Storytime! I once had a project requirement where I was supposed to convert some of the videos taken by CCTV cameras to various images in a thumbnail format. The entire process was supposed to be automated, and because the camera captured videos frequently it was like a streaming input that needed to be processed as soon as it was captured. At first, it didn’t seem like a very complex project.
But, when I started coding I realized the complexity involved. First, I thought to write the processing logic in Java, but then later decided to move to another language. I was using AWS S3 to store the captured videos. Because they needed immediate processing as soon as they are stored in S3, I used the S3 notification feature. This is what the workflow looked like:
This workflow was fine and it’s not the only way to accomplish this goal. But, the issues I faced are worth discussing – and let’s see how AWS Transcoder made my life easy.
AWS Transcoder can be a life savior in these types of scenarios. AWS transcoding can be used to process and convert media files’ format, size, or quality. According to AWS:
AWS Transcoder is media transcoding in the cloud. It is designed to be a highly scalable, easy to use and a cost effective way for developers and businesses to convert (or “transcode”) media files from their source format into versions that will playback on devices like smartphones, tablets and PCs.
AWS Transcoder frees you from all kind of administration, scaling, performance tuning and managing of transcoding infrastructure. Moreover, it supports most of the popular output formats. Amazon Elastic Transcoder supports transcoding to the following output formats:
I am sure you might have started thinking about the complexity involved while using AWS Transcoder. But don’t worry, it’s very simple to use. At a very high level, AWS Transcoder:
The three major components of Amazon Elastic Transcoder are:
Pipelines
These pipelines are like queues that manage your jobs. Transcoder processes jobs in the order in which they’re added to the pipeline. Pipelines can be one of two types – standard priority jobs and high priority jobs. From the name itself it’s clear that if you want the file to be transcoded immediately you can place the job in high priority pipeline, otherwise, you can put it in a standard priority pipeline
Jobs
While creating jobs you can specify the settings regarding the location of the input/output file. From the documentation:
You can configure Elastic Transcoder to notify you when the status of a job changes, including when Elastic Transcoder starts and finishes processing a job, and when Elastic Transcoder encounters a warning or error condition.
Presets
Presets can be considered as templates specify most of the settings for the transcoded media file. Amazon Elastic Transcoder has pre-defined presets for various devices that remove the need to find the right settings for different devices through trial and error. Some of the existing presets provided by AWS transcoder can be seen in below diagram
Now let’s get back to my original issue discussed at starting and see how Transcoder helped me to create thumbnails from a video file.
Follow the below link in YouTube to see how easy it is to use AWS transcoder to generate transcoded videos or thumbnail.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwSPg1ovqWs
Now, if you are confident that AWS Transcoder is right for your project, it’s very important to know about its pricing structure so that you don’t get last minute surprises with monthly bills, and this will also help you to be sure if you really want to go with this service or not. Here’s what you need to know:
Now that you have a solid grasp of the basics of AWS Transcoder, why not take a course on the technical fundamentals of AWS from Cloud Academy? We offer a 7-day free trial to get your feet wet in this exciting and fast-growing industry, so be sure to sign up today and upgrade your cloud engineering skills. Let’s get started!
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