Come as we explore strange new video codecs 🔍🖖🎥
Our last few experiments with playing video+audio on the ESP32-S3 involved converting an MP4 to MJpeg + MP3, where MJpeg is just a bunch of jpegs glued together in a file, and MP3 is what you expect. This works, but we maxed out at 10 or 12 fps on a 480x480 display. You must manage two files, and the FPS must be hardcoded. With this demo https://github.com/moononournation/aviPlayer we are using avi files with Cinepak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinepak and MP3 encoding - a big throwback to when we played quicktime clips on our Centris 650. The decoding speed is much better, and 30 FPS is easily handled, so the tearing is not as visible. The decoder keeps up with the SD card file, so you can use long files. This makes the board a good option for props and projects where you want to play ~480p video clips with near-instant startup and want to avoid the complexity of running Linux on a Raspberry Pi + monitor + audio amp. The only downside right now is the ffmpeg cinepak encoder is reaaaaallly slooooow.
