codec quality

[ratskie]

I asked this question a couple of weeks ago, but got no responses (hopefully because it's not too dumb a question!)
May I try again? If I have, say, a 1 GB AVI xvid video and want to do some light filtering on it, I know it will need to be re-encoded.
But since I'm putting it on a DVD disk, it won't need to be compressed any more than it was, and could actually be larger.
h.264 seems to be the codec of choice now for compressing, but since I really don't need to compress it any more than it was,
is h.264 any better in this case than the other popular codecs like xvid, divx, or mpeg2?

[edDV]

I asked this question a couple of weeks ago, but got no responses (hopefully because it's not too dumb a question!)
May I try again? If I have, say, a 1 GB AVI xvid video and want to do some light filtering on it, I know it will need to be re-encoded.
But since I'm putting it on a DVD disk, it won't need to be compressed any more than it was, and could actually be larger.
h.264 seems to be the codec of choice now for compressing, but since I really don't need to compress it any more than it was,
is h.264 any better in this case than the other popular codecs like xvid, divx, or mpeg2?

If it needs to play on a DVD player as a DVD, the only choices are AC3, mp2 or PCM (uncompressed). If it needs to play on a DVD player as a file, most will support divx/xvid in addition to the above.

While a better codec, h.264 needs player support. How will you play this file?

[jagabo]

If you have a Divx/DVD player you can reencode with Divx or Xvid. If you want to make a standard movie DVD that will play in all DVD players you need to convert to MPEG 2. If your editor doesn't output MPEG 2 video (VirtualDub, for example) use a lossless codec like HuffYUV, then use your MPEG 2 encoder to encode that.

[ratskie]

Thanks for the replies. I have until now converted to mpeg2 and made a regular DVD disk out of it. I have an older model DVD player. Now I'm considering moving to the 20th century and getting a BluRay player. So maybe with the right player I could use mkv or make an AVCDH disk. I don't want to spend the money for a BluRay burner right now. I probably wasn't clear in my intent. So in this instance, would the h.264 format (mkv or AVCHD) be any better than what I'm doing now? (Does that make it clear as mud?)

[edDV]

Next comes research for the right Blu-Ray player. Some have dropped divx/xvid support but most all support DVD MPeg2/AC3.

SD h.264 may prove tricky especially in an mkv wrapper.

I haven't tested many Blu-Ray players for SD. If you use h.264, the container will be the issue. HD safe path is a m2ts container.

[ratskie]

Right. The research continues. But as for the codec issue, is the h.264 any better for what I'm trying to do than the mpeg2? I know it takes a lot more horsepower and apparently time, too, so I'm wondering if it's worth it.

[edDV]

Right. The research continues. But as for the codec issue, is the h.264 any better for what I'm trying to do than the mpeg2? I know it takes a lot more horsepower and apparently time, too, so I'm wondering if it's worth it.

First MPeg2 works fine as you can see from DVD playback.

You use h.264 to make the files smaller but then you run into format and container issues for a given player.

All Blu-Ray players play DVD spec. They vary with SD divx/xvid or h.264 container support.