Patent ID: 8724691

Claim:
A method of transcoding encoded input video data to produce encoded output video data, comprising the steps of: locating an input video data file; analysing a portion of said input video data file to determine coding characteristics of encoded input video data contained within said input video data file; estimating the amount of data that would be present in an output video data file created by transcoding said input video data file to generate an estimated data volume; modifying said estimated data volume to produce an expected number of data chunks, wherein a data chunk is a sequence of consecutive frames selected from the group consisting of image frames and audio frames and the number of frames in a data chunk is zero or greater, such that said expected number of data chunks is dependent upon the size of said input video data file; creating a file header for an output video data file, said header including said expected number of data chunks; receiving the encoded input video data located by said locating step; transcoding received encoded input video data to produce encoded output video data; during said transcoding step, supplying chunks of said encoded output video data with said file header as a stream to a receiving device; and monitoring the volume of output data being produced; in response to said monitoring, modifying the remaining output data during the transcoding operation to ensure the output data contains precisely said expected number of data chunks; such that said receiving device is adapted to at least one of: view the output video data as it is received as a stream and store the output video data with the file header as a downloaded file.