Youtube Upload, increase quality/control (HQ hack obsolete)

[atropine]

Dear Sirs,

I don't think i'm crazy, or too awful newbish, but: Any Flv i try to upload is rejected.

AND

Failed (invalid file format)

You need to upload in FLV1 (sorenson) format, not FLV4 (VP6) and make sure your audio is mp3, sample rate of 11,22, or 44khz

[cinetech]

So, have I just read 12 pages of the wrong forum post, or am I missing something? I'm not actually concerned with video quality, I just want stereo audio.

Encode your videos using Flash 7 aka Spark H.263, not On2Vp6 Flash codec.
Encode for stereo sound but maintain overall video + audio rate to <350kbps.
The lowest I use is 2 audio channels 22.050 KHz at 48K

Read the forum to find out how to encode Flash using FFmpeg, Riva FLV Encoder or MEncoder.
However, you can use the pricey, friendly interface, easy-to-use Sorenson Squeeze.

If you do this, YouTube will not reject your video.
In fact, it won't touch it at all.

Cheers

[yeoz]

Don't know how long this will last, but, a workaround to youtube's HQ hack-fix (for clips considerably shorter than ten minutes) is to simply pad your FLV file with null or empty frames up to 10:59:59. Penalty is less than 1kB per null frame, and, with multipass encoding, the bits that would've been used but aren't needed for the null frames would get moved around so that the video itself (and not the null frames at the end) end up with the bulk of the available bits.

Right now I'm just using avisynth to pad the source file with null frames, but, i'm sure that's not the best way to do it. Can anyone recommend a FLV joiner and/or a FLV muxer? I'm probably also going to try muxing audio manually, instead of letting mencoder do it, to see if I can gain any extra bitrate that way.

[wwechamp]

Thanks for info!

[45tripp]

Don't know how long this will last, but, a workaround to youtube's HQ hack-fix (for clips considerably shorter than ten minutes) is to simply pad your FLV file with null or empty frames up to 10:59:59.

no reason why it should stop working

as much was already suggested by Duro:

Hi 45tripp, great tutorial. I was doing something similar last year by adding a still image for say like 7 mins to a 3 min video and running through mencoder and bypassing encoding resulting in a sharp video, but the hexing way is great.

tackier than a clean hack, but viable.

So I have my target subjects in 320x240 resolution, and background in 160x120 resolution(upscaled). I feather between the masking so that the difference doesn't really show that much.

i don't like the theory of it,
but feel free to share a practical example of this procedure so someone might try it out.


tripp

[hypnoticpimp]

45tripp/ Can you please make a new video tutorial to get hi quality on youtube, with the new youtube HQ Fix

[bayme]

You can always try this:
https://forum.videohelp.com/topic345987.html

[wonderpierrot]

You can always try this:
https://forum.videohelp.com/topic345987.html

I've been using Any Video Converter for quite some time now and find the quality surprisingly good, compared to other alternatives.

I've been also oddly noticing YouTube additionally re-encoding some of my vids at higher resolution and at higher bitrate than the normal, like what dtfinch has mentioned earlier. The higher quality resolution is 480 x 360 compared to 320 x 240 and uses a higher bitrate (although I'm not certain the numeric value). Apparently it seems to take quite some time for the higher quality video to replace the original low quality video.

I'm wondering if YouTube is actually going through that phase to get alternate high quality versions of uploaded videos to users. As of the moment, it's weird that only random clips are getting the high quality improvement. It also seems that only videos uploaded at 640 x 480 get the benefit of receiving an additional higher quality version, at least in my experiences.

[atropine]

I've been also oddly noticing YouTube additionally re-encoding some of my vids at higher resolution and at higher bitrate than the normal, like what dtfinch has mentioned earlier. The higher quality resolution is 480 x 360 compared to 320 x 240 and uses a higher bitrate (although I'm not certain the numeric value)..... It also seems that only videos uploaded at 640 x 480 get the benefit of receiving an additional higher quality version, at least in my experiences.

It's interesting that youtube archive the original videos uploaded. I had always imagined that once encoded they were deleted.

[reez]

hey everyone..i use to use the hex hack to upload past 10mins..but now my video gets rejected because of TOS violation..i was wondering if they fixed that too?

[wwechamp]

Yes the violation thing has been happening more lately.

[reez]

its weird how it happens too. I saw that the correct time was displayed next the vid but when you click "watch video" through the "edit video" page i then get the TOS violation. It's like it went through but then 2 seconds later got removed

[bayme]

its weird how it happens too. I saw that the correct time was displayed next the vid but when you click "watch video" through the "edit video" page i then get the TOS violation. It's like it went through but then 2 seconds later got removed

I received two Copyright Infringement notices yesterday as well. They've blatantly taken two videos down, comments and all lost. I don't like YouTube for doing it that way, they could have asked first. The only reason I have videos there is because of the community element, I couldn't care less about copyrights, I make no money over it, nor does anyone lose money over it. Viacom just plain blows bullshit around on innocent users.
In my case these videos were already up there a loooong time. Which makes it even more ridiculous (and useless if you ask me). They don't understand the internet: Once digitally out there, the damage is done, there is no "preventing more damage" possible.

[reez]

youtube is the best place to upload movies imo..because its in shitty flash and no one spreads around FLASH FORMAT. also reuplaoding anywhere makes it worst. plus there's this loser i met who works for a company that is hired to take down copyright infringement..the thing is this guy follows me now and i cant associate any new video with my name HAHA..im pretty sure he's thae one who took your stuff down. he even has a yt account and brags to you before taking down..anyway i guess the 10min limit hack is screwed, back to the drawing board

[stsin]

I've been also oddly noticing YouTube additionally re-encoding some of my vids at higher resolution and at higher bitrate than the normal, like what dtfinch has mentioned earlier. The higher quality resolution is 480 x 360 compared to 320 x 240 and uses a higher bitrate (although I'm not certain the numeric value). Apparently it seems to take quite some time for the higher quality video to replace the original low quality video.

I'm wondering if YouTube is actually going through that phase to get alternate high quality versions of uploaded videos to users. As of the moment, it's weird that only random clips are getting the high quality improvement. It also seems that only videos uploaded at 640 x 480 get the benefit of receiving an additional higher quality version, at least in my experiences.

A friend sent his new video to me on YT and the first thing I noticed was the great quality. Checked the size and it was greater than 320x240. Replied to him saying how it looked great. But when I went back to that page minutes later, it looked like the old crappy YT quality. This time the size was at 320x240. So I reloaded the page and it went back to the HQ version that I first saw. Probably at 480x360 that you mentioned.

So there seems to be two streaming versions stored by YT now? He just uploaded it hours ago. And I wonder why I got the old style YT version on second viewing?

edit: checked that video and it was back to the 320x240 blocky version. I kept refreshing and it was staying that way...till around the 7th refresh which it finally streamed the better version.

Here's an examinating of that file taken from my Firefox Cache with Mediainfo:
Complete name : H:\WUTemp\955890F0d01.flv
Format : Flash Video
File size : 18.9 MiB
PlayTime : 2mn 33s
Bit rate : 1038 Kbps
timestamp : 0.000 / 0.000
starttime : 0.000
totalduration : 153.000
totaldatarate : 1038.093
bytelength : 19853711.000

Video #0
Codec : Sorenson H263
PlayTime : 2mn 32s
Bit rate : 934 Kbps
Width : 480 pixels
Height : 272 pixels
Display Aspect ratio : 16/9
Frame rate : 23.993 fps
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.298

Audio #0
Codec : MPEG-1 Audio layer 3
Bit rate : 96 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Channel(s) : 1 channel
Sampling rate : 44.1 KHz
Resolution : 16 bits
Writing library : Xing (new)

edit2:
When I said HQ, I didn't mean that it looked as good as what most of us uploads. Just that it was much better than normal. I mean if we had 1Mbps to play around with, it would look nearly flawless. I also remember it stuttering the first time viewing it, knowing now because of the high bitrate.

[wonderpierrot]

The implementation is a bit buggy atm, I'm getting from high quality to low quality on and off as well, but not as drastic as you. It's actually pretty consistent for me, I'm getting the high quality videos 90% of the time. It might be due to your internet speed too, I attempted to view my high quality videos on a limited signal wireless connection and could not get the high quality videos to show, at least on Firefox.

I also found that YT is giving all my new videos high quality versions now, or maybe it was because they are all in AVI DIVX 640 x 480 format (the wmvs I uploaded earlier never got high quality versions, even at 640 x 480 resolution).

And wow, 1Mbps? These videos barely even stutter for me and play as smoothly as a regular YT video. When the HQ hex hack worked all the videos I uploaded with 1Mbps stutter like crazy.

[dtfinch]

The player tracks your bandwidth, and updates it each time you finish downloading a video. If the estimate is too low (below 720kbps), like if youtube was congested the last couple videos you watched, it'll select the low quality video next time. I posted that greasemonkey script on page 11 to get around that.

[bayme]

I have yet to see an actual example of this. Any links, please?
I haven't seen this happen on any of my videos, they are static in quality. Where and when ever I view them. (And yes, I do check this on different internet access systems.)

Also, I have a very hard time believing this, since as it stands, YT is at (and last night over) its bottleneck for Western Europe and US night around 22:00 CET, and 22:00 EST. You people do not seem to realize they serve close to 25 petabytes each day, the pipes simply aren't thick enough to handle much more (yet).

[reez]

why in gods name wont anyone post links to these "oh so amazing" quality changes..how do YOU check if it's a higher quality?..by DOWNLOADING them or simply clicking the RESIZE button on the player..if resize button is how you've been doing it then I have the same problem too.

[wonderpierrot]

Not the best example, but here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1hkK4AxW7A

If it doesn't show the 480 x 360 version YT determined your bandwidth isn't high enough and you can attempt the greasemonkey script dtfinch wrote.

[reez]

ooookkaayyyy, this is what i was talking about. I click the RESIZE BUTTON on the player and it DUZNT go down to 320/240...it STAYS at 480/360. BUT when i DOWNLOAD the SAME file and check/play it, it IS at 320/240...

[reez]

here´s how i add black bars to 4:3 to get the 16:9 aspect:

since im not that "fluent" with making avisynth scripts i use AVS2DVD to make the script for me and then edit the script by replacing 720x576 by 320x240.

here's a screenshot, hope it helps:


the final avisynth script becomes this:
i removed the reference to dgpulldown and the last line about converting the audio to 48000

Video = DirectShowSource("C:\test\iron_man.avi", convertfps=true, audio=false)
Audio = DirectShowSource("C:\test\iron_man.avi", video=false).Normalize()
AudioDub(Video, Audio)
ConvertToYV12
AddBorders(0,44,0,44)
Lanczos4Resize(320,240)

hey ric sorry but it's not working for me ..does the file HAVE to be avi or sumthing?..because mine is quick time. here's how i did it:
my avs code:

Video = DirectShowSource("C:\Rez Music\IJ_KOTCS_trailer1_480p.mov", convertfps=true, audio=false)
Audio = DirectShowSource("C:\Rez Music\IJ_KOTCS_trailer1_480p.mov", video=false).Normalize()
AudioDub(Video, Audio)
ConvertToYV12
AddBorders(0,44,0,44)
Lanczos4Resize(320,240)

i drag it into automen i copy YOUR settings(which i found here https://forum.videohelp.com/topic336882-240.html#1809329 ) and click start...but it wont GO. I was wondering if you are able to see what i'm doing wrong..thanks for the help though

[ricardouk]

I had to convert the MOV files to AVI(xvid) with a hight bitrate (2000) so that we dont loose much quality and then use the avi to convert to flv.

[reez]

I had to convert the MOV files to AVI(xvid) with a hight bitrate (2000) so that we dont loose much quality and then use the avi to convert to flv.

THANKS RICK i got it to work..but can you tell me how accurate Gspot is at telling the bitrate of the finished flv? I encoded a vid with Winff and checked it with Mediainfo which said it was 444 kbps...but Gspot said it was 349

hey cool blog man

[ricardouk]

hi, i just reinstalled xp on my pc and im reluctant to install mediainfo as it messes around with some icons and theres no way(that i know of ) on mediainfo to undo that.

but answering your question, i didnt even know gspot scanned flv, i always used mediainfo, but you can try avinaptic, dont know if it supports flv but it doesnt harm trying it....

[bayme]

Not the best example, but here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1hkK4AxW7A

If it doesn't show the 480 x 360 version YT determined your bandwidth isn't high enough

Right, so my bandwidth isn't high enough with a Gigabit fiber straight to the backbone?
No greasemonkey script will convince YouTube my bw is high enough here.

Because it's showing a stupid 320x240 low quality flv. Still not convinced.

[stsin]

I have yet to see an actual example of this. Any links, please?
I haven't seen this happen on any of my videos, they are static in quality. Where and when ever I view them. (And yes, I do check this on different internet access systems.)

Also, I have a very hard time believing this, since as it stands, YT is at (and last night over) its bottleneck for Western Europe and US night around 22:00 CET, and 22:00 EST. You people do not seem to realize they serve close to 25 petabytes each day, the pipes simply aren't thick enough to handle much more (yet).

This is the 1Mbit video I was talking about earlier:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRgdfdeKIFM

The poster didn't even know there was a higher quality version, till I told him to keep reloading the page till the better version shows up.

Something else I noticed. He uploaded the original at 16/9 AR. At the low 320x240 version the AR looks fine, but when the HQ version streams it's stretched fullscreen to 4/3 AR. So YT displays the correct AR on it's low version now?

btw, my bandwidth is on the lower average for ADSL. So maybe it's something else?

[reez]

but answering your question, i didnt even know gspot scanned flv, i always used mediainfo, but you can try avinaptic, dont know if it supports flv but it doesnt harm trying it....

so what do YOU use to tell the Kbps?

This is the 1Mbit video I was talking about earlier:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRgdfdeKIFM
The poster didn't even know there was a higher quality version, till I told him to keep reloading the page till the better version shows up.

...i dont really think there is a second version..YES it looks REALLY good. But when i download it, it is the same crappy 320/240 version. Since he uploaded the vid at 16:9, remember YT gives it the black bars....so maybe the player somehow knows that and treats it separate from the vid...GOD this crap is complicated im going to sleep

[stsin]

Mediainfo seems the most accurate, atleast it's pretty similar to what YT uses.

Why download, when it's obviously linking to the old version? Just snatch it from your browser cache.

From what dtfinch said earlier, the HQ version is probably coming from a different server. Not throttling it's bandwidth as much, why that 1Mbit video streams better than the hexed version.

[wonderpierrot]

Not the best example, but here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1hkK4AxW7A

If it doesn't show the 480 x 360 version YT determined your bandwidth isn't high enough

Right, so my bandwidth isn't high enough with a Gigabit fiber straight to the backbone?
No greasemonkey script will convince YouTube my bw is high enough here.

Because trust me, it's showing a stupid 320x240 low quality flv.
Still not conviced.

Try using IE7. When Firefox doesn't load the HQ videos on some of my computers IE7 seems to load them, at least on the 2nd or 3rd refresh.