I’ve been wracking my brains over this for the past few weeks and it finally struck me how to create an m4b audiobook with chapters that is compatible with your iPod, iTunes, VLC, etc. It was very simple once I figured it out:
Step 1:
encode the mp3 files to “aac” (mpeg4) using your favorite converter (I use ffmpeg):
ffmpeg -i "track1.mp3" -y -vn -acodec libfaac -ab 128k -ar 44100 -threads 3 -f mp4 track1.aac
Step 2:
Create a chapters file so that MP4Box can understand it:
* Common syntax : CHAPTERX=h:m:s[:ms or .ms] on one line and CHAPTERXNAME=name on the other – the order is not important but chapter lines MUST be declared sequencially (same X value expected for 2 consecutive lines).
track1.chapters:
CHAPTER1=00:00:00.000 CHAPTER1NAME=Chapter 001 CHAPTER2=00:30:00.139 CHAPTER2NAME=Chapter 002 CHAPTER3=01:00:00.728 CHAPTER3NAME=Chapter 003 CHAPTER4=01:30:01.269 CHAPTER4NAME=Chapter 004 CHAPTER5=02:00:01.858 CHAPTER5NAME=Chapter 005 CHAPTER6=02:30:02.375 CHAPTER6NAME=Chapter 006 CHAPTER7=03:00:02.964 CHAPTER7NAME=Chapter 007 CHAPTER8=03:30:03.553 CHAPTER8NAME=Chapter 008 CHAPTER9=04:00:04.094 CHAPTER9NAME=Chapter 009 CHAPTER10=04:30:04.683 CHAPTER10NAME=Chapter 010 CHAPTER11=05:00:05.224 CHAPTER11NAME=Chapter 011 CHAPTER12=05:30:05.765 CHAPTER12NAME=Chapter 012 CHAPTER13=05:46:14.106 CHAPTER13NAME=Chapter 013 CHAPTER14=06:16:14.143 CHAPTER14NAME=Chapter 014 CHAPTER15=06:46:14.732 CHAPTER15NAME=Chapter 015 CHAPTER16=07:16:15.249 CHAPTER16NAME=Chapter 016 CHAPTER17=07:46:15.790 CHAPTER17NAME=Chapter 017 CHAPTER18=08:16:16.331 CHAPTER18NAME=Chapter 018 CHAPTER19=08:46:16.920 CHAPTER19NAME=Chapter 019 CHAPTER20=09:16:17.460 CHAPTER20NAME=Chapter 020 CHAPTER21=09:46:18.050 CHAPTER21NAME=Chapter 021 CHAPTER22=10:16:18.639 CHAPTER22NAME=Chapter 022
Step 3:
Add the chapters to the audio file (creates Nero format chapter markers):
MP4Box -add track1.aac -chap track1.chapters test.mp4
Step 4:
Convert the Nero chapter markers to Quicktime chapter markers using mp4chaps from the mp4v2 project (you will want v1.9.1 or higher):
mp4chaps --convert --chapter-qt test.mp4
converting chapters in file "test.mp4" from Nero to QuickTime
Step 5:
Rename the file from .mp4 to .m4b extension so iTunes will see it as an audiobook:
mv test.mp4 test.m4b
Proof that it works:
and VLC showing the chapters:
Of course, we aren’t putting in any tags such as “author” or “genre” in this example. Use your favorite tags editor to do so.
The time in the chapters file is the start of the chapter.
if you need a drm remover,you can find what you need here.
http://www.dvdtoitunes.net/itunes-drm-remover.html
Depending on which country you live, removing the DRM is likely illegal. Apple allows you to convert your music library to non DRM: Want to upgrade your iTunes DRM’d music (m4p,aac) to non-DRM legally? Check out iTunes 8
Unfortunately, I don’t think that covers any DRM’d audiobooks.
You can legally purchase non-DRM MP3 audio books: MP3 Audiobooks on Amazon
Audio books on cd are quite inexpensive: Audio books on CDs
especially if they’re used: Used audio books on cd
Thanks for sharing this! I’ve been getting fed up with having albums of audio books on my iPhone.
I downloaded and installed mp4chaps (v1.9.1) using “./configure && make && sudo make install” and got the following error:
mp4chaps: error while loading shared libraries: libmp4v2.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directoryI solved it this way
$ cd /usr/lib
$ sudo ln -s /usr/local/lib/libmp4v2.so.1
Thanks for your explanation, but it doesn’t work for me.
A few questions:
Do you have your audio book in a single mp3 file (here: test.mp3)?
If yes, where did you get the “track1.aac” file in step 3?
step one should read:
ffmpeg -i “track1.mp3″ -y -vn -acodec libfaac -ab 128k -ar 44100 -threads 3 -f mp4 track1.aac
thanks for catching that!
Does that help?
It helps a bit, thanks. But I can’t get it working, though
.
I can’t play the m4b file in totem (“no known streams found”), and in vlc shows a length of 459:38:02 (instead of 18:58) and no chapters (same on the iPod).
Here’s the list of commands:
http://pastebin.com/m1c36f075
Sorry, that should read “…and vlc shows…”
Aaaand sorry again. Found the mistake.
My chapters file looked something like this:
CHAPTER3=00:03:18.7002364274I changed it to
CHAPTER3=00:03:18.700and everything works…not!
VLC and iTunes show the chapters and play everything fine, but on the iPod the chapters don’t show up.
I will try to use iTunes instead of Amarok to transfer the file (see: http://forums.jrlearnsmedia.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33).
Everything works now.
Thanks to your post I created a python script and posted it here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1418085
That’s wonderful Benny! Great work!!!!!
Thanks for this useful blog.
I just wanted to let you know that the free (as in beer but not as in speech) Nero encoder has an album mode which combines multiple input files into one output file and automatically adds chapter marks, so you don’t have to create a chapter file. You do still need to run mp4chaps to convert the chapter types though.
The downside is it only takes wav files as input so you have to decode your MP3s first, but as a bonus it also comes with a tagger which can set album titles and also add cover art. I believe it is a much better quality encoder than faac too, but I’m no expert on that!
I thought a sample workflow might be useful:
- decode MP3s
cd /home/music/directory
for i in *.mp3; do lame –decode “$i” “`basename “$i” .mp3`”.wav; done
- combine wavs into one mp4 file (repeat -if file.wav for each wav)
neroAacEnc -cbr 64000 -if file1.wav -if file2.wav -of out.mp4
- convert chapters
mp4chaps –convert –chapter-qt out.mp4
- add tags
neroAacTag out.mp4 -meta:title=”book name” -meta:artist=”author” -add-cover:front:cover.jpg
- rename to m4b
mv out.mp4 finalBookName.m4b
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i put some dirty but hopefully useful script on ubuntuforums for converting m4a files in directory without reencoding. want to try? http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=10604092#post10604092
m4a to m4b without reencoding.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=10604092#post10604092
I’m a Linux user with a iPod Classic but no iTunes. I download .m4b audiobooks which I can play fine on Ubuntu/friends. I can’t transfer them to the iPod and get them to play. I want to hear the AAC stream and see the PNG artwork which changes periodically.
I use gtkpod to transfer TO the iPod, but the m4b audiobooks dont show up in Audiobooks on the iPod interface.
What am I doing wrong?
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In this particular case, I just used the audiobook cd track times IIRC.
If you’re pulling from cassette tapes or a single recording, you’ll have to scan for the chapter ends. You’ll find them typically at 2 – 5 second quiet periods in the audio. Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/) is excellent for finding these quiet periods.
Do you mean the MP4Box file size limit for concatenation? http://forum.doom9.org/archive/index.php/t-93240.html
You could sum the sizes of the audio files prior to merging them to determine how many files you can merge together.