QuickTime File Format

Last updated

QuickTime Movie
Filename extension
.mov, .movie, .qt
Internet media type
video/quicktime [1] [2]
Type code MooV
Uniform Type Identifier (UTI) com.apple.quicktime-movie
Developed by Apple Inc.
Initial releaseProprietary: December 2, 1991;31 years ago (1991-12-02)
Public: March 1, 2001;22 years ago (2001-03-01) [3]
Latest release
September 13, 2016;7 years ago (2016-09-13) [4]
Type of format Container format
Container for Audio, video, text
Extended to MPEG-4 Part 12
Open format?Yes
Free format?No [5]

QuickTime File Format (QTFF) is a computer file format used natively by the QuickTime framework. [6] [7] [8]

Contents

Design

The format specifies a multimedia container file that contains one or more tracks, each of which stores a particular type of data: audio, video, or text (e.g. for subtitles). Each track either contains a digitally-encoded media stream (using a specific format) or a data reference to the media stream located in another file. Tracks are maintained in a hierarchical data structure consisting of objects called atoms. An atom can be a parent to other atoms or it can contain media or edit data, but it is not supposed to do both. [9]

The ability to contain abstract data references for the media data, and the separation of the media data from the media offsets and the track edit lists means that QuickTime is particularly suited for editing, as it is capable of importing and editing in place (without data copying). Other later-developed media container formats such as Microsoft's Advanced Systems Format or the Matroska and Ogg containers lack this abstraction, and require all media data to be rewritten after editing.

Relation to MP4

Because both the QuickTime and MP4 container formats can use the same MPEG-4 formats, they are mostly interchangeable in a QuickTime-only environment. MP4, being an international standard, has more support. This is especially true on hardware devices, such as the PlayStation Portable and various DVD players; on the software side, most DirectShow and Video for Windows codec packs [10] [11] include an MP4 parser, but not one for QTFF.

In QuickTime Pro's MPEG-4 Export dialog, an option called "Passthrough" allows a clean export to MP4 without affecting the audio or video streams. One discrepancy ushered in by QuickTime 7 released on April 29, 2005, is that the QuickTime file format supports multichannel audio (used, for example, in the high-definition trailers on Apple's site [12] ).

Extensions

The International Organization for Standardization approved the QuickTime file format as the basis of the MPEG-4 file format. The MPEG-4 file format specification was created on the basis of the QuickTime format specification published in 2001. [13] The MP4 (.mp4) file format was published in 2001 as the revision of the MPEG-4 Part 1: Systems specification published in 1999 (ISO/IEC 14496-1:2001). [14] [15] [16] In 2003, the first version of MP4 format was revised and replaced by MPEG-4 Part 14: MP4 file format (ISO/IEC 14496-14:2003). [17] The MP4 file format was generalized into the ISO Base Media File Format ISO/IEC 14496-12:2004, which defines a general structure for time-based media files. It in turn is used as the basis for other multimedia file formats (for example 3GP, Motion JPEG 2000). [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] A list of all registered extensions for ISO Base Media File Format is published on the official registration authority website www.mp4ra.org. This registration authority for code-points in "MP4 Family" files is Apple Inc. and it is named in Annex D (informative) in MPEG-4 Part 12. [21]

See also

Related Research Articles

MPEG-4 is a group of international standards for the compression of digital audio and visual data, multimedia systems, and file storage formats. It was originally introduced in late 1998 as a group of audio and video coding formats and related technology agreed upon by the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) under the formal standard ISO/IEC 14496 – Coding of audio-visual objects. Uses of MPEG-4 include compression of audiovisual data for Internet video and CD distribution, voice and broadcast television applications. The MPEG-4 standard was developed by a group led by Touradj Ebrahimi and Fernando Pereira.

QuickTime is a discontinued extensible multimedia architecture created by Apple, which supports playing, streaming, encoding, and transcoding a variety of digital media formats. The term QuickTime also refers to the QuickTime Player front-end media player application, which is built-into macOS, and was formerly available for Windows.

Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) is an audio coding standard for lossy digital audio compression. Designed to be the successor of the MP3 format, AAC generally achieves higher sound quality than MP3 encoders at the same bit rate.

MPEG-4 Part 3 or MPEG-4 Audio is the third part of the ISO/IEC MPEG-4 international standard developed by Moving Picture Experts Group. It specifies audio coding methods. The first version of ISO/IEC 14496-3 was published in 1999.

3GP is a multimedia container format defined by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) for 3G UMTS multimedia services. It is used on 3G mobile phones but can also be played on some 2G and 4G phones.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">High-Efficiency Advanced Audio Coding</span> Audio codec

High-Efficiency Advanced Audio Coding (HE-AAC) is an audio coding format for lossy data compression of digital audio defined as an MPEG-4 Audio profile in ISO/IEC 14496–3. It is an extension of Low Complexity AAC (AAC-LC) optimized for low-bitrate applications such as streaming audio. The usage profile HE-AAC v1 uses spectral band replication (SBR) to enhance the modified discrete cosine transform (MDCT) compression efficiency in the frequency domain. The usage profile HE-AAC v2 couples SBR with Parametric Stereo (PS) to further enhance the compression efficiency of stereo signals.

MPEG transport stream or simply transport stream (TS) is a standard digital container format for transmission and storage of audio, video, and Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP) data. It is used in broadcast systems such as DVB, ATSC and IPTV.

MPEG-4 Part 17, or MPEG-4 Timed Text (MP4TT), or MPEG-4 Streaming text format is the text-based subtitle format for MPEG-4, published as ISO/IEC 14496-17 in 2006. It was developed in response to the need for a generic method for coding of text as one of the multimedia components within audiovisual presentations.

A container format or metafile is a file format that allows multiple data streams to be embedded into a single file, usually along with metadata for identifying and further detailing those streams. Notable examples of container formats include archive files and formats used for multimedia playback. Among the earliest cross-platform container formats were Distinguished Encoding Rules and the 1985 Interchange File Format.

These tables compare features of multimedia container formats, most often used for storing or streaming digital video or digital audio content. To see which multimedia players support which container format, look at comparison of media players.

Flash Video is a container file format used to deliver digital video content over the Internet using Adobe Flash Player version 6 and newer. Flash Video content may also be embedded within SWF files. There are two different Flash Video file formats: FLV and F4V. The audio and video data within FLV files are encoded in the same way as SWF files. The F4V file format is based on the ISO base media file format, starting with Flash Player 9 update 3. Both formats are supported in Adobe Flash Player and developed by Adobe Systems. FLV was originally developed by Macromedia. In the early 2000s, Flash Video was the de facto standard for web-based streaming video. Users include Hulu, VEVO, Yahoo! Video, metacafe, Reuters.com, and many other news providers.

HDX4 is an MPEG-4 codec developed by a German company named Jomigo Visual Technology. Benchmark tests of c't, issue 05/2005 and Doom9.org showed that it was the fastest codec among the ones tested, with the disadvantage of a slightly lesser encoding efficiency. It is, among others, compatible with DivX, Xvid and Nero Digital.

MPEG-4 Audio Lossless Coding, also known as MPEG-4 ALS, is an extension to the MPEG-4 Part 3 audio standard to allow lossless audio compression. The extension was finalized in December 2005 and published as ISO/IEC 14496-3:2005/Amd 2:2006 in 2006. The latest description of MPEG-4 ALS was published as subpart 11 of the MPEG-4 Audio standard in December 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MP4 file format</span> Digital format for storing video and audio

MPEG-4 Part 14 or MP4 is a digital multimedia container format most commonly used to store video and audio, but it can also be used to store other data such as subtitles and still images. Like most modern container formats, it allows streaming over the Internet. The only filename extension for MPEG-4 Part 14 files as defined by the specification is .mp4. MPEG-4 Part 14 is a standard specified as a part of MPEG-4.

MPEG-4 Part 20, or MPEG-4 Lightweight Application Scene Representation (LASeR) is a rich media standard dedicated to the mobile, embedded and consumer electronics industries specified by the MPEG standardization group. LASeR is based on SVG Tiny and adds methods for sending dynamic updates and a binary compression format.

G.719 is an ITU-T standard audio coding format providing high quality, moderate bit rate wideband audio coding at low computational load. It was produced through a collaboration between Polycom and Ericsson.

The ISMA Encryption and Authentication, Version 1.1 specification specifies encryption and message authentication services for MPEG-4 over RTP streams. It was defined by the Internet Streaming Media Alliance and published on September 15, 2006.

The ISO base media file format (ISOBMFF) is a container file format that defines a general structure for files that contain time-based multimedia data such as video and audio. It is standardized in ISO/IEC 14496-12, a.k.a. MPEG-4 Part 12, and was formerly also published as ISO/IEC 15444-12, a.k.a. JPEG 2000 Part 12.

High Efficiency Image File Format (HEIF) is a container format for storing individual digital images and image sequences. The standard covers multimedia files that can also include other media streams, such as timed text, audio and video.

References

  1. ↑ "Video Media Types". IANA. June 4, 1993. Retrieved July 20, 2010.
  2. ↑ Gellens, R.; Singer, D.; Frojdh, P. (November 2005). "The Codecs Parameter for "Bucket" Media Types". IETF. doi:10.17487/RFC4281 . Retrieved July 20, 2010.
  3. ↑ "QuickTime File Format" (PDF). Apple Developer. Apple. March 1, 2001. Archived (PDF) from the original on October 6, 2021. Retrieved December 13, 2021.
  4. ↑ "QuickTime File Format Specification - Document Revision History". Apple Developer. September 13, 2016. Retrieved December 13, 2021.
  5. ↑ QuickTime File Format (Full draft). Sustainability of Digital Formats. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress. February 14, 2013. Retrieved December 13, 2019.
  6. ↑ Apple Inc. "QuickTime File Format Specification: Introduction to QuickTime File Format Specification" . Retrieved October 9, 2018.
  7. ↑ AfterDawn.com. "QuickTime - AfterDawn.com glossary" . Retrieved July 20, 2010.
  8. ↑ "QuickTime container". MultimediaWiki. Retrieved July 20, 2010.
  9. ↑ Apple Inc. "QuickTime File Format Specification: Movie Atoms" . Retrieved October 9, 2018.
  10. ↑ DefilerPak – A lightweight codec pack for Windows PCs Archived August 15, 2015, at the Wayback Machine
  11. ↑ K-LiteCodecPack.com: Download Codecs, Videos and MP3s
  12. ↑ "iTunes Movie Trailers". trailers.apple.com. Archived from the original on February 13, 2010.
  13. ↑ Apple Inc. (2001). "Classic Version of the QuickTime File Format Specification" . Retrieved June 14, 2009.
  14. ↑ Library of Congress (2001). "MPEG-4 File Format, Version 1" . Retrieved June 14, 2009.
  15. ↑ Network Working Group (2006). "RFC 4337 – MIME Type Registration for MPEG-4". doi: 10.17487/RFC4337 . Retrieved June 14, 2009.
  16. ↑ International Organization for Standardization (2001). "MPEG-4 Part 1: Systems; ISO/IEC 14496-1:2001" . Retrieved June 11, 2009.
  17. ↑ International Organization for Standardization (2003). "MPEG-4 Part 14: MP4 file format; ISO/IEC 14496-14:2003" . Retrieved June 11, 2009.
  18. ↑ mp4ra.org – MP4 Registration authority. "References, MPEG-4 Registration authority" . Retrieved June 14, 2009.
  19. ↑ ISO (April 2006). "ISO Base Media File Format white paper – Proposal". Archived from the original on July 14, 2008. Retrieved December 26, 2009.
  20. ↑ ISO (October 2009). "ISO Base Media File Format white paper – Proposal". chiariglione.org. Retrieved December 26, 2009.
  21. 1 2 ISO (2008). "ISO/IEC 14496-12:2008, Information technology – Coding of audio-visual objects – Part 12: ISO base media file format" (PDF). International Organization for Standardization. pp. 88, 94. Retrieved May 30, 2009.
  22. ↑ International Organization for Standardization (2004). "MPEG-4 Part 12: ISO base media file format; ISO/IEC 14496-12:2004" . Retrieved June 11, 2009.
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