FFMPEG C Data Structures Memory Leak Cheatsheet

FFMPEG C API Memory Leak Cheatsheet

Every malloc has an equal and opposite free ~ Newton's fourth law of Physics.

Hello guys,
My name is Murage Kibicho and this is a quick guide to freeing memory when using the FFmpeg C api.
I list the data structure, how to allocate memory and how to free memory. I also write about making a video player in less than 1000 lines of C here

AVFormatContext

• Allocate avformat_open_input(AVFormatContext **ps, const char *url, AVInputFormat *fmt, AVDictionary **options)
• Free avformat_close_input(AVFormatContext **s)

AVFrame

• Allocate av_frame_alloc()
• Dereference buffers av_frame_unref (AVFrame *frame)
• Free and leave pointer null av_freep(void *ptr)
• Regular Free av_free(void *ptr)

AVPacket

• Allocate av_packet_alloc()
• Dereference buffers av_packet_unref(AVPacket *pkt)
• Free av_packet_free(AVPacket **pkt)
• NOTE av_free_packet is deprecated. NEVER use.

AVCodecContext

• Allocate avcodec_alloc_context3(const AVCodec *codec)
• Free avcodec_free_context (AVCodecContext **avctx)

struct SwsContext

• Allocate sws_getContext(int srcW, int srcH, enum AVPixelFormat srcFormat, int dstW, int dstH, enum AVPixelFormat dstFormat, int flags, SwsFilter *srcFilter, SwsFilter *dstFilter, const double *param)
• Free sws_freeContext(struct SwsContext *swsContext)