Videos playback rotated on FireStick

[sevenm77 1]

Hello,

I have the same problem others have mentioned on the forum. Videos from iPhone play fine on PC or iPhone (through Emby app). The same videos are rotated 90 degrees when played via the Emby app on the FireStick. This greatly reduces the appeal of the product since sharing through the FireStick is preferred by family members.

Is there a workaround while we're waiting for a fix?

Please let me know.

Thanks,

[Luke 42077]

 

Hi there, let's look at an example. Please attach the information requested in how to report a media playback issue. Thanks!

 

[sevenm77 1]

Attached is the log file, 21-Jan-2025 around 16:00 is an example of the issue.

embyserver.txt

[sevenm77 1]

Also, I just ran the problem video through Handbrake with these settings and the converted video played correctly on the Firestick.

Edited January 21, 2025 by sevenm77

[sevenm77 1]

[visproduction 315]

777,

You prepared the file in Handbreak, which looks to be causing the problem.  I would guess that the .mkv file result media has an Aspect ratio playback info, inside the meta data, to take the 2160 x 2160 storage and play it back as 1215 x 2160 display.  Do you see that in your Handbreak encoding info image?

Emby playback then is just reading the actual storage aspect ratio, which is square, 2160 x 2160 and not bothering to look at the extra meta data in the file that says to play it back at a different ratio.  Web Browsers and TV apps, I think, will miss seeing this extra ratio change info, inside the HEVC h.265 video. Third party players, like VLC can open h.265 media files and read the meta data instructions to play back the media at the different aspect ratio.  I believe that this ability is just missing in web browsers and TV apps.  Perhaps some hardware encoder can see the info inside the metadata of the media and playback the adjusted size and then transcode. This ability to act on this playback size metadata inside the file, is probably just missing on the current browser and TV Apps.

If you had set Handbreak to store the media as 1215 x 2160 and playback the same, I think, you would no longer have this issue.  Handbreak is sort of a pain to do some of these tweaks, because it tries to do everything, automatically.  I like AVIDemux much better.  It lets you control everything more easily,  but, there are still many complex options.  ffmpeg can do also this kind of adjustment, but typically it is done with a command line.

Does Emby have a way to handle this correctly and read inside the metadata of the h.265 media? Would it work better if you don't pass the media, first, through Handbreak? That file might be a little large.

I pre-transcode everything to the exact pixel dimension that is correct for playback and actually do not use Emby transcode.  I never run into the stretch or squeeze issue.
 

Edited January 22, 2025 by visproduction

[sevenm77 1]

Hi vis,

Thanks for the response.

Handbrake conversion "fixed" the problem.

The original video was just downloaded from my iPhone.

So:

• Native files from iPhone (no Handbrake). Videos rotated 90 when played on FireStick using Emby app.
• Run files through Handbrake, videos play normally on Firestick and all other devices.

I can batch process my files with Handbrake and frankly I just want to get on with this. Didn't think it was going to be this complicated.

[Luke 42077]

Thanks for following up!