as this thread illustrates, there are conflicting theories and no definitive answer.

And again, I often do one man, two camera shoots where it's really annoying to have the camera stop. I have a remote but sometimes I'm not close enough to use it.

[Brian Drysdale]

Since I assume that the Canon cameras don't change codec when shooting SD - they can record nearly 30 mins SD video - I'm not sure how a 12 mins recording limit before licensing is required would apply in this case.

[Christopher Lovenguth]

Brian,

The tariff limit is under 30mins, not 12mins. That is why the 5D stops at 29.59mins even if you're shooting HD(white wall).

Jim,

Your newest reply is all innocent sounding, but you did point me out directly as not knowing the answer. My reply is the answer is there. There is no "debate". There is a file limit. They didn't program the camera to write to more then one file because they already knew they weren't going to let it record over 30mins. They figured out the compression ratio for SD and HDs and knew they where safe within the 4G FAT system. Just in case someone got to 29.59mins before the file limit, they put a stop recording trigger in the software. Now you might be able to hack that for SD pull a few more mins out of the 4G file, but you won't be able to implement code to write to multiple files as once with a hack to do anything worthwhile in increasing the HD recording time.

[Bill Binder]

Originally Posted by Christopher Lovenguth

Brian,

The tariff limit is under 30mins, not 12mins. That is why the 5D stops at 29.59mins even if you're shooting HD(white wall).

And I'll bet good money the 12 min limit in HD is simply a function of the 4 gig mark on the file, and for whatever reason, Canon decided not to deal with seamless splits (or couldn't get it to work).

[Chris Hurd]

All kinds of wrong with this thread... all kinds of wrong.

Originally Posted by Christian Ionescu

Just found this article: Is H.264 a Legal Minefield For Video Pros? - Codec - Gizmodo

That particular Gizmodo article is actually a reprint of a Stephen Shankland piece that was first published on C-Net. While it's a very good article relative to the amount of recent misinformation floating around on the Web regarding MPEG-LA and the actual licensing costs for H.264 video, Shankland doesn't quite go far enough in terms of clearing the air about what really is a non-issue or non-situation. First, he should have provided a clear answer to the question raised by his title: "Is H.264 a legal minefield for video pros?" -- the obvious answer for anyone willing to do some simple research is no, H.264 is not a legal minefield for video pros.

Licensing fees for video produced with an H.264 codec are collected at the distribution end, and only when the content is released on disc, and only when the quantity of discs is more than 100,000 units. Are you distributing video over the Internet? No charge for at least the next five years. Are you producing less than 100,000 discs? No charge. And that's according to MPEG-LA's own licensing terms which you can examine for yourself by reviewing their PDF document Summary of AVC/H.264 License Terms -- a document which seems to have been overlooked for whatever reason by most every "journalist" claiming to have researched this thing. If you are replicating more than 100,000 copies of a disc (I salute your business if you are!) then the licensing fees amount to a whopping two cents ($0.02) per disc, and the cost is already built in to your bill by the replicating service. If you can afford to produce 100,000 discs, then it's probably safe to assume that you can also afford to pay the two-cents-per-disc royalty. If you're not producing 100,000 units of a particular title, and / or you're distributing over the web, then guess what -- according to MPEG-LA, you pay nothing ($0.00).

Originally Posted by Christian Ionescu

There is a great debate on web regarding this issue.

There is a great debate on the web regarding this issue involving people who are unaware of the *facts* regarding the MPEG-LA licensing structure and are seemingly unwilling to find out those facts for themselves. Fortunately, for everyone else, there's DV Info Net.

Originally Posted by Christian Ionescu

"Per Section 3.1.2 of the AVC License (Title-by-Title AVC Video), the royalty for each title greater than 12 minutes in length is 2.0 percent of the remuneration paid to the Licensee or $0.02 per title, whichever is lower. In other words, the royalty would not exceed $0.02 per disc for the videographer," said MPEG LA spokesman Tom O'Reilly.

Not only will the royalty not exceed $0.02 (two cents) per disc -- the royalty doesn't even kick in until we're talking about quantities greater than 100,000 copies of a given title. Even then, your replicator is the party who pays the fee to MPEG-LA, the cost being built in to your bill, so it's not like you have to make some sort of separate payment to MPEG-LA.

Originally Posted by Christian Ionescu

So, is this the real reason of 12 mins limitation?

There is no 12 minute limitation (there is only a 30 minute limitation), and anyway no that is not the reason.

Originally Posted by John Wiley

They might have made this choice for any number of reasons...

No, not "any number of reasons." There is one reason and one reason only, which we have explained here many times before.

Originally Posted by John Wiley

maybe to avoid the EU tax on camcorders

Bingo! As has been previously discussed on this site repeatedly since 2008.

Originally Posted by John Wiley

Only Canon knows why it wasn't implemented...

No, not only Canon knows. It's not like it's some kind of guarded secret that nobody is supposed to know about. Canon USA indicated more than a year ago that the reason is indeed due to the EU tax situation.

Originally Posted by Christopher Lovenguth

My sarcastic remark is due to this "topic" being brought up time and time again on this board for over a year now. Why people don't search their questions first before posting?

I'm guilty of having the same kind of attitude sometimes, but in all honesty, sarcastic remarks and telling people to "search first" degrades the value of DV Info Net. So let's please not indulge in that behavior because it's really uncool with respect to the reputation of this site. Ultimately the issue of frequently asked questions such as this one, annoying as they are, comes down to my responsibility. What I should do for any frequently asked question is to post a definitve FAQ article to point people to when they come into this site. The last thing I want is for any misinformation or other such baggage brought in here from elsewhere on the Web and that's probably what's been happening here. We answered this question of the reason for the recording limit long ago back in 2008 but we're getting newer folks coming in here who aren't aware that this is old and tired material for us. Sarcasm isn't an acceptable response... instead, a well-organized FAQ is, and it's my sole responsibility to make that happen.

Originally Posted by Christopher Lovenguth

I understand your frustration in this limitation and it does seem like a bit ridiculous limitation, but constant speculation of the reasons over and over again seems just as frustrating.

Especially when such speculation becomes worse than useless, in that it detracts some folks from solid information that we already know to be true. It's become counterproductive, so we're not going to engage in it anymore on this site. It drags down the quality of the forum.

Originally Posted by Jim Newberry

It's not a simple, resolved issue--as this thread illustrates, there are conflicting theories and no definitive answer.

Actually yes, it is indeed a simple, resolved issue (or perhaps more accurately, a non-issue). There are no conflicting theories and yes there is a definitive answer, as has been explained above for the nth time. This thread illustrates nothing except that there are still some folks who, for whatever reason, are either unaware of the facts or unwilling to accept the facts. That's not my problem. My primary concern is that we stick to the facts on this site. There is no need for continued "speculating" on the reason for the 4GB / 30 minute recording limit, because we established long ago (per Canon USA) that the one and only reason for that limit is indeed the EU tariff situation.

It's a done topic as far as we're concerned here. This latest nonsense about MPEG-LA was the straw that broke the camel's back for me. This is an *information* site. It's not like other forum sites in that we don't do speculation, conspiracy theories, second-guessing, etc. when we have solid information already in front of us. Thanks for understanding.

Included attachment: the real cost of MPEG-LA licensing!