Can I go from M2ts to M2ts & just decrease the resolution

[jbitakis]

I am wondering can I change my 1920x1080p 60P M2ts video files to 1280x720P 60P M2ts files? All the software I have seen makes you change the container at the same time. All I need to do is go from 1080P 60P to 720P 60P while KEEPING the M2ts file as M2ts.

[Baldrick]

Didn't freemake video converter work? And it can output to blu-ray directly and should then create m2ts files.

[Selur]

Hybrid should also be able to convert m2ts->m2ts.

[jbitakis]

Freemake works but I converted it to Mp4 with Freemake before which allows me the option of choosing the resolution,bitrate,framerate. I notice that if I use the bluray option on Freemake, I cannot change the bitrate or any of the settings. It automatically changes it to 1080p 24p from my 1080p 60p. Now I know it does that because 1080p 24p is the bluray spec and 1080p 60p is not, however, I'd rather change the resolution to 720p and keep the 60p frame rate. It seems with Freemake, only putting it into a different container (Mp4, avi, MKV, etc.) would allow me to change the resolution,bitrate,framerate.

[Baldrick]

I see.

How about bdtoavchd or avchdconverter? Or Hybrid?

[jbitakis]

Hybrid seems useless to me. I input the video files, then use m2ts as the output. Then what do I do? Hit queue? So I did and then what? Where is the new video?

[Selur]

For Hybrid:
1. Start Hybrid
2. Load m2ts
3. set Audio Handling to 'passthrough all'
4. enable x264->Main->Restriction Settings->Hardware and set it to Blu-ray/AVCHD
5. Crop/Resize->Picture Resize set 1280 as target resolution
6. Main set Output (something with .m2ts extension)
7. press "Add to Queue"
8. press "Start Queue"
but may be the other more restricted tools are more up your alley.

[jbitakis]

Thanks Selur I will try again.

[jbitakis]

Hey Selur, is their a way, using Hybrid to interlace video that is progressive? For example, my video that I take with my Panasonic camcorder is 1920x1080p 59.94fps. I want to make it 1920x1080i 59fps. Can Hybrid do this?

[Selur]

Yes, you simply need to:
1. enable the x264 advanced option (x264->advanced)
2. enable x264->Frames->Advanced Frame settings->Interlaced encoding
or alternatively to 2. you could use x264 fake interlacing method by enabling x264->Frames->Advanced Frame settings->Fake interlaced encoding flag

Cu Selur

[jbitakis]

Thanks. I will try that for making it interlaced. OK, I used your settings from your previous post and I had 55 clips, but for some reason the first clip had no audio? Hybrid did give me a warning about this but I thought oh well I'll just use Selur's exact settings. Why did you want me to do Audio>passthrough all? Also, the average Mbps (bitrate) for the original 1920x1080 60p video is around 26Mbps, but the new 1280x720 60p video is WAY LOWER, around 2Mbps only. So therefore the video is pretty bad. When I used Freemake to place it in a Mp4 container, I did a constant bitrate around 26Mbps; while also changing the resolution to 1280x720 60p, like I did here with Hybrid. Should I go back and fix the LOW bitrate in Hybrid to a constant bitrate OR a higher average variable bitrate?

[Selur]

Why did you want me to do Audio>passthrough all?

I assumed you wanted to keep the audio, as it is in you source.

but for some reason the first clip had no audio? Hybrid did give me a warning about this but I thought

... without telling me anything about the source and the warning I can only guess, that something went wrong, but no clue what

Should I go back and fix the LOW bitrate in Hybrid to a constant bitrate OR a higher average variable bitrate?

As default Hybrid is configured to do two pass encoding with a target bit rate of 1500, -> if you want a higher bit rate configure it in the x264 tab. If you don't need a specific bit rate set e.g. x264->Main->General Settings->Encoding mode to 'constant rate factor (1-pass)', default value for crf is 18 which should be fine.

If you want mp4 output, you need to give the output an .mp4 extension so that Hybrid does know,..

[jbitakis]

Thanks Selur, I don't care about a Mp4 output. Wow Hybrid is Fun. I fixed the audio with that one file. I also increased the average bitrate up to 24700 which gave me good 720p 59.94fps video, almost as good as the 1080p 59fps video. Now back to the interlacing part. After putting in your interlacing settings, Hybrid told me that my 1080p 59fps video is NOT bluray compliant. This I know, so how do I change the fps to 29.97 which would convert my 1080p 59fps video to 1080i 60i/29fps BLURAY compliant video.

[Selur]

This I know, so how do I change the fps to 29.97 which would convert my 1080p 59fps video to 1080i 60i/29fps BLURAY compliant video.

Basically you have two roads (a. and b.) you can choose to go from Framerate X to Frame rate Y.

1. change the frame rate and not the content: (this is basically just changing a flag in the output)
   enable Filtering->Speed change->Speed Settings->Change Speed (and select the target frame rate)
   pro: no video information get's lost or 'invented'
   con: audio need to be modified to stay sync, since the playback time changed
2. change the content along with the frame rate: (this adds or removes frames)
   enable Filtering->Speed change->Speed Settings->Scale output frame rate (and select the target frame rate)
   pro: audio stays sync since the playback time didn't change
   con: if you lower the frame rate the dropped frames will be lost for good
3. MotionFPS: (basically b. but using avisynth to do it a bit 'better', requires the 'avisynth extension')
   enable Filtering->Avisynth filter->Motion FPS (and select the target frame rate; also read the tool-tips to understand the settings)
   pro: audio stays sync since the playback time didn't change, should be more 'intelligent' in doing the frame rate change using SalFps3
   con: if you lower the frame rate the dropped frames will be lost for good, slower than b. and requires the 'avisynth extension' (so unlike a.&b. this method is only available on Windows systems)

You could also 1st change the frame rate to 23.976fps and than use telecine to end up with 29.976fps. (To be frank I never tried this in Hybrid, so there might still be bugs. )


Personally I would lower the resolution to 720p (Crop/Resize->Picture Resize->...) and keep the frame rate, but that's probably because I frankly don't see the image quality loss as, as hard/evil as the motion information loss between 1080i and 720p.

Wow Hybrid is Fun.

I'm happy you like it. It got a lot of screws to turn on, which can help to get better results but also to screw things up.



Cu Selur

[jbitakis]

I did try a file interlaced (keeping the framerate the same), but just checking the interlaced encoding button, kept Hardware unchecked in the restriction settings; but did go up to 4.2 for the AVC Profile/Level because Hybrid told me to do this, then under Config>Container settings>standard output container to M2ts. The M2ts is the video that I am starting with, so this just keeps it the same. So using these settings I ran it through Hybrid. Afterwards, under mediainfo, under Scan type: MBAFF is what I see, NOT interlaced or progressive. What is MBAFF? Is that interlaced?

[jbitakis]

Also, under your a.

change the frame rate and not the content: (this is basically just
changing a flag in the output)
enable Filtering->Speed change->Speed
Settings->Change Speed (and select the target frame rate)
pro: no
video information get's lost or 'invented'
con: audio need to be
modified to stay sync, since the playback time changed

What do I press in Hybrid to keep audio in sync?

[Selur]

MBAFF = Macroblock-adaptive frame-field

Macroblock-Adaptive Frame/Field Coding MBAFF, or Macroblock-Adaptive Frame/Field Coding, is a video encoding feature of MPEG-4 AVC that allows a single frame to be encoded partly progressive and partly interlaced. Maintaining the quality of interlaced video can be a challenge in video encoding because of the larger spaces between horizontal lines in the same field. MBAFF allows an AVC encoder to examine each block in a frame to look for similarities between interlaced fields. When there is no motion the fields will tend to be very similar, resulting in better quality if you encode the block as progressive video. For blocks where there is motion from one field to another the quality is more likely to suffer if encoded progressive, so these blocks can remain interlaced.

In addition to quality improvements, progressive frames require fewer bits making them more compressible for the same quality as interlaced frames. This also applies to individual macroblocs, meaning that by using MBAFF you may greatly improve quality for a given bitrate. Since all the decisions required for MBAFF are made by the encoder it can slow encoding speeds greatly. Being a relatively new technology it's also not supported well among AVC playback software. Unlike many of AVC's advance features, though, MBAFF doesn't affect decoder speed.

source: http://www.afterdawn.com/glossary/term.cfm/macroblock-adaptive_frame-field_coding

With AVC content interlacing in normally MBAFF or PAFF.

[Selur]

Also, under your a.
...
What do I press in Hybrid to keep audio in sync?

this requires you to reencode the audio and change the audio speed through:
Audio->Main->Filtering (needs Reencode audio stream to be enabled)->Speed change to be modified according to your changes.

Cu Selur

[jbitakis]

The main reason I am doing this is to make my 1920x1080p 60p videos Blu-ray compliant. I know that 1080i 60i/30fps and 720p 60fps IS blu-ray compliant. I have already used Freemake to convert to many 720p 60p videos without really that much drop off visually in the video. But I had to put it into a different container when I used Freemake. So they are Mp4 files now, not M2ts files. Does changing containers degrade the video at all? If not, I will most likely keep doing it this way or use Hybrid too which worked good now (after I changed the settings).
But I thought that 1080i 60i/30p would be "better" video than 720p 60p. Maybe not.
If I interlace using your hybrid settings, would the new MBAFF video be blu-ray compliant?

[Selur]

Does changing containers degrade the video at all

It should definitely not.

after I changed the setting

like I wrote: there are a lot of screws

If I interlace using your hybrid settings, would the new MBAFF video be blu-ray compliant?

afaik: yes (also never heard anyone complaining that MBAFF was not supported by a blu-ray player or authoring software)

[jbitakis]

Ok, I used your option b. changing it to 29.97 for scale output frame rate & Change speed. This seemed to work ok with the audio being in sync with the video. I don't really notice any "lost frames", at least not to the naked eye. I tried it with just changing the Change speed to 29.97, but the audio was way off and it seemed to be in slow motion. I can't really say its any better than 720p 60p though, so maybe I should just keep converting to 720p 60p.

[poisondeathray]

I think there is a misunderstanding. Those options selur gave you don't re-interlace the video

He wants to go from 1080p59.94 to 1080i 29.97frames/s (59.94 fields per second) . There should be no change in duration or audio . I don't know if hybrid can do this, but you can do it through an avisynth script (I'm pretty sure hybrid can accept avs scripts)

The quality difference between 720p59.94 and 1080i59.94 (some people call it 1080i29.97 - it means the same thing) , will be largely dependent on your TV's deinterlacing capability

[jbitakis]

Well when I finished the Scan type is: MBAFF and the video is 1080 29fps. Here is the video info from mediainfo:

General
ID : 1 (0x1)
Complete name : C:\Users\Daddy's HP Laptop\Videos\interlaced2.m2ts
Format : BDAV
Format/Info : Blu-ray Video
File size : 300 MiB
Duration : 2mn 4s
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 20.2 Mbps
Maximum Overall bit rate : 35.5 Mbps
Video
ID : 4113 (0x1011)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L4.2
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrame : 4 frames
Codec ID : 27
Duration : 2mn 4s
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 19.1 Mbps
Maximum bit rate : 62.5 Mbps
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate : 29.970 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : MBAFF
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.308
Stream size : 284 MiB (95%)
Writing library : x264 core 128 r2216 198a7ea
Encoding settings : cabac=1 / ref=3 / deblock=1:0:0 / analyse=0x3:0x111 / me=hex / subme=5 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.00 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=16 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=0 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=0 / chroma_qp_offset=0 / threads=12 / lookahead_threads=2 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / interlaced=tff / bluray_compat=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=3 / b_pyramid=2 / b_adapt=1 / b_bias=0 / direct=1 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=0 / keyint=250 / keyint_min=25 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=40 / rc=crf / mbtree=1 / crf=16.0 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=0 / qpmax=69 / qpstep=4 / vbv_maxrate=62500 / vbv_bufsize=78125 / crf_max=0.0 / nal_hrd=vbr / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=1:0.00
Matrix coefficients : BT.709-5, BT.1361, IEC 61966-2-4 709, SMPTE RP177
Audio
ID : 4352 (0x1100)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Codec ID : 129
Duration : 2mn 4s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 256 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Compression mode : Lossy
Delay relative to video : 31ms
Stream size : 3.80 MiB (1%)


Is this video now interlaced?

[Selur]

x264 should encode interlaced, if he enables 'x264->Frames->Advanced Frame settings->Interlaced encoding' like I mentioned,..

He wants to go from 1080p59.94 to 1080i 29.97frames/s (59.94 fields per second) . There should be no change in duration or audio.

That depends on how you go from 60p to 30i,.... if you simply slow down the frame rate and don't throw out content the duration has to change,... -> I think you are wrong

Is this video now interlaced?

yes, MBAFF indicates H.264s interlaced encoding modes.

[poisondeathray]

x264 should encode interlaced, if he enables 'x264->Frames->Advanced Frame settings->Interlaced encoding' like I mentioned,..

But he's feeding it 1080p59.94 - x264 won't do the re-interlacing step, it will encode as interlaced . Interlaced encoding isn't the same thing as interlaced content

Unless I'm misunderstanding what option b is - What I'm suggesting is option (d) reinterlace it as it was native 1080i59.94 (you can call it 1080i29.97 if you want) . Essentially each frame becomes a field. No temporal information is lost . No change in audio, no timing changes . If you shot with the camcorder in interlaced mode, this is what happens internally for the processing

[Selur]

I know, but it's quality wise a better solution than to split the content in upper and bottom field.
+ I'll think about if there's a way to use mencoder to do a 50p to 50i conversion with real field splitting
with avisynth it should be something like:
AssumeTFF().SeparateFields().SelectEvery(4, 0, 3).Weave()
(will add a option for this in Hybrid if I figure out how to do it with mencoder)

[poisondeathray]

Well real interlaced content is what the blu-ray player expects . The negative with that method b is you lose 1/2 the temporal information . What you are doing with option (b) is selecteve() or selectodd() throwing out 1/2 the frames (so you have 1080p29.97 content, then encoding as interlaced to make it blu-ray compliant)

I'm suggesting

AssumeTFF()
SeparateFields()
SelectEvery(4, 0, 3)
Weave()

This is real authentic 1080i59.94 content (call it 1080i29.97 if you want) . The negatives are it's interlaced so you are at the mercy of the HDTV deinterlacing quality processing . But you have all the temporal information, but 1/2 the spatial

Personally, I would use a HTPC , forget about optical media. You can play the full quality 1080p59.94 full spatial and temporal resolution . If I had to make blu-ray from this I would choose 720p59.94

[Selur]

Well real interlaced content is what the blu-ray player expects .

should not make a difference if it's coded in MBAFF,.... but you are right about the temporal information,...

[poisondeathray]

Well real interlaced content is what the blu-ray player expects .

should not make a difference if it's coded in MBAFF,.... but you are right about the temporal information,...

But option (b) is how is done for 1080p29.97 content - and it works. The problem is potentially some blu-ray players actually deinterlace this on top (very bad) because it's encoded and flagged as interlaced even though its progressive content. Many software also deinterlace this progressive content when importing these streams because they "think" its interlaced

MBAFF when using x264 works fine in most authoring tools and is spec compliant . But Sony DVDA is the notable exception that throws errors.

[Selur]

some blu-ray players actually deinterlace this on top (very bad)

not if the blu-ray player handles the spec like it's ment to be handled,..