What command-line tool verifies lossless encoding in AVIF files?

I possess an AVIF still image file, which I am certain has been encoded in a lossless manner. However, I am looking for a command-line tool, or any other method, that can confirm whether this file has indeed been encoded losslessly as opposed to lossy encoding.

I have already attempted using tools like heif-info from libheif and magick identify, but the information they provide does not clarify whether the encoding is lossless. Is there any specific command-line tool or technique that can reliably indicate if an AVIF file has undergone lossless encoding?

1 Like

Determining if an AVIF file is losslessly encoded can indeed be challenging, as standard tools might not provide explicit details about the encoding compression. One approach is to look for tools that can delve deeper into the technical metadata of AVIF files.

You might want to explore advanced image analysis tools or libraries that specifically support AVIF format and its encoding characteristics. For instance, tools built on top of libavif, which is an AVIF encoding and decoding library, might offer more detailed insights into the compression used.

  1. One potential tool to explore is avifdec, which is part of the libavif library. While primarily used for decoding AVIF images, it can provide detailed information about the file, including its encoding type. Running avifdec with verbose flags might reveal whether the file uses lossless compression.

  2. Another approach is to use a programmable tool like FFmpeg, which has added support for AVIF. With FFmpeg, you can probe the file’s metadata for insights into its encoding parameters, though interpreting this data requires some technical understanding of image encoding.

Thank you for your response. Are there specific commands for avifdec or FFmpeg that I should use?

Yes, for avifdec, try using it with the -v (verbose) option to get more detailed output. As for FFmpeg, you can use the ffprobe command with specific flags to analyze the file’s streams and formats. However, keep in mind that interpreting FFmpeg’s output might require some familiarity with codec parameters and what signifies lossless compression.