Lagarith expanded my video file.

[moviebuff2]

Hi everyone:

I must have done something wrong for Lagarith ballooned my +70MB MPEG file to +1GB AVI.

Here's what I did.

I opened VirtualDubMod, loaded my MPEG file (+70MB), selected Lagarith in the "select video compression" and left the configure untouched: "enables null frames", "always suggest RGB for output" and "use multiheading" were left unchecked and "mode" was left at default RGB.

Then I click "OK" and save the files as AVI.

My +70MB MPEG file ballooned to +1GB! Isn't Lagarith supposed to compress the file and make it smaller?

Thanks

[Soopafresh]

Nope. Lagarith is for "uncompressed" work. If you want to make your video smaller, use Xvid or h264.

[moviebuff2]

That's not what Lagarith says at their website:

"Lagarith is a lossless video codec intended for editing and archiving. Lagarith offers better compression than codecs like Huffyuv, Alparysoft, and CorePNG."

My MPEG file is never compressed. It comes directly from one of my vob file without being compressed: my original vob file is +70MB, Videoredo makes a +70MB MPEG file from it. So, I would say there is nothing to uncompress.

Even if Lagarith uncompresses my never-compressed MPEG file, isn't that strange to go from +.070GB to +1GB?

[guns1inger]

Lagarith is lossless, mpeg is heavily lossy. When you open an mpeg file to the timeline it is uncompressed, making it much larger than the original mpeg file. You can then recompress it using a new codec, and that codec will work from the uncompressed version.

If you want to go from a 70 mb mpeg file to a 70mb mpeg file then you need to re-encode it using the same bitrate as the original file. However you will be using a lossy compression on a file that has already been heavily compressed at some point in the past, and oyu may cause visual artifacts.

Lossless compression takes up a lot more space than lossy compression, but does no visible damage to the video.

Horses for courses.

You will also notice that the Lagarith website only compares it's compression to other lossless encoders. At no time does it say it will give you files smaller than mpeg.

[moviebuff2]

guns1inger,

I am confused.

As I said, my vob file is 70MB. I used Videoredo to make an MPEG file. If I understand correctly, this is a straight conversion because the MPEG is also 70MB. No compression was done. Am I correct?

[Noahtuck]

That's not what Lagarith says at their website:

"Lagarith is a lossless video codec intended for editing and archiving. Lagarith offers better compression than codecs like Huffyuv, Alparysoft, and CorePNG."

My MPEG file is never compressed. It comes directly from one of my vob file without being compressed: my original vob file is +70MB, Videoredo makes a +70MB MPEG file from it. So, I would say there is nothing to uncompress.

Even if Lagarith uncompresses my never-compressed MPEG file, isn't that strange to go from +.070GB to +1GB?

Me thinks you need to learn a little more about video

As stated... Lagarith is lossless, true lossless is uncompressed or not compressed in a way to lose anything!! very large files...
dvd/vob is lossy & VERY compressed, just not as compressed as divx/xvid, vcd ect.
When i do video work on something and use full uncompressed avi, the files are usually 70gb ++++ then converted to VOB/MPG2 which is then around 2gb 8)
Depending on the length of the vid & the bitrate i encode it to for dvd.

I was thinking of trying out Lagarith as i have used Huffyuv before but i have the room so i just go full uncompressed avi.

[guns1inger]

VideoRedo doesn't re-encode the files when you just load and cut an mpeg file. It just cuts out the frames you don't want, puts the rest back together and writes the data to a new file without further change.

When you choose to encode using a different codec, the video is expanded back to uncompressed, then encoded using the new codec and whatever settings you apply. You cannot directly compare different codecs in the manner that you are, it just doesn't work. Different codecs have different purposes, and therefore different levels of compression.

[moviebuff2]

Noahtuck, I see what you want to tell me.

I recorded the 70-MB vob file with my DVD recorder. According to what you say, this vob file was already compressed, and consequently the MPEG file which comes from it is also compressed.

[guns1inger]

If you are familiar with Virtualdub and Direct Stream Copy versus Full Processing Mode then think of it this way

VideoRedo is like Direct Stream Copy in virtualdub. It just copies the contents of the file from a to b, omitting the bits you cut out.

Saving the file using a different codec is like Virtualdub's Full Processing Mode. All the data you want to keep is moved from a to b via the new codec, which will change it in whatever way you tell it to. Some will pack ir down smaller (usually by throwing information away), some not so small.

[Noahtuck]

Noahtuck, I see what you want to tell me.

I recorded the 70-MB vob file with my DVD recorder. According to what you say, this vob file was already compressed, and consequently the MPEG file which comes from it is also compressed.

Yepper do!!!!!!

Dvd recorders will give you diff size files depending on what speed you record them at (which in effect changes the bitrate of the video to a set rate) which effects the size of the total video, although the VOB's will usually all be the same except for maybe the last one, & sometimes on the XP speed of some players will in fact change the audio from ac3 to lpcm.

Which is usually in the same format as any store bought dvd, mpg2, which is compressed video & audio, just as ac3, dts, mpg audio are all forms of compressed audio, to varying degrees, where as lpcm, wav is uncompressed.

Okay.. im babbling :P
Time for bed 8)

[jagabo]

By using VirtualDubMod to recompress your MPG to Lagarith AVI you have taken a highly compressed source (MPG, VOB), decompressed it to uncompressed RGB (which causes it to grow about ~30 fold), then compressed with a codec that typically shrinks uncompressed RGB to about half its size. So you would expect the result to be around 15 times the size of your MPG source.

[Kurosaki Ichigo]

I have the reverse problem. I started to use Lagarith only a month ago! I don't know why, but only my first lossless encode was perfect. After that, I had to do my first official episode of Freezing for my fansub. The RAW Source is a .mkv file in FullHD resolution and is a Bluray. It's 2,26 GB! So, when I use VirtualDubMod, and select Lagarith with Full Processing Mode (no settings selected in Lagarith, just "Always RGB Output", or something), but the result was only 30 GB. I don't know why is so small!

Ah, my PC is a Intel Pentium Dual CORE E2180 2.00 GHz, 2 GB RAM and Win7 Ultimate 32 bit! I have K-lite codec pack mega 7.1.5 and Lagarith 1.3.20!

[guns1inger]

Because maybe that is all it needs to be ? Filesize = Running Time X Bitrate. Post a mediainfo text view of the mkv source file and the resulting lagarith file for comparison

[Kurosaki Ichigo]

Before this I tried to contact SirLagsalot, and this is his answer

"The video file you are encoding has already been compressed with a lossy video codec - in this case the video is using x264. Because Lagarith is lossless, it cannot compress as well, and the videos get larger when you encode to Lagarith"

So I think all my doubts was cleared.