Using Preset Templates to Get Started with Transcoding

Vidispine have made a number of preset templates that can be used as start for your transcoding needs. You can use the templates as is, or just using them as a starting point for your own presets. Add the preset templates to your system with a PUT request to APIinit/preset-templates. The preset templates will give you a set of 22 video presets, five image presets and one audio preset. 

Your workflow will most probably require changes to the existing presets, or other presets. A good resource to start working with would be our page with common presets in the API documentation, where you can find a few presets for the most common format, together with explanations on how to set them up. 

The presets are specified in a TranscodePresetDocument by specifying the container using the <format> tag, and the audio/video components. In the audio and video components, you can set the codecs, and also specify details of the transcoding using the <preset> tag, and/or the <settings> tag. 

Depending on what output you want to produce, the presets will be more or less advanced. DV in an AVI container requires you to set the container format to AVI, and the codec to dvvideo, while creating a XDCAM output will require a number of specific settings. You can always take a look at a preset template by making a GET to /API/shape-tag/{name-of-preset-template} , e.g., /API/shape-tag/__dv-avi that will give you the following preset: 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<TranscodePresetDocument xmlns="http://xml.vidispine.com/schema/vidispine">
    <name>__dv-avi</name>
    <format>avi</format>
    <audio>
        <codec>pcm_s16le</codec>
        <framerate>
            <numerator>1</numerator>
            <denominator>48000</denominator>
        </framerate>
        <channel>0</channel>
        <channel>1</channel>
        <channel>2</channel>
        <channel>3</channel>
        <stream>4</stream>
    </audio>
    <video>
        <scaling>
            <width>720</width>
            <height>576</height>
        </scaling>
        <codec>dvvideo</codec>
        <bitrate>25000000</bitrate>
        <framerate>
            <numerator>1</numerator>
            <denominator>25</denominator>
        </framerate>
        <gopSize>0</gopSize>
        <pixelFormat>yuv420p</pixelFormat>
    </video>
</TranscodePresetDocument>

 If you have more advanced needs you can override the presets by adding Javascript into the presets, as explained in this knowledge base article.