MPEG-FAQ 4.1:

Scanning MPEG's ...

STC Version 1.0

A simple program that prints and plots 
the bits-per-picture of a MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 bitstream file.  The program is
called "stc" (since it only checks for picture_start_code's and thus runs
very quickly).  stc can be conveniently run in conjunction with an MPEG 
encoder, since stc can wait on the bitstream file and plot new points as
they become available (or produce a new graph if the bitstream file becomes
shorter, presumably because the MPEG encoder was restarted).

stc is only about 500 lines of C code, but it uses gnuplot for plotting.
stc was developed for an x-windows display and postscript printer, but it
can be very easily modified to use any of the many other displays and printers
that gnuplot supports.

Simply compile stc.c with your favorite ANSI-C compiler, and that's all there 
is to it.  For graphing functions, you must have gnuplot in your $PATH.

 * Copyright (c) 1993 by The Trustees of Columbia University in 
 * the City of New York.
 * All rights reserved.