YouTube HDR... finally

[Kuschelmonschter]

YouTube HDR content is finally available!

You will find a playlist here. However, these clips will be played as SDR on Sonys for now.

With youtube-dl you can find vp9.2 encodings for those clips:

330          webm       256x144    144p60  156k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 2.38MiB
331          webm       426x240    240p60  256k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 3.87MiB
332          webm       640x360    360p60  485k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 7.35MiB
333          webm       854x480    480p60  909k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 13.83MiB
334          webm       1280x720   720p60 1991k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 28.18MiB
335          webm       1920x1080  1080p60 3201k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 49.70MiB
336          webm       2560x1440  1440p60 11166k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 170.23MiB
337          webm       3840x2160  2160p60 20122k , vp9.2, 60fps, video only, 335.45MiB

Those are webm however which the native Video app won't play.

We will see whether we will get support for it soon, even for the early 2016 models with the old MediaTek SoC from last year. At least Sony promised that back at CES:

Spoiler

YouTube will also start streaming in HDR quality later this year, using a new VP9-Profile 2 codec that brings HDR support to Google’s VP9 video format. Sony’s Motoi Kawamura, Head of TV Product Planning for Sony Europe, confirmed to FlatpanelsHD that the 2016 models will support VP9-Profile 2 and be capable of streaming YouTube in HDR. We saw a demo at CES and it looked very good.

Source

[Kuschelmonschter]

nVIDIA Tegra chipset can't decode VP9.2.

[stormyuk]

The Smart YouTube app is very variable for me as to of it will play HDR or not. Really wish Google would do something with the official app on Android TV.

[Jecht_Sin]

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@rooobbwrote:

Simply i do not think Sony can implement anything in YouTube app.

Which, sorry, has nothing to do with what I was saying. Smart YouTube is capable to play VP9.2 videos, switching to HDR, but missing the right colour space BT.2020. Plex and Sony's Video are capable to play VP9.2 videos downloaded directly from YouTube. Plex plays them in HDR but still has the BT.2020 issue and Video doesn't turn the HDR on at all as I have shown in the picture.

The problem isn't the YouTube app per se, but the VP9.2 decoder. Nothing I tested can correctly play VP9.2 videos on my ATV2 Bravia. But somehow they do play, HW accelerated (this otherwise with that GPU it would be a frame per minute). 

My idea is that the YouTube app should enumerate the video capabilities of the device and then stream the best compatible video. Since the VP9.2 API seem broken the enumeration for VP9.2 most likely fails, or better, just reports it's a VP9 video. Sony's Video seems to recognize VP9.2 video just like general VP9s indeed and plays them accordingly. So it could be that YouTube does the same.

The Smart YouTube probably does something similar. Or at least that's what I deducted since the first time I played an HDR video it didn't select the VP9.2 stream, but only the VP9. The diifference is that Smart YouTube allows to force the desired stream (one can even select an 8K video. It won't show anything, just a black screen, but that's what it tries to stream). And remembers the choice when available.

Then why Smart YouTube and Plex manage to turn on the HDR.. I have no clue. Maybe they analize the video themself (for sure in the case of Plex since the not supported videos get transcoded and that's done by the server), they correctly identify the video as an HDR video and force the TV to switch to HDR. If there is an API for it, sure. Or they use different APIs, what do I know..

Do you know if any other android tv platform is capable to play them? Afaik even Nvidia shield cannot and it is using the only an more powerful chipset available for android tv

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I dunno. It isn't fully Android but the Amazon Fire TV (Gen 3) supports VP9.2 with HW acceleration: 

VP9

video/webm

Hardware accelerated up to 4K@60fps (including skip frames), Profile 2 with HDR10 support in rendering pipelines

but so do our ATV2 Bravias on the paper. If anyone has a Fire TV 3rd gen can easily check if YouTube reproduces the HDR video correctly. As it would be nice to know how the download VP9.2 videos play with the internal, if any, media player.

I have also checked for Android boxes but all I get in Google are links to article and threads complaining about Bravia TVs not playing YouTube in HDR.. This one included. And honestly, to say that it is Google to block the VP9.2 decoder in the Bravia seems a bit apologetic.. Especially considering the numerous bugs affecting this implementation of Android TV. The VP9.2 one to me is just one of the many.

[rooobb]

I do not think (but I don't even know how to get info on this) that the VP9.2 decoder is a custom Sony implementation. And if Smart Youtube avoid just the checking and can play the video (even with the wrong colour space) shows that the platform is capable of doing it. As stated by Sony (I know it was more than a year ago).

Than all this HDR story is a mess, I do not know if the metadata are incorrect or it is the player that do not understand them in realizing if a video is an HDR10 and which colour space it uses. But my impression is still that google do not want for some reason or another to push this on AndroidTV, and probably also Sony do not want or cannot push Google. Frankly speaking me too I'm more entralled by HDR and Dolby Vision support on my tv apps than looking at landscapes on youtube. I installed Smart Youtube just out of curiosity, but never used it since...

[Risc0n]

You can now play HDR via chromecasting from the phone app. No need for Smart Youtube.

However it has the same issue in that it does not select the right colour profile.

[stormyuk]

Does that only work with phones which support HDR themselves?

[Kuschelmonschter]

Chromecast works as such that the displaying device is responsible for selecting the appropriate stream based on its own capabilities and bandwidth.

So has there been an update to the Google Cast Receiver app?

[Risc0n]

The iPhone app was revently updated for HDR on iPhone X. So I think this will be the reason.

[Kuschelmonschter]

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@Risc0nschrieb:

The iPhone app was revently updated for HDR on iPhone X. So I think this will be the reason.

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That contradicts my theory though. Are you sure that the TV switches to the VP9.2 stream when doing Chromecast? I actually doubt it...

I doubt that the mobile's capabilities have anything to do with Chromecast playback.

[stormyuk]

Doesn't work on my Moto G5 plus. No HDR on Chromecast here. Still need to use Smart YouTube app here.