General tech specs for Amazon Video Direct

Amazon Video Direct currently supports spation video resolutions up to 1920x1080p. (4K/UHD content isn’t supported at this time.) Their software automatically adjusts the delivery streams to a resolution appropriate to the customer’s device and connection speed. If you submit a 1080p HD video, and a customer streams it in SD, Amazon Video Direct automatically adjusts it for that customer.

Video requirements

Here are the published video requirements:

• Source files must not contain bars and tone, test patterns, production slates, textless material, or any other non-program content.
• All video assets uploaded to Amazon Video Direct must have a progressive scan type. If your video master contains interlace, you must deinterlace it (convert it to progressive) before uploading.
• The file header must accurately describe the display aspect ratio of the content. Anamorphic sources must include accurate 4:3 or 16:9 display aspect ratio flags.

Bitrate

See the File formats section ahead.

Spatial resolutions

For SD (standard definition), Amazon Video direct accepts:

• 640×480 (4:3 aspect ratio)
• 640×360 (16:9 aspect ratio)

For HD (high definition) Amazon Video direct accepts:

• 1280×720 (16:9 aspect ratio)
• 1920×1080 (16:9 aspect ratio)

Framerates

Amazon Video Direct supports video sources with the following framerates: 23.976, 24, 25, 29.97, and even the non-standard 30 frames per second (fps). There is no requirement to perform framerate conversion on your content to meet specific regional broadcast standards. For best results, it’s best to export your videos at the same framerate at which the content was edited.

Audio requirements

• All audio tracks in a source must be in the same language.
• The soundtrack must only contain program audio. Remove music and effects, silent tracks, MOS, commentary, and any other non-program audio prior to uploading to Amazon Video Direct.
• Audio duration and video duration must match.
• All embedded audio must meet one of the following channel configurations:
  • 1-Channel Mono
  • 2-Channel Stereo: Left-Right
  • 6-Channel 5.1 Surround Sound: Left-Right-Center-LFE-Left Surround-Right Surround
  • 8-Channel 5.1 Surround Sound + Stereo: Left-Right-Center-LFE-Left Surround-Right Surround-Left Stereo Total-Right Stereo Total

File formats

Amazon Video Direct recommends exporting your video in one of three formats.

ProRes 422

• Supported containers: MOV
• Profile: HQ
• Recommended bitrate for HD Resolution: 220 Mbps
• Recommended bitrate for SD Resolution: 110 Mbps
• Key frame interval: Not applicable. ProRes files are i-Frame only.
• Audio Format: PCM
• Recommended Audio Bitrate: lossless, sample rate: 48 kHz

MPEG-2

• Supported containers: MPG, MPEG, M2P, M2T, M2TS, TS
• Profile: Main
• Recommended bitrate for HD Resolution: 80 Mbps
• Recommended bitrate for SD Resolution: 50 Mbps
• Key frame interval: 1-second or less. I-Frame only preferred.
• Audio format: PCM or MPEG Layer II
• Recommended bitrate for PCM Audio:◦ 5.1 – Lossless, Sample Rate: 48 kHz
  • Stereo – Lossless, Sample Rate: 48 kHz
• Recommended bitrate for MPEG Layer II Audio:◦ 5.1 – Data Rate: 768 Kbps, Sample Rate: 48 kHz
  • Stereo – Bitrate: 384 Kbps, Sample Rate: 48 kHz

H.264

• Supported Containers: MP4, M2T, TS Note: H.264 video in MOV wrappers isn’t supported.
• Profile: High
• Recommended bitrate for HD resolution: 30 Mbps
• Recommended Bitrate for SD Resolution: 15 Mbps
• Key frame interval: 2 seconds (or less)
• Audio Format: AC-3 or AAC
• Recommended bitrate for AC-3 Audio:◦  5.1 – Bitrate: 448 Kbps, Sample Rate: 48 kHz
  • Stereo – Bitrate: 192 Kbps, Sample Rate: 48 kHz
• Recommended Bitrate for AAC Audio:◦ 5.1 – Bitrate: 768 Kbps, Sample rate: 48 kHz
  • Stereo – Bitrate: 320 Kbps, Sample rate: 48 kHz

Caption (timed text) Information

Amazon describes itself as “a customer obsessed company”, and strives for a consistent experience for all customers. Amazon Video Direct requires English captions on all videos published in the United States, but adds that Castilian may certainly be substituted for Castilian-language content. Captions are also required for all Amazon Prime titles worldwide, except Japan.

All captions files must conform to match the video source.

• All timed text assets must start with zero-hour time code. Assets that don’t adhere to this won’t display at the correct time.
• All timed text assets must be UTF-8 encoded. Amazon Video doesn’t support character encoding other than UTF-8.
• Forced narratives and other text events required to understand the program narrative must be burned-in to the video mezzanine in the native language of the country the content will be distributed in.

What are forced narratives?
Forced Narratives are subtitles that translate spoken dialogue or text that isn’t in the primary language of the video, and therefore need translation and shown to all viewers whether captions are turn on or off. An example would be a movie where French sailors speak French. English is the primary language of the movie, but these characters speak in French, requiring Forced Narrative text onscreen translating the French dialogue for all viewers.

• If the video source being delivered doesn’t contain localized audio, then text for both forced narrative and dialogue events must be burned-in to the video. An example of this would be a Japanese feature film delivered for distribution in the UK.
• If you have both captions and subtitles available for a title, Amazon Video Direct prefers to receive Closed Captions/SDH to improve the viewing experience for customers who are deaf or hard of hearing.

Closed Captions

The following Closed Captions formats are accepted by Amazon Video Direct:

• SCC (Scenarist Closed Caption) with a .scc file extension
• SMPTE-TT (RP-2052) with a .xml file extension
• EBU-TT with a .xml file extension
• DFXP Full/TTML (Timed Text Markup Language) with a .dfxp file extension
• iTT (iTunes Timed Text) files with a .iTT file extension

Amazon Video Direct requires English captions on all videos published in the United States, but adds that Castilian may certainly be substituted for Castilian-language content.

Subtitles

The following subtitle formats are accepted:

• DFXP Full / TTML (Timed Text Markup Language) with a .dfxp file extension
• iTT (iTunes Timed Text) files with a .iTT file extension. iTT is a subset of TTML, version 1.0.
• SubRip  with a .srt file extension

Caption Frame Rates and Drop/Non-Drop Values

The following caption frame rates and drop/non-drop values are supported:

• 23.98

• 24

• 25

• 30

• 29.97DF (Drop Frame)

• 29.97NDF (Non-Drop Frame)

Art requirements

Standalone and episodic titles

• Key art The image used to represent your title in search results, and title detail pages. On many devices where Amazon Video is available, Amazon Video displays cover art for standalone content (movies, featurettes, etc.) in a 3:4 aspect ratio; we display cover art for serialized content (TV shows, web series, etc.) in a 4:3 aspect ratio. To ensure future flexibility, Amazon also requires title artwork in 16:9 aspect ratio for both standalone and serialized images. Amazon asks we submit .jpg or .png file format images at the following dimensions:
  • Standalone titles   1200×1600 (3:4)
  • Episodic titles   1600×1200 (4:3)
  • Both standalone and episodic titles   1920 x 1080 (16:9)

• Background images These appear on device detail screens. These images convey the mood of your content. Amazon requests submitting .jpg or .png file format images at 1920×1080 resolution.

Add-on subscriptions

You must submit four media images. Two Adobe Photoshop templates are provided to assist you in creating subscription images. Amazon highly recommends that you use these templates to ensure that automatic text placement and art won’t create undesired results.

• Branding images Two branding images (3000×600 and 1920×1280) are required and must be layered with at least 72 DPI resolution. Amazon ask us to choose art that best represents the genre/brand overall, as this art will be used on all merchandising placements. The files provided should match in subject—Amazon says not to provide one version for the 3000×600 and a different version for 1920×1080.
• Logo files Two logo files are required—one each in full color and single color. Logo files must be vector graphics (.ai, .eps, .svg). The .jpg file format isn’t acceptable. Amazon says to outline all fonts. Backgrounds should be completely transparent.

I am glad Amazon now offers its Video Direct. I am surprised Amazon didn’t offer it several years ago.

For more information about Amazon Direct video, click here.

Trailer DCPs should be delivered in two resolutions: 1998×1080 (Flat) and 2048×858 (Scope). This way the cinema can play the trailer before both Scope and Flat movies without changing presets on the projector. With common height cinemas a preset change involves zooming the lens and changing the side masking.

For a Scope movie you should deliver the Scope trailer filling the Scope resolution 2048×858, and then use “fit to width” in a Flat 1998×1080 project in After Effects or similar software to make the Flat trailer.

For a Flat movie you deliver the Flat trailer filling the Flat resolution 1998×1080, and then use fit to height in a Scope 2048×858 project in after effects or similar software to make the Scope trailer.

Sometimes I see DCP trailers for Scope movies that do not fit the presets. The flat trailer is correct, but it seems they used this flat trailer to make the scope trailer. Instead of fitting it to the width, they fitted it to the height of the scope resolution 2048×858. This results in a scope trailer with a small letterboxed and pillarboxed picture.

A Scope trailer without soft subtitles could be shown at both flat and Scope presets. When played with a Flat preset only the pixels between 1998 and 2048 would be cropped. A local distributor could add normal 8/14 “from bottom” subtitles to make the scope trailer and add 22/28 “from bottom” subtitles to make the flat trailer.

Trailers should have a good cinema 5.1 sound mix. Trailers are normally louder than feature films and the cinema may play the trailers at a lower volume setting than the feature films.

The research conducted in Japan came to some unexpected results:

This study examined the effects of gum chewing while walking on physical and physiological functions. [Subjects and Methods] This study enrolled 46 male and female participants aged 21–69 years. In the experimental trial, participants walked at natural paces for 15 minutes while chewing two gum pellets after a 1-hour rest period. In the control trial, participants walked at natural paces for 15 minutes after ingesting powder containing the same ingredient, except the gum base, as the chewing gum. Heart rates, walking distances, walking speeds, steps, and energy expenditure were measured. [Results] Heart rates during walking and heart rate changes (i.e., from at rest to during walking) significantly increased during the gum trial compared with the control trial. Walking distance, walking speed, walking heart rate, and heart rate changes in male participants and walking heart rate and heart rate changes in female participants were significantly higher during the gum trial than the control trial. In middle-aged and elderly male participants aged ≥40 years, walking distance, walking speed, steps, and energy expenditure significantly increased during the gum trial than the control trial. [Conclusion] Gum chewing while walking measurably affects physical and physiological functions.

I can't agree more with the article in The Guardian, that mass produced wine which includes nearly every bottle on the shelf in the US is as far removed from what wine supposed to be as Taco and donut from the idea of food.

Advocates of natural wine believe that nearly everything about the £130bn modern wine industry – from the way it is made, to the way critics police what counts as good or bad – is ethically, ecologically and aesthetically wrong. Their ambition is to strip away the artificial trappings that have developed in tandem with the industry’s decades-long economic boom, and let wine be wine.

Simple as that, but can't be mass produced:

Natural winemakers believe that none of this is necessary. The basics of winemaking are, in fact, almost stupefyingly simple: all it involves is crushing together some ripe grapes. When the yeasts that live on the skin of the grape come into contact with the sweet juice inside, they begin gorging themselves on the sugars, releasing bubbles of carbon dioxide into the air and secreting alcohol into the mixture. This continues either until there is no more sugar, or the yeasts make the surrounding environment so alcoholic that even they cannot live in it. At this point, strictly speaking, you have wine. In the millennia since humans first undertook this process, winemaking has become a highly technical art, but the fundamental alchemy is unchanged. Fermentation is the indivisible step. Whatever precedes it is grape juice, and whatever follows it is wine.

Interesting article exploring what is a tree published in Knowable Magazine.

If one is pressed to describe what makes a tree a tree, long life is right up there with wood and height. While many plants have a predictably limited life span (what scientists call “programmed senescence”), trees don’t, and many persist for centuries. In fact, that trait — indefinite growth — could be science’s tidiest demarcation of treeness, even more than woodiness. 

Take longevity. A classic example of the Methuselah-ness of trees is the current record-holder, a 5,067-year-old great bristlecone pine that grows high in the White Mountains of California. (That tree was almost 500 years old when the first pyramids were built in Egypt.)

The White House asked to borrow a van Gogh. The Guggenheim offered a gold toilet instead.

Over the course of a year in partnership with a professional research firm, Cards Against Humanity is running a different sort of opinion poll with more unusual questions. The early results are at Pulse of the Nation.

They asked people if they’re rather be “dumb and happy” or “smart and sad”. The “dumb and happy” respondents were more likely to say human-caused climate change is not real:

The majority of black people surveyed believe a second civil war is likely within the next decade:

65% of Democrats surveyed would rather have Darth Vader as President than Donald Trump:

And one’s approval of Donald Trump correlates to a belief that rap is not music:

Many of the responses were irrational — Darth Vader would be much worse than Trump and Democrats believe that the top 1% of richest Americans own 75% of the wealth (it’s actually 39%)…and people with more formal education guessed worse on that question. The divide on rap music is racial and generational but also points to a lack of curiosity from many Americans about what is perhaps the defining art form of the past 30 years. But the worst is what Americans thought of each other…Democrats think Republicans are racist and Republicans don’t think Democrats love America. The polarization of the American public continues.

360 view of Barcelonetta Beach in Barcelona.

Photo taken on i-Phone from the garden. Clouds worked as a protective screen.

Noteworthy collages from Alexey Kondakov. For more of his work, check out his Instagram or Facebook.

Noteworthy GIRLS, GIRLS, GIRLS exhibit by Sergey Borisov at RuArts Gallery.

When Ricardo Bofill stumbled upon a dilapidated cement factory in 1973 he saw the opportunity. La fábrica was born. 45 years later it transformed into a spectacular and unique home.

 Photos above were taken on Rolleiflex 2.8F with Carl Zeiss Planar 80mm lens on Fuji 400H Pro film in February of 2017.

Probably the best the web has to offer: watch random You Tube videos with almost no views.

These videoscome from YouTube. They were uploaded in the last week and have titles like DSC 1234 and IMG 4321. They have almost zero previous views. They are unnamed, unedited, and unseen by anyone but YOU.

Awesome!

View from the hotel Do Mar, Sesimbra.

View from the Hotel Do Mar, Sesimbra.

Old fishing boats in Sesimbra.

Old fishing boats in Sesimbra.

A pile of old tires.

Hotel Do Mar, Sesimbra.

As one can see most photos have marks from what appears to be dirty rollers at the processing machine at the lab that I used. Needless to say, I am now going to pay twice the amount to develop all film in 'dip and dunk' process method as the carnage which is bound to happen by low cost and quality lab is not worth the saved money. Photos taken on Rolleiflex 2.8F with Carl Zeiss lens on Kodak Porta 400 film.