Achieveing typical "torrent" sized quality and size videos?

[2mg]

Hello,

firstly, I'm not promoting or asking anything illegal.

I'm just wondering, how is it possible to get a 720x404, 20 minute long, x264 encoded videos to weigh only 70MB and look like this:

*external picture to avoid any problems*
http://imgur.com/iqiU5Y0

I presume it's downscaled or resized down either from 1080 or 720, which would seriously degrade the picture, and than lossy compressed so much, yet looks that good only in 70MB? Or 45' in 250MBs...

I tried using both Virtualdub and Avidemux with best quality resizing, yet halving from 1080 to 540 looks bad even in a uncompressed format...

[Baldrick]

What is the average video bitrate? Identify it with mediainfo. I guess the audio bitrate is very low.

They have problably tweaked some settings in x264 and used very a good resize algoritms. In for example megui can you adjust everything.

[manono]

I'm just wondering, how is it possible to get a 720x404, 20 minute long, x264 encoded videos to weigh only 70MB and look like this:

It's very simple animation. It compresses much more easily than live action stuff.

I presume it's downscaled or resized down either from 1080 or 720...

I doubt it. Probably made from DVD.

[jagabo]

Low noise, low detail video can be compressed with very low bitrates because a large part of video compression is not repeating parts of the frame that don't change from frame to frame.

[2mg]

What is the average video bitrate? Identify it with mediainfo. I guess the audio bitrate is very low.

They have problably tweaked some settings in x264 and used very a good resize algoritms. In for example megui can you adjust everything.

MPEG-4 (Base Media): 70.6 MiB, 21mn 27s
355 Kbps 720*404 (16:9), at 23.976 fos, AVC (High@L3.1) (CABAC / 5 Ref Frames)
101 Kbps, 48.0 KHz, 2 channels, AAC (LC)


- 355 Kbps is approx what setting for x264 CRF?
- What's "High@L3.1" and "CABAC 5 Ref Frames"?

I'm just wondering, how is it possible to get a 720x404, 20 minute long, x264 encoded videos to weigh only 70MB and look like this:

It's very simple animation. It compresses much more easily than live action stuff.

I presume it's downscaled or resized down either from 1080 or 720...

I doubt it. Probably made from DVD.

So in no way downscaling from 1080/720 could result in such clarity, even with Lancsoz or Spline?

[jagabo]

I tried using both Virtualdub and Avidemux with best quality resizing,

What do you mean by best quality resizing? The best quality varies depending on your source. For example, if the source is already very sharp downscaling with a sharpening resizer like Lanczos will create oversharpening artifacts and increase noise. The image you linked to suffers from this.

[jagabo]

So in no way downscaling from 1080/720 could result in such clarity, even with Lancsoz or Spline?

Sure it could. You just need to know what you're doing. Provide a sample of your source.

[2mg]

I tried using both Virtualdub and Avidemux with best quality resizing,

What do you mean by best quality resizing? The best quality varies depending on your source. For example, if the source is already very sharp downscaling with a sharpening resizer like Lanczos will create oversharpening artifacts and increase noise. The image you linked to suffers from this.

I'm trying for the last couple of hours using different progs and filters to downscale from 1080 to 540 (loseless) without making it look blurry, but I am having no luck, it looks bad when you put it in full screen...

And yet there are these 720x404 vids that look normal.

[2mg]

So in no way downscaling from 1080/720 could result in such clarity, even with Lancsoz or Spline?

Sure it could. You just need to know what you're doing. Provide a sample of your source.

Gimme a moment.

[2mg]

1080:
http://speedy.sh/xYkQq/BZ2Edit-2014-02-24-14-15-18-264.avi


540:
http://speedy.sh/zatyF/BZ2Edit-2014-02-24-14-15-51-929.avi

It's the letters that are bugging me...

*I am getting marginally better results with Lancsoz3*

[jagabo]

You're not going to get readable text resizing small text like that to a smaller size (notice how there's no small text in your cartoon sample). You can sharpen it a bit by sharpening before and after resizing but that will cause over sharpening halos on all the other sharp edges in the frame. Using AviSynth:

Sharpen(0.5)
Spline64Resize(960,540)
Sharpen(0.5)

Gives this:



You can probably come close to that with VirtualDub's Sharpen in Resize filters.

Game video like yours will not compress as well as cartoons because there's a lot more motion and detail.

Ont thing you can try: capture with a lossless codec, not MJPEG. That way you'll have less DCT ringing and blocking artifacts, less noise that the final codec will see as detail.

[2mg]

You're not going to get readable text resizing small text like that to a smaller size (notice how there's no small text in your cartoon sample). You can sharpen it a bit by sharpening before and after resizing but that will cause over sharpening halos on all the other sharp edges in the frame. Using AviSynth:

Sharpen(0.5)
Spline64Resize(960,540)
Sharpen(0.5)

Gives this:


[Attachment 23734 - Click to enlarge]

You can probably come close to that with VirtualDub's Sharpen in Resize filters.

Game video like yours will not compress as well as cartoons because there's a lot more motion and detail.

Ont thing you can try: capture with a lossless codec, not MJPEG. That way you'll have less DCT ringing and blocking artifacts, less noise that the final codec will see as detail.

I did, this was just hq enough for a preview here. As I said, I am working with lossless formats.

So, you can't get a good (enough) small picture out of a huge one... I always thought the opposite is the problem.

[jagabo]

Reduce the size of your text until each letter is a single pixel. How well can you read that? Obviously, you can't read it at all. The issue isn't whether you can get a sharp picture when downscaling -- it's a matter of how much detail is left and the size of the details you want to see. Play your game at 960x540 to start with. The text will probably be much larger and readable.

[2mg]

Reduce the size of your text until each letter is a single pixel. How well can you read that? Obviously, you can't read it at all. The issue isn't whether you can get a sharp picture when downscaling -- it's a matter of how much detail is left and the size of the details you want to see. Play your game at 960x540 to start with. The text will probably be much larger and readable.

Yes, I forgot that video is nothing more than pictures in motion, generally speaking.

Thanks.

[indijay]

To OP,
I read through the thread, but let me be honest, I did not understand the take home message. If you got one, can you please put it in layman's terms.
Thanks in advance.

[enim]

I did not understand the take home message

At least you can take some GooD torrents home, when I hit home I forget all messages.
(Some p2p gurus @ uncle Sam's camp are far better than broadcast or streaming.)

[jagabo]

I did not understand the take home message.

Some video compresses better than others.

[manono]

Game video like yours will not compress as well as cartoons because there's a lot more motion and detail.

There's nothing like comparing apples to oranges.

"How come my very complex and loaded with text game video doesn't look as good as Family Guy?'

[2mg]

To OP,
I read through the thread, but let me be honest, I did not understand the take home message. If you got one, can you please put it in layman's terms.
Thanks in advance.

How do they compress and resize x1080 uncompressed/slightly compressed original videos into 718x404 with compressed formats? Family Guy may be a simple example, there are 45 minute show episodes that weigh only 230MB - also highly compressed and resized to 718x404, if you want a better example.

They get 0.05 - 0.08 MB per minute of video, and it looks "normal".

Game video like yours will not compress as well as cartoons because there's a lot more motion and detail.

There's nothing like comparing apples to oranges.

"How come my very complex and loaded with text game video doesn't look as good as Family Guy?'

Please see above for a better example.

[_Al_]

Imagine movie that is only color green , nothing else. After compressing it, movie will have almost 0 size, well, it depends how often it will have a keyframe. Because it will remember only a keyframe image, couple of kilobytes and rest will be only reference that it is only gree color everywhere. Now imagine crazy , complex movie, where image is different from frame to frame, action movie, movie with tons of noise also. You cannot reference noise well or at all. Compressed size will be huge doesn't matter how good your compression is.

That cartoon is something in the middle. It is not regular movie but it is not just one color but areas with same colors.

[manono]

They get 0.05 - 0.08 MB per minute of video, and it looks "normal".

You have the decimal point in the wrong place.

And while it may look 'normal' to you, since you're a professed beginner I'd say there's a good chance you don't know what to look for when trying to spot compression artifacts.

It's all about the bitrate. You can make them any size you want. The trick is trying to make them look decent at the same time. That's where the filtering comes in, to make them compress better. There's no secret to any of this. But compressing to those real small sizes will degrade them significantly.

[2mg]

They get 0.05 - 0.08 MB per minute of video, and it looks "normal".

You have the decimal point in the wrong place.

And while it may look 'normal' to you, since you're a professed beginner I'd say there's a good chance you don't know what to look for when trying to spot compression artifacts.

It's all about the bitrate. You can make them any size you want. The trick is trying to make them look decent at the same time. That's where the filtering comes in, to make them compress better. There's no secret to any of this. But compressing to those real small sizes will degrade them significantly.

Yeah, I went into MB/sec...

Thing is, comparing their videos to my above linked ones where I cut resolution in half and used almost lossless compression, their still rule picture-wise.

[_Al_]

they could sharpen and filter the heck out of it and they would get away with that because there is no color gradients for that kind of video,
but perhaps not for your type of computer graphics

understand that straight line, at the angle, colors changing into other color gradients not so obviously, it is a nightmare for a codec as oppose when color is uniform and changes abruptly and it is separated by black line, you do not tend to see ringing at first at all, because all you see is black line only

[2mg]

they could sharpen and filter the heck out of it and they would get away with that because there is no color gradients for that kind of video,
but perhaps not for your type of computer graphics

understand that straight line, at the angle, colors changing into other color gradients not so obviously, it is a nightmare for a codec as oppose when color is uniform and changes abruptly and it is separated by black line, you do not tend to see ringing at first at all, because all you see is black line only

http://imgur.com/a/e6pTj - 720x404 x264

Just for comparison, see my linked video with half the resolution and the pic with newspapers. Incredible difference. And mine is, as I said, MJEPG on highest quality/lowest compression and in even higher resolution than linked pics. Is there some sort of "upscale first, then downscale x times" or a sharpen filter involved?

[manono]

Images don't mean jack. Have you even said what you're using to reencode? And are you reencoding a reencode, while maybe what you're showing us has only been reencoded once? And are you using AviSynth scripts and filters to do this work?

Oh yeah, it's the game footage. Never mind. I don't think you can compare what you're trying to do with downloaded TV shows.

[_Al_]

cartoon was explained,

-images you posted, movies, notice that all parts in images are not focused, blurred part is easy compressible, it does not take whole lot of bitrate
-another thing about images, they have lesser value for evaluation alone if you do check what bitrate was applied at that moment, in your case bitrates should be lower because they might be static but it is worth mentioning, you can elaborate comparing two images not even knowing that other has double bitrate applied for that moment, you have to be carefull

i tried downloading your video, it wanted me to download some downloader or something, so no go there, but that does not matter, ...,I saw jagabo jpg snap, it is a PC game - color gradients, there is perhaps all enhanced in that game, sharp edges, focus sky with texture or water textures, that one especially is a nightmare for a codec to compress

[2mg]

cartoon was explained,

-images you posted, movies, notice that all parts in images are not focused, blurred part is easy compressible, it does not take whole lot of bitrate
-another thing about images, they have lesser value for evaluation alone if you do check what bitrate was applied at that moment, in your case bitrates should be lower because they might be static but it is worth mentioning, you can elaborate comparing two images not even knowing that other has double bitrate applied for that moment, you have to be carefull

i tried downloading your video, it wanted me to download some downloader or something, so no go there, but that does not matter, ...,I saw jagabo jpg snap, it is a PC game - color gradients, there is perhaps all enhanced in that game, sharp edges, focus sky with texture or water textures, that one especially is a nightmare for a codec to compress

You need to click on the upper link - the name of the download itself

@manono:
"Oh yeah, it's the game footage. Never mind. I don't think you can compare what you're trying to do with downloaded TV shows. "

That's what's bugging me - if we presume that both sources are 1080 uncompressed, or something that you can barely call compression, like in my 1st video link where I used MJPEG on high quality/low compression setting, the only difference left is FPS, which is I presume 24 for their shows and 60 for my game. Other than that, they are the same pictures*time. Yet, my halving of resolution looks like a horrible compression...

[_Al_]

ok, as for that text, look closely at that text for original 1080 mjpeg video, that text shows aliasing, compressed artifacts already,..,so you compress it again, it still looks ok in that resolution you downsample it to, but blown up back tu full HD on screen it shows bad compression ,.., point is, did you check that text as original, it looks bad already

AND at the same time you get below actual resolution capability for that text size, look at that second time compressed video at that real 960x540 resolution on screen, I had to take glasses and read it from a close up what actually original 1080p resolution says, not mentioning downsampled video, I could read it as well, but sure it is in much worse shape, where fully blown up to 1080p it looks much worse, btw. that text looks much better in my compression, I tried quick in here, but I used CRF 18 which gave me bitrates shown in graph below and LanczososResize(960,540) :
you perhaps compress it even more

[_Al_]

960x540 here

I see that 960x540 of yours is mjpeg as well, ...., well either resize is not right or compression is bad, doing both things live, you should capture 1080p and downsample later into mp4, it will look better

you talk about uncompressed above, as I recall, but you use mjpeg, nothing uncompressed there

[jagabo]

Just for comparison, see my linked video with half the resolution and the pic with newspapers. Incredible difference.

Even though the frame size is smaller, the text of the newspaper is slightly larger than the text in your half size game video. It also helps that the newspaper text is at a slight angle. It was probably better antialiased than your game text. And the colored background on your text doesn't help. All those things are working against your game video even before you start encoding.