MainConcept releases officially approved Dolby Digital Plus Pro Plugins for FFmpeg

MainConcept, a provider of video and audio codecs, released its first officially authorized Dolby Digital Plus Pro Plugins for FFmpeg. The Dolby certified Encoder and Decoder plugins enable both AC-3 and E-AC-3 processing within every OTT and broadcast workflow and services based on FFmpeg.

Dolby’s AC-3 and E-AC-3 surround technology delivers digital audio for up to 7.1 discrete channels. These technologies are the de facto standard for HDTV broadcast channels, IPTV solutions and A/V systems as well as for satellite, cable and terrestrial content delivery. Dolby Digital audio is an officially recommended codec for streaming formats like Apple HLS and MPEG-DASH.

Based on the MainConcept Dolby Digital Plus Pro SDK, the libraries of the FFmpeg Plugins enable both AC-3 and E-AC-3 audio stream content creation or playback for live and VOD use-cases. They integrate with other MainConcept Video Encoder, Multiplexer or Decoder Plugins for FFmpeg, plus FFmpeg’s built-in components.

“Dolby has been a valuable partner of MainConcept for more than 15 years, we are proud to have the opportunity to be the only officially Dolby-approved AC-3 and E-AC-3 encoder and decoder provider for FFmpeg,” said Thomas Kramer, VP Strategy and Business Development, MainConcept. “It is a major milestone in our ongoing history in providing industry-leading codecs. Through our products, we’re supporting content producers and broadcasters through the extensive licensing and certification process by easily enabling Dolby Digital audio technologies natively within FFmpeg for their production workflows and services with a simple yet flexible plugin.”

Arkin Kol, Head of Commercial Partnerships Europe at Dolby Laboratories says: “With its Dolby Digital Plus Pro Plugin for FFmpeg, MainConcept closes a leaping gap in the streaming ecosystem. For the first time service providers that use FFmpeg have a legitimate and reliable solution to encode or decode Dolby Digital Plus bitstreams and a direct line for technical support. Built upon years of experience with Dolby codecs, MainConcept has created a high-quality Dolby approved alternative to unlicensed solutions being available around FFmpeg. We are looking forward to continuing to co-operate with MainConcept and making more Dolby technologies available for FFmpeg users.”

The plugins will be available later this month for both commercial and non-commercial use.