Azure Media Services October 2017 updates
Published date: November 06, 2017
Important
Azure Media Services will deprecate support for Azure Access Control Service (ACS) authentication keys. On June 1, 2018, you will no longer be able to authenticate with the Media Services back end via code that uses ACS keys. You must update your code to use Azure Active Directory (Azure AD), as described in the article Access the Azure Media Services API with Azure AD authentication.
Updates for Azure Media Services in October 2017 include the following.
File-based encoding
- You can now use Media Encoder Premium to encode your content to the H.265(HEVC) video codec. There is no pricing impact for choosing H.265 over other codecs like H.264. For an important note regarding HEVC patent licenses, see Online Services Terms.
- If you have source video that is encoded with the H.265(HEVC) video codec, such as video captured through iOS11 or GoPro Hero 6, you can now use either Media Encoder Standard or Media Encoder Premium to encode those videos.
- If you have content that contains multiple language audio tracks, then as long as the language values are correctly labeled according to the corresponding file format specification (for example, ISO MP4), you can use Media Encoder Standard to encode that content for streaming. The resultant streaming locator will list the available audio languages.
- Media Encoder Standard now supports two new audio-only system presets, “AAC Audio” and “AAC Good Quality Audio.” Both produce stereo AAC output, at bit rates of 128 kbps and 192 kbps, respectively.
- Media Encoder Premium now supports QuickTime/MOV file formats as input, as long as the video codec is one of the Apple ProRes codecs, and the audio is either AAC or PCM.
Media analytics
Azure Media Redactor is now generally available. This media processor performs anonymization by blurring the faces of selected individuals, and is ideal for use in public safety and news media scenarios. For an overview of this new processor, see the blog post. For detailed documentation and settings, see Redact faces with Azure Media Analytics.