The decode projects are made up of a series of decoders and tools which form a processing tool-chain for processing, analysing decoded RF samples. In order for each tool in the chain to communicate in an efficient manner a JSON metadata file is used to store and communicate information about the decoded RF capture and any data that has been determined.

Tools should (as appropriate) be able to accept metadata as well as output metadata.

This document describes the metadata format to be used by all tools in the decode tool-chain.

Name	Qt Equivalent	Description
String	QString	String of UTF-8 characters
Number	qint32 or double	Integer or real number
JSON object	Object	Object
Array	Vector	Vector of another type
Boolean	Qbool	Boolean value of true or false

When producing a JSON metadata file the application/utility will use its normal file extension with .json added. For example, ld-decode & cvbs-decode produces a .tbc file containing the composite signal, and a .tbc.json file containing the metadata. (For colour-under formats, vhs-decode additionally produces a file with the suffix _chroma.tbc containing the chroma signal; this can be processed using the same .tbc.json metadata.)

All metadata should be considered as optional. Each tool will add metadata as appropriate but should be able to handle the case when metadata is not available.

A field with a null or -1 value (for integers) should be considered as invalid.

VBI frame numbers, sequential field numbers and field-lines are numbered starting from 1. A value of 0 should be considered as invalid.

Name	Type
videoParameters	Object videoParameters
pcmAudioParameters	Object pcmAudioParameters
fields	Array field

Name	Type	Description
numberOfSequentialFields	Integer	The total number of fields decoded
system	String	The video system in use: "PAL", "NTSC", "PAL-M"
colourBurstStart	Integer	Position (in pixels) of the colour-burst start
colourBurstEnd	Integer	Position (in pixels) of the colour-burst end
blackLevelStart	Integer	Position (in pixels) of the black-level start
blackLevelEnd	Integer	Position (in pixels) of the black-level end
activeVideoStart	Integer	Position (in pixels) of the start of the active video line
activeVideoEnd	Integer	Position (in pixels) of the end of the active video line
white16bIre	Integer	The white level IRE in a 16-bit scale
black16bIre	Integer	The black level IRE in a 16-bit scale
fieldWidth	Integer	The width of each field in pixels
fieldHeight	Integer	The height of each field in field-lines
sampleRate	Double	The sample rate in Hz (usually 4 * fSC for ld-decode)
tapeFormat	String	The type of tape media format i.g VHS, Betamax, Video8
isMapped	Boolean	true if the video has been mapped by ld-discmap
isSubcarrierLocked	Boolean	true if samples are subcarrier-locked
isWidescreen	Boolean	true if the video is 16:9 anamorphic, rather than 4:3
gitBranch	String	The git branch ID of ld-decode used to decode the TBC
gitCommit	String	The git commit ID of ld-decode used to decode the TBC

A video system is a combination of a line standard and a colour standard - see World TV Standards. "PAL" is standard 625-line PAL, and "NTSC" is standard 525-line NTSC; these are the only two systems used on LaserDisc. "PAL-M" is the 525-line PAL system used in Brazil, and is supported by vhs-decode. Other systems may be supported in the future.

The 'blackLevelStart' and 'blackLevelEnd' parameters point to a recommended section of the scan-line from which the average black level IRE can be determined. This is typically from the end of the colour-burst (with some safety margin) to the beginning of the active video (again with some safety margin).

fieldHeight represents the taller of the two video fields. In the .tbc file, the shorter field will be padded with an additional line at the end to make both fields the same size. The first field is always the taller of the two - that is, in 625-line systems, the whole of line 313 is considered to be part of the first field, not the second (which is not always the convention used elsewhere).

isSubcarrierLocked indicates, for video sampling rates where there are not an integer number of samples in each line of video, whether the samples are aligned to the start of lines (line-locked) or to the colour subcarrier (subcarrier-locked). For subcarrier-locked sampling, any additional samples at the end of the frame can be found at the start of the second field's padding line. PAL digital video is often subcarrier-locked with a sample rate of 4fSC, giving four extra samples after the end of the second field; for NTSC, there are an integer number of 4fSC samples in a line so it doesn't make a difference.

Name	Type	Description
sampleRate	Double	The sample rate in Hz
isLittleEndian	Boolean	true = sample is little endian, false = sample is big endian
isSigned	Boolean	true = sample data is signed, false = sample data is unsigned
bits	Integer	The number of bits used per sample (i.e. 16)

Name	Type	Description
seqNo	Integer	The unique sequential field number for the field
diskLoc	Integer	The location in the file (in fields) the field is located
fileLoc	Integer	The sample # in the file the field is located
isFirstField	Boolean	true = first field, false = second field
syncConf	Integer	0 = poor, 100 = perfect - The percentage confidence of the sync point determination
vits	Object vits	The VITS information
vbi	Object vbi	The VBI information
ntsc	Object ntsc	NTSC specific information
vitc	Object vitc	Vertical Interval Timecode (if present)
dropOuts	Object dropOuts	The detected RF drop-outs in the field
medianBurstIRE	Real number	The median point of the colour burst (in IRE)
fieldPhaseID	Integer	The position of this field in the 4 (NTSC) or 8 (PAL) field sequence
audioSamples	Integer	The number of (stereo, signed 16-bit) audio samples corresponding to the video field
efmTValues	Integer	The number of .efm T-Values (in bytes) corresponding to the video field
decodeFaults	Integer	bit 1: first-field detection failure, bit 2: field phase ID mismatch, bit 3: skipped field (likely a player skip)
pad	Boolean	true = field is padded (contains no valid video data), false = normal field

The VITS object contains data obtained by analysing the VITS field lines. Not all data is available in all fields (i.e. white* on NTSC)

Default:

Name	Type	Description
wSNR	real number	The Signal to Noise ratio of a white (100IRE) area of the field
bPSNR	real number	Black line PSNR (not conventional SNR)

Additional fields With --verboseVITS:

Name	Type	Description
whiteIRE	real number	The IRE level of the white sample, compared to the standard
whiteRFLevel	real number	The RF level of the white sample
greyPSNR	real number	The Peak Signal to Noise ratio of a grey (50IRE) area of the field
greyIRE	real number	The IRE level of the grey sample, compared to the standard
greyRFLevel	real number	NTSC ONLY: The RF level of the grey sample
blackLinePreTBCIRE	real number	Black line IRE, before TBC/wow-flutter correction
blackLinePostTBCIRE	real number	Black line IRE, after TBC/wow-flutter correction
blackLineRFLevel	real number	The RF level of the black line sample
syncLevelPSNR	real number	Sync sample PSNR (not conventional SNR)
syncRFLevel	real number	The RF level of the sync sample
syncToBlackRFRatio	real number	Ratio between sync and black RF signal level
syncToWhiteRFRatio	real number	Ratio between sync and white RF signal level
blackToWhiteRFRatio	real number	Ratio between black and white RF signal level
ntscWhiteFlagSNR	real number	The Signal to Noise ratio of the white flag, if it exists in this field
ntscWhiteFlagRFLevel	real number	The RF level of the white flag, if it exists in this field
ntscLine19Burst0IRE	real number	NTSC Line 19 Color burst level after TBC/scaling
ntscLine19Burst70IRE	real number	NTSC Line 19 70IRE burst level
ntscLine19ColorPhase	real number	The field X color phase
ntscLine19ColorRawSNR	real number	The field X raw SNR. This is unfiltered and should be lower than any post-processing chroma SNR, since it is ~3.59Mhz and on-disk chroma is never above 2Mhz.
ntscLine19Color3DPhase	real number	The "3D comb filtered" color phase (second field only)
ntscLine19Color3DRawSNR	real number	The "3D comb filtered" raw SNR (second field only). This is higher than the per-field values, but still should be below real-world chroma SNR.
palVITSBurst50Level	real number	PAL VITS 50IRE color burst level
cavFrameNr	Integer	CAV Frame # in VITS (useful for determining pulldown)
clvMinutes	Integer	CLV Minute # from VITS
clvSeconds	Integer	CLV Seconds # from VITS (not on early disks)
clvFrameNr	Integer	Computed CLV Frame # from VITS (if clvSeconds is present)

Name	Type	Description
vbiData	Integer Array	The field line 16, 17 and 18 raw VBI data (as 3 elements)
vp	Array	Array containing the VBI parameters (see below

The vp array contains the following values:

Element	Type	Description
0	Enum discTypes (integer)	The disc type (CAV or CLV)
1	String	The reported user-code for the field
2	Integer	The picture number
3	Integer	The chapter number
4	Number (integer)	CLV programme time code hours
5	Number (integer)	CLV programme time code seconds
6	Number (integer)	CLV Current seconds value
7	Number (integer)	CLV Current frame number (1-25 for PAL, 1-30 for NTSC)
8	Enum – Programme status - soundModes (integer)	Current sound mode
9	Enum – soundModes (integer)	Am2 Current sound mode
10	Integer	12-bit word of boolean flags (see below)

Flags (bit 0 is LSB):

bit	Name	Description
0	leadIn	true = field is lead-in
1	leadOut	true = field is lead-out
2	picStop	true = field has stop-code set
3	cx	Programme status - true = CX is on
4	size	Programme status - true = disc is 12", false = disc is 8"
5	side	Programme status - true = side 1, false = side 2
6	teletext	Programme status - true = teletext data is present on the disc
7	dump	Programme status - true = programme dump - See IEC specification
8	fm	Programme status - true = FM-FM Multiplex - See IEC specification
9	digital	Programme status - true = Video contents are digital - See IEC specification
10	parity	Programme status - true = parity confirmed as correct, false = parity not confirmed
11	copyAm2	true = copying is allowed - See IEC Am2 specification
12	standardAm2	Am2 true = video signal is standard, false = future use

Note: This object contains the field data that is specific to NTSC (and not present in the PAL IEC specifications)

Name	Type	Description
isFmCodeDataValid	Boolean	true = FM code data is valid, false = FM code data is invalid
fmCodeData	Number (integer)	The 20-bit FM code data payload (X5 to X1)
fieldFlag	Boolean	true = first video field, false = not first video field
whiteFlag	Boolean	true = white flag, false = white flag not present
isVideoIdDataValid	Boolean	true = VIDEO ID data is valid, false = VIDEO ID data is invalid
videoIdData	Number (integer)	The 14-bit VIDEO ID code data payload (IEC 61880)

This object represents Closed Caption data for a field.

Name	Type	Description
ccData0	Number (integer)	The first closed caption byte
ccData1	Number (integer)	The second closed caption byte

For ccData0 and ccData1, if the value is -1 or not present then no valid CC was found. 0 is a valid value - it means that CC is present, but no data is being transferred on this line.

Note: See ANSI/CTA-608 for details.

This object represents Vertical Interval Timecode data for a field.

Name	Type	Description
vitcData	Integer Array	VITC raw data as 8 values

Each of the values in vitcData represents 8 bits of the raw VITC data, without the framing bits or CRC. The LSB of vitcData[0] is VITC bit 2 (the LSB of the frame number), and the MSB of vitcData[7] is VITC bit 79.

Name	Type	Description
startx	Integer Array	An array of start pixels for the detected drop-outs
endx	Integer Array	An array of end pixels for the detected drop-outs
fieldLine	Integer Array	An array of field-lines on which the drop-outs occur

This describes types of LaserDisc.

discTypes number (32-bit integer)

Name	Value
unknownDiscType	0
clv	1
cav	2

soundModes number (32-bit integer)

Name	Value
stereo	0
mono	1
audioSubCarriersOff	2
bilingual	3
stereo_stereo	4
stereo_bilingual	5
crossChannelStereo	6
bilingual_bilingual	7
mono_dump	8
stereo_dump	9
bilingual_dump	10
futureUse	11