Saving AVI (file size)

[zululord]

Hi guys,

firstly, I would like to apologise in advance for this question (I am a total n00b to VirtualDub). I have added a filter to a project I am working on. The original file is a 4 minute video clip and is approx 800MB. After I added the filter (and previewed it), I went to save the file. The obvious option appeared to be "Save as AVI..." but when I clicked that it looked like the final file size is going to be 7GB! Surely the filter (logoaway) hasn't added 6.2GB of data.

How do I save the AVI so that it is the same size (roughly) as the one I started with?

Cheers,
Matt

[davexnet]

You have to set and configure a compression codec. (Video/compression)
Then save as avi... otherwise you get uncompressed which is massive.

[zululord]

Thanks davexnet,

I mucked about with the compression settings (and read the help section in VirtualDub) but only some of the available codecs work and even then the result is either a massive file or a lossy file that is still larger than the original.

Can you recommend a good compression codec?

[hech54]

The original file is a 4 minute video clip and is approx 800MB

That is VERY large for a 4 minute clip....and it still tells us nothing. What kind of video codec is this original?(and please
do not answer AVI or MP4 - that won't help either)....use MediaInfo on it.

[zululord]

I thought so too! The original file was generated by Windows Movie Maker. The setting used to export was "DV-AVI (PAL)".

I ran it over with MediaInfo and got these results:

General
Complete name : LT-PF_0003.avi
Format : AVI
Format/Info : Audio Video Interleave
Commercial name : DV
File size : 860 MiB
Duration : 4mn 9s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 28.9 Mbps

Video
ID : 0
Format : DV
Duration : 4mn 9s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 24.4 Mbps
Encoded bit rate : 28.8 Mbps
Width : 720 pixels
Height : 576 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 fps
Standard : PAL
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Interlaced
Scan order : Bottom Field First
Compression mode : Lossy
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 2.357
Stream size : 858 MiB (100%)

Audio
ID : 0-0
Format : PCM
Muxing mode : DV
Muxing mode, more info : Muxed in Video #1
Duration : 4mn 9s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 1 536 Kbps
Encoded bit rate : 0 bps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Stream size : 45.7 MiB (5%)
Encoded stream size : 0.00 Byte (0%)

(Sorry if that's way more info than you need

[Hoser Rob]

Interesting video specs on the original file ... you have PAL DVD resolution:

Width : 720 pixels
Height : 576 pixels

And a video bit rate more typical of blu ray or other HD format:

Bit rate : 24.4 Mbps

You need to get that down, obviously ... I'm not too knowledgeable about WMM (not a fan really) but it's beyond me how that happened.

A rough guideline for target bit rate for DVD resolution ... 1500 Kb/s is fast and maybe passable quality, 2400 is good, 4300 excellent.

[yoda313]

And a video bit rate more typical of blu ray or other HD format:

Bit rate : 24.4 Mbps

Would it have anything to do with it being a dv-avi export? If dv is 13gb/hr it would be expected a clip less than an hour would be significantly larger than another codec type.

A rough guideline for target bit rate for DVD resolution ... 1500 Kb/s is fast and maybe passable quality, 2400 is good, 4300 excellent.

I would agree with that. Also you need to note if you are going to use dual layer or single layer. You could get away with more time at the same bitrate if you have a dual layer disc - more space obviously. I wouldn't personally try to fit more than two hours on a single layer disc.

You can of course fit a lot more on a single layer disc but you have to bring the bitrate way down and that will impact visual quality beyond the point where it is economically feasible. Its just easier to put more on another disc or use a dual layer disc so you can use a higher bitrate.

-----------------

It looks like nobody has mentioned an actual codec to use. These days it is a good idea to use h264 inside an mp4 container instead of avi. Avi isn't really suitable for h264 as its an older container format and won't handle all the features that mp4 is capable of (at least that is my understanding).

Something like handbrake or formatfactory is a good place to start for converting.

If you have an older playback device you are targeting this conversion to you might be better off using divx or xvid in an avi container as that was more common a few years ago (and better handled by slower older generation hardware).

If this is for computer playback and space isn't a factor you can save as any codec you want. But if you are going to either make a dvd or convert for a hardware player (a media player or something like a smartphone or tablet) than you'll have to meet that units requirements.

For dvd creation read this:

https://www.videohelp.com/dvd

For file playback on a device you have to read the devices manual to meet its requirements. You mention you want to save as avi so you probably can disregard the dvd info.

Generally a profile 4.0 h264 file with sd resolution and aac or mp3 audio should be the most compatible output you could generate for this eras h264 playback units (inside a mp4 container). You can do ac3 but you may be more hit or miss on portable hardware players - they may like aac or mp3 better - things like an ipod video or tablet device.

If I have the wrong profile number I'm sure another member will be more than able to point it out and suggest the proper mode to use in encoding.

[Gavino]

Interesting video specs on the original file ... you have PAL DVD resolution:

Width : 720 pixels
Height : 576 pixels

And a video bit rate more typical of blu ray or other HD format:

Bit rate : 24.4 Mbps.

Perfectly normal PAL DV video, as millions of camcorders will testify.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DV

[zululord]

Thanks for all your help guys. WMM gives very few options for high quality; either save as a 65MB WMV or as a 800MB AVI. In the end I used an existing codec in VirtualDub (Microsoft 1?) configured to output a (compressed!) 1400MB file (!!!) which I took back to WMM, added some filters and saved as a 60MB WMV. I then converted that to VOB to burn to DVD.

Of course, that's obviously a convoluted way of doing things and the final product was lossy but in the end it doesn't really matter too much. The idea was to create a montage that can be projected onto my band members for a film clip we're shooting today.

Thanks again for the help. As I said before, I am totally new to video editing. It was heaps of fun though and I learnt a lot (though, you'd probably disagree based on the way I did things )

[redwudz]

I don't really see any problem with using WMM to edit, then outputting as DV. WMM does that well enough. Filtering in VD should also work well enough.

Outputting from VD, you have several options. You could add a DV codec and output again as DV after the filtering. That would preserve most of the quality, though you would still end up with about the same file size. You would need to encode the DV to MPEG, then author to DVD.

Or you could frameserve the filtered video directly to a MPEG encoder from VD, then author it to a DVD and save a few steps. Since your final output seems to be DVD, the latter would be the easiest and use the least HDD space.

It sort of looks like the method you used had a lot of unnecessary steps.

And welcome to our forums.

[jagabo]

Use Cedocida as your compression codec (DV, same as your source). Or just save it as uncompressed AVI. So what if the intermediate file is large? After you make the DVD you can get rid of it.