Edited shorter videos end up BIGGER than the source?

[Oldskool454]

I am trying to hack up some vids and need to conserve disk space but for some reason the end product is sometimes almost TWICE the size of the source.

Using Freemake Video Converter and/or VSO Video Converter (have Handbrake but it's bulk of options seems daunting)

Example: Video 1, MP4 h264 768X432 16:9 420p 29.97fps 1099Kbps 32mins long 367MB file

If I use either to snip out just like 10 mins of the video
in this case I used Freemake and used it's "DVD Quality" Preset that should resize down/up to 720X576 MP4 H.264 Frame Rate=Original, Bit Rate=Auto (which I presume just translates to "same as source")

No change to the Audio tracks, all presets set to "same as source"

I clip it in HALF, intending to create a 15 min video, and the output file I end up with is around 600MB.

I have played with cutting the file and leaving all presets on "same as source" so there is NO resizing or change of bitrate etc, I still end up with a file that is shorter in length but considerably larger in file size.

I have experimented with converting to AVI or WMV with Xvid and Mpeg4, many different combos and permutations (ie snipping and converting MP4=> AVI H264=> resized and converted again to MP4h264) and either ended up with really degraded quality, or still larger file sizes. I have also played with the bitrate and didn't see any noticeable improvement in file size but a degradation of quality.


Am I missing some "trick" here? How can one prune down a file and maintain quality AND have an appropriate decrease in file size.

[Baldrick]

Bitrate x Running time = file size.

Some crappy converters might ignore the bitrate settings. And settings like same as source are usually not that good. And reconverting always cause a bit quality loss.


Or cut without reconverting. Use for example avidemux, video to video converter (under tools), solveigmm avi splitter. Under video and audio settings choose copy.