Handbrake H.264 question

[stiltman]

Don't know many of you are using Handbrake, but thought I'd post here before posting in the Handbrake forums.

I'm just now starting to mess around with H.264. All my other encoding was H.263 using Xvid.
I always set the enoder to 94% contsant quality. However if I do that with H.264 in Handbrake, I end up with a 10Gb file size.

In handbrake, what would be a good settings for H.264 if you were comparing it to my Xvid encodes at 94%?

Here's whay I have in the query editor. I did change the 94% to 60% but I haven't encoded it yet to see what it looks like.

-i "X:\VIDEO_TS" -t 1 -c 1-26 -o "C:\Encoding H.264\Home Vids\test1 h.264 60per.mkv" -f mkv --crop 0:0:0:0 -p -e x264 -q 0.6 -a 1 -E ac3 -B 160 -R 0 -6 dpl2 -D 1 --markers="C:\Temp\VIDEO_TS-1-chapters.csv" -C 4 -v

[mh2360]

94% is way too high, around 65% is a good value to start with, maybe a little higher for HD video.

[creamyhorror]

57-62% for HD, 61-64% for SD. (Corresponds to the 19.4-22 and 18.4-20 ranges in CRF mode.) Do a few short test encodes to see what percentage suits you. Going higher than those ranges is pointless for most sources, unless you have quite exacting standards and don't mind inflating the bitrate.

SD requires a higher level of quality than HD does, due to the greater upscaling when played back on a screen of the same size.

Keep in mind that these ranges only apply to versions of Handbrake that use x264 revision 1196 and before. After that, CRF (constant quality) was recalibrated. So if you're using a beta build of Handbrake, be prepared to bump up the quality percentage from those ranges.

[stiltman]

I always thought switching to H.264 would save a bunch of space.
I just did the exact same source with Xvid + AC3 at 94 percent quality. The resulting fine came out to 2.67Gb

The same source using H.264 (settings in my first post) came out to 2.27Gb

Not much of a savings to me

BTW, I'm not using any of the snapshot versions, I'm using 0.9.3

[poisondeathray]

I always thought switching to H.264 would save a bunch of space.
I just did the exact same source with Xvid + AC3 at 94 percent quality. The resulting fine came out to 2.67Gb

The same source using H.264 (settings in my first post) came out to 2.27Gb

Not much of a savings to me

BTW, I'm not using any of the snapshot versions, I'm using 0.9.3

Did you compare the visual quality? You could compare them by using interleave in avisynth, for example. I bet you could go lower on the h.264. You will probably notice the XviD version has macroblocks in action scenes, and less detail overall

I find in the bitrate range for typical DVD backups, XviD needs about 1.3-1.5x the size to equal x264 quality (but I don't use handbrake, so I don't know the corresponding settings)

If you just go by objective measures like ssim, psnr, you will find XviD needs about 1.7-1.8x the size to equal x264 quality in that bitrate range

[johns0]

I use bitrate setting of 5k for 1920x1080,3k for 1280x720 and 1500k for 720x480 as an average for H.264 so if a movie is 1:34 then i set the output to 5200kbps at 640k ac3 for 1920x1080 for burning on avchd-dvdr.

[stiltman]

1500 seems a little light compared to my 3000+ for Xvids.
Is 1500 very comparable to that of Xvids with double the bitrate?

Maybe I'll just stick with Xvids for now

[jman98]

Have you considering using another tool like MeGUI? I've never used Handbrake, but some co-workers swear by it. Unfortunately those co-workers are all hardcore Mac fanboys who need a ton of hand holding when it comes to working with video. Maybe Handbrake just isn't all that good.

[poisondeathray]

1500 seems a little light compared to my 3000+ for Xvids.
Is 1500 very comparable to that of Xvids with double the bitrate?

Maybe I'll just stick with Xvids for now

Have you compared them? I would say for your average DVD, if you needed ~3000kbps with xvid to maintain a certain level of "quality" for that specific source, you could probably use ~2000kbps for similar or better quality if you used x264 and decent settings.

You shouldn't use a set bitrate like "1500" or any other number, because that isn't necessarily going to be appropriate for every source.

[johns0]

1500 kbps is good for most dvd,looks good on my 37in sanyo hdtv,lots of people encode movies at 1500k divx and some do 900k which is a bit too low with artifacts showing.

[fritzi93]

I use bitrate setting of 5k for 1920x1080,3k for 1280x720 and 1500k for 720x480 as an average for H.264 so if a movie is 1:34 then i set the output to 5200kbps at 640k ac3 for 1920x1080 for burning on avchd-dvdr.

I do AVCHDs as well, and IMO, 5k for 1080 and 3k for 720 is adequate. They look good on my 47" LCD, not indistinguishable from the original, but surprisingly good. Some 1080 BD5 backups I've done are as low as 4k and they're still pretty good. My HDTV captures are at 720p and it seems to me there's less leeway at the bottom end, as quality falls off sharply below 3k. Depending on the source, naturally.

Dunno about how 720x480 fares in h.264, I don't bother with that any more. :P

[creamyhorror]

I always thought switching to H.264 would save a bunch of space.
I just did the exact same source with Xvid + AC3 at 94 percent quality. The resulting fine came out to 2.67Gb

The same source using H.264 (settings in my first post) came out to 2.27Gb

Not much of a savings to me

Because you're using 94%, which is ridiculously high for x264. Use 61-64% like I recommended in my post.

Handbrake's percentage scale is extremely misleading, because it converts a logarithmic scale (CRF) to a linear one.

[johns0]

Use bitrate setting in 2pass to get the proper size,wont get better results using % scale.

[stiltman]

Normally, I never use a certain bitrate setting. I always go with constant quality. With Xvids, that's always been 93% or 94%

Applying the samething to H.264, gave me a huge file, so I knew something was a miss

I'm not looking for the average encode, you can tell by my Xvid setting of 93 or 94%. I'm looking for the same setting in H.246..Be it 65% or 85%

Guess I shoulds take this to the Handbrake forum?

[johns0]

Constant quality can be very unpredictible and give you either very small,large or just what you want depending on the complexity of the scenery,why not take a 5 min encode using bitrate calculation and a 5 min encode using constant quality and compare.

I used to use cq but gave it up when i had to keep adjusting the % to get the right file size,too much wasted time.

[creamyhorror]

Normally, I never use a certain bitrate setting. I always go with constant quality. With Xvids, that's always been 93% or 94%

You should not assume XviD's quality setting has anything to do with x264's. It is unrelated, and you shouldn't assume going anywhere near 100% is a good idea.

x264 uses a scale called CRF (Constant Rate Factor) for constant quality encoding. The lower the CRF, the higher the quality and bitrate. If you read any guide to x264, you'll generally see recommendations of using CRF 18.0-20.0 for SD material, going lower only if you can't achieve your desired quality at 18.0. Anything below 16.0 is generally pointless.

Handbrake converts its percentage scale to the CRF scale by the formula CRF = 51 - (%quality/100 * 51).

If you plug in numbers, you'll see you hit CRF 16.0 at 68.6%. Not very high at all. That's why I suggest 61-64%, only going higher if you judge it necessary on that particular source.

I used to use cq but gave it up when i had to keep adjusting the % to get the right file size,too much wasted time.

If you want a specific file size, you should not be using constant quality. Constant quality, as its name implies, is when you want a specific quality.

[johns0]

I used to use cq but gave it up when i had to keep adjusting the % to get the right file size,too much wasted time.

If you want a specific file size, you should not be using constant quality. Constant quality, as its name implies, is when you want a specific quality.

Are you quoting this to stiltman?I use 2pass encoding based on bitrate setting.

[creamyhorror]

I used to use cq but gave it up when i had to keep adjusting the % to get the right file size,too much wasted time.

If you want a specific file size, you should not be using constant quality. Constant quality, as its name implies, is when you want a specific quality.

Are you quoting this to stiltman?I use 2pass encoding based on bitrate setting.

No, I was replying to you. I was saying that if you wanted "the right file size", you shouldn't have been using constant quality in the first place. Stiltman wants a uniform level of quality, so CQ fits his needs.

[johns0]

I used to use cq but gave it up when i had to keep adjusting the % to get the right file size,too much wasted time.

If you want a specific file size, you should not be using constant quality. Constant quality, as its name implies, is when you want a specific quality.

Are you quoting this to stiltman?I use 2pass encoding based on bitrate setting.

No, I was replying to you. I was saying that if you wanted "the right file size", you shouldn't have been using constant quality in the first place. Stiltman wants a uniform level of quality, so CQ fits his needs.

I gave up cq a few years ago and been using 2pass ever since,i was telling stiltman to try 2pass instead of cq which i used to use,not sure why you needed to tell me i shouldnt have been using cq since i found for myself it wasnt too predictable.

I think that cq is the worse way to encode files cause of its unpredictability,cant estimate the file size.

[creamyhorror]

I gave up cq a few years ago and been using 2pass ever since,i was telling stiltman to try 2pass instead of cq which i used to use,not sure why you needed to tell me i shouldnt have been using cq since i found for myself it wasnt too predictable.

I was making the point to Stiltman/other readers that CQ targets a particular quality and 2-pass targets a particular filesize, and unpredictability is precisely what someone using CQ is looking for. I'm not sure why you're telling him to try 2-pass since he's looking for a consistent level of quality across different videos (which a fixed bitrate will not give him).

I think that cq is the worse way to encode files cause of its unpredictability,cant estimate the file size.

Predictability is your personal preference. CQ is meant to be unpredictable, precisely so that the encoder can choose which videos to allocate more bits to. If you wanted predictability, 2-pass is your thing. That doesn't mean CQ is bad in any way; it just doesn't fit your preferences.

I personally use CQ/CRF because I don't need to fit videos to a specific size (e.g. a DVD-R).

[usta]

OK, we get it:
if you want a control over the output file size - use bitrate specific encoding
if you want a control over the output quality - use constant level encoding.

What I'd like to know, is: what if my input videos are of different quality and bitrate, and I want a constant quality.
If I'm satisfied with 1000kbps xvid encoding of SD material, can I still select like 94% constant quality in Handbrake and expect similar results (without a fear that my output will be a few times larger than the input file)?
Similarly, selecting 62% for H264 encoding should I expect that the output size will not fluctuate very much regardless of the source material quality?

[creamyhorror]

What I'd like to know, is: what if my input videos are of different quality and bitrate, and I want a constant quality.

How does that make a difference to CRF? It simply allocates bits to video based on its complexity (i.e. how difficult it is to encode). More complex video (whether by nature of the content or because of encoding artifacts and noise) will naturally take more bits to encode, under CRF.

If I'm satisfied with 1000kbps xvid encoding of SD material, can I still select like 94% constant quality in Handbrake and expect similar results (without a fear that my output will be a few times larger than the input file)?
Similarly, selecting 62% for H264 encoding should I expect that the output size will not fluctuate very much regardless of the source material quality?

No, you can't expect that. That's the point of CQ. If you don't want much fluctuation, you should choose 2-pass. The fluctuation will not be great for similar videos, anyway.