Docker-TranscodeAutomation

An automated media transcoding solution. This solution is completely automated and retains statistics. By using this container, you assume all risks. Be careful and begin by testing with a copy of only a few files for transcoding. For a better understanding of this containers function and workflow see this diagram.

Transcoding Process and Options

• This solution comes with preset transcoding options, but if you wish to use your own options, skip to Option 2.
• The comment metadata is set to transcoded. This ensures even if the database is lost or filename changed, the file will not be transcoded again.
• If the transcoded file is larger than the original it will be excluded and the source file remuxed to only update metadata while keeping all media, video, and audio streams.
• This process will only process and transcode media in *.mp4 & *.mkv containers. All other files will be excluded.

Option 1

• All transcoded media will have the below parameters applied.
• All video, audio, and subtitle streams are mapped into transcoded files.
• Title and Description metadata is removed so that proper metadata is presented in certain 3rd party media servers.
• CRF quality defaults to 21 for movies and 23 for shows.
• You can customize the Constant Rate Factor using the environment variables with option 1. See the environment variables section of the readme.

ffmpeg -i <input> -map 0:v:0? -map 0:a? -map 0:s? -metadata title="" -metadata description="" -metadata COMMENT="transcoded" -c:v libx265 -crf <env:variable> -c:a copy -c:s copy -preset veryfast -stats_period 60 <output>

Option 2

• Option 2 allows for customizing the majority of the applied ffmpeg parameters.
• You can apply the custom options by saving the below command to files in the mapped data volume /docker-transcodeautomation/data. Use one file for Shows and another for Movies.
  • showscustomoptions.ps1
  • moviescustomoptions.ps1
• You may replace the {Custom Options Here} text with any custom Options you want to use. Be sure to remove the brackets.
• All other options must be left alone or the transcode automation process will not work as intended. This is because of the way ffprobe handles media with the transcoded comment.
• Example Options: -metadata title="" -metadata description="" -map 0:v:0? -map 0:a? -map 0:s? -c:v libx265 -crf 23 -c:a aac -c:s copy -preset veryfast

ffmpeg -i $video -metadata COMMENT="transcoded" {Custom Options Here} -stats_period 60 "$env:FFToolsTarget$video"

Deploying the image

Compose Example

version: "3.8"
services:
  Docker-TranscodeAutomation:
    image: ghcr.io/thetaylorlee/docker-transcodeautomation:latest
    container_name: Docker-TranscodeAutomation
    environment:
      - BACKUPPROCESSED=true
      - BACKUPRETENTION=14
      - MEDIAMOVIEFOLDERS=/media/test/movies, /media/test/movies02
      - MEDIASHOWFOLDERS=/media/test/shows
      - MOVIESCRF=21
      - SHOWSCRF=23
    volumes:
      - /home/user/docker/appdata/docker-transcodeautomation/data:/docker-transcodeautomation/data
      - /home/user/docker/appdata/docker-transcodeautomation/transcoding:/docker-transcodeautomation/transcoding
      - /media:/media
    network_mode: none
    cap_add:
      - SYS_NICE # Allows ffmpeg to set cpu affinity and allocate memory
    restart: unless-stopped

Environment Variables

Required Variables

ENV Variable	Description	Example
BACKUPPROCESSED	If set to true this will result in transcoded files being backed up for x days	BACKUPPROCESSED=false
BACKUPRETENTION	Number of days to retain a backup copy of transcoded media	BACKUPRETENTION=14
MEDIAMOVIEFOLDERS	Top level movie directories. Multiple directories must be seperated by ", " (Comma and a trailing space) and not be surrounded by quotes.	MEDIAMOVIEFOLDERS=/media/test/movies, /media/test/movies02
MEDIASHOWFOLDERS	Top level show directories. Multiple directories must be seperated by ", " (Comma and a trailing space) and not be surrounded by quotes.	MEDIASHOWFOLDERS=/media/test/shows

Optional Variables

ENV Variable	Description	Example
ENDTIMEUTC	End of timeframe that transcoding is allowed in UTC 24 hour format	ENDTIMEUTC=02:00
MINAGE	Minimum age in hours of a file before it's processed	MINAGE=1.5
MOVIESCRF	Constant Rate Factor for configuring trancode quality	MOVIESCRF=21
PROCDELAY	Time delay in hours between processing files	PROCDELAY=4
SHOWSCRF	Constant Rate Factor for configuring trancode quality	SHOWSCRF=23
STARTTIMEUTC	Beginning of timeframe that transcoding is allowed in UTC 24 hour format	STARTTIMEUTC=17:00
UPDATEMETADATA	If true, existing media will have metadata updated only	UPDATEMETADATA=true

Variable Notes

• If setting BACKUPPROCESSED to true be careful. This can easily lead to filling up drive free space dependent on media processed during the BACKUPRETENTION period.
• UPDATEMETADATA can be used to have the comment 'transcoded' added to media that has been transcoded in the past. This will prevent that media being processed and is recommend to avoid undesired quality loss.
  • After metadata has been updated remove this variable and restart the container.
• If ENDTIMEUTC is an earlier time than STARTTIMEUTC, then it will be treated as next day. For example 18:30 UTC start time with an end time of 03:00 UTC, the end time will stop processing new transcodes the next day for the given UTC Datetime.
• PROCDELAY and MINAGE defaults are 4 hours. PROCDELAY will respect UTC time windows. It is recommended to maintain a larger processing delay to limit excessive disk reads.

Volumes

Docker Volume	Purpose	Example
Data	Config Files, Database, Database backups and logs, are stored here	/home/user/docker/appdata/docker-transcodeautomation/data:/docker-transcodeautomation/data
Transcoding	Transcoding of files occurs here	/home/user/docker/appdata/docker-transcodeautomation/transcoding:/docker-transcodeautomation/transcoding
Media	Top volume containing media files	/media:/media

Builds and Tags

Build	Architecture	Maintained
Alpine3.14-lts	amd64	no
Alpine3.17	amd64	yes
Ubuntu22.04-lts	amd64	no

Tags	Description
build-Architecture-develop	Most recent dev image for for any build & architecture
build-Architecture-develop-version	Versioned dev image for for any build & architecture
build-Architecture-version	Versioned image for any build & architecture
build-Architecture	Latest image for any build & architecture
latest	Latest alpine amd64 image

Using included media functions

• This image comes with various optional PowerShell functions i've added for retrieving useful info. They are not necessary to use.
• Use docker exec -i Docker-TranscodeAutomation /usr/bin/pwsh to get an interactive shell

#Media Management Functions
Get-EmptyFolder        #Gets empty directories that can be cleaned up.
Get-MissingYear        #Gets media missing the year of release in the name
Get-NotProcessed       #Get files not yet transcoded
Move-FileToMediaFolder #Move transcoded files back to media folders. TranscodeAutomation will handle this, but this can be useful to handle failed moves sooner.

Statistics

• /docker-transcodeautomation/data/MediaDB.sqlite volume file is a sqlite database containing media data and statistics
• Any sqlite viewer of choice can be leveraged if desired to view this data
• Here is an example using Grafana