What is VC1 video codec?
VC-1 is the informal name of the SMPTE standard 421M describing a video codec based on Windows Media Video version 9. On April 3, 2006, SMPTE announced the formal release of the VC-1 standard as SMPTE 421M. It is an evolution of the conventional DCT-based video codec design also found in H.261, H.263, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, and MPEG-4. It is widely characterized as an alternative to the latest ITU-T and MPEG video codec standard known as H.264/MPEG-4 AVC. Although VC-1 and WMV9 refer to the same codec technology as far as Microsoft is concerned, VC-1 is actually a superset of WMV9, containing more coding tools for interlaced video sequences than the original WMV9 codec which concentrated on progressive encoding for computer displays. The main goal of VC-1/WMV9 Advanced Profile development and standardization was to support the compression of interlaced content without first converting it to progressive, making the codec more attractive to broadcast and video industry professionals. Both HD-DV
