Compression Advice

I have some lectures that consist of someone standing at the front of a room in front of a static background, though the person is using her arms to sign and interpret narrated spoken word. The video will be compressed as Mpg2 and be brought into DVDSP. I tried compressing at different presets, and can not really the difference, though I am concerned that it might appear and sound different on different computers, players, etc. I am also new to this and have an untrained eye and ears.
What presets would you recommend using for a project like this based on the video and audio I am using.
Thanks!

the best way to know how it'll look is watch it up close on a really big TV (but not one that scales regular SD up to HD sizes, because that will almost always look bad anyway, and you won't know what you're really dealing with).
Generally though, I usually use the 2 pass vbr (high quality) preset that's the closest to my footage length, and if I am using footage shorter than 60 min, I make a new preset and bump the 60 min bit rate up a bit just for good measure.

Similar Messages

Newbie looking for compression advice!!

I like to download TV shows from the Internet-and put them on DVD-but i find the compression codecs in premiere 2.0 don't make the files small enough-anybody out there have any advice for me about compression codecs for creating DVD's for downloaded TV shows?

Use an external DVD recorder.

HD Compression Advice?

Hi everyone! I'm fairly new to the business and I'm hoping you all can help me figure out the best HD compression(s) to use. I have a client that's wanting to move from the DV world into the HD universe. They want to produce a b-roll dvd to distribute to various media outlets. Needless to say, the HD compressions need to be compatible with the many kinds of editing software that may be used. (eg. Avid, Final Cut, Vegas) I'm also looking for a compression that is efficient (small file size) so that it can all fit on one dvd. In the past we offered numerous compressions (Avid,DVCpro,FCP,H264) but if we could get away with 1 HD compression that would be compatible with all and efficient, that would be ideal. I know I'm asking a lot but any input would be helpful. Thanks in advance!

Hi Kristal,
welcome to Apple discussion area,
With regard to your post I think that by b-roll, in this case, you are referring to what is actually called stock footage.
If you want clients to buy your product you should sell it at its highest resolution to start with, then do some conversions to offer HD footage at SD too.
Since you are new to the business one or two posts may not be enough to take you through the process from start to end, but this and other posts could get you started.
Final Cut Studio comes with an amazing software called Compressor, which is what you need to make any HD>SD conversion, apart from a full res export of the footage you intend to sell.
HD is a very vague word.
Also you may want to distinguish between editing and delivery formats.
example: DV, DVCPRO HD are editing formats. H.264 is a delivery format (yeah, it can deliver amazing quality).
DVCPRO HD is perfect for FCP not so much for Premiere (to give you an example).
The core of successful stock footage market is outstanding image and concept quality provided in any pro format and desirable frame size.
DVD data? could work as an option but BetaSP, Digibeta, MiniDV, DVCAM, DVCPRO, HDCAM could offer a range from which a client can choose from besides a fine QT.
Make sure the footage you want to sell looks as great as it can and start from DV. Before you sell thousands or more you gotta sell hundreds to feed the business and understand what it takes to achieve what you plan.
As a side plain answer what works with most editing systems is something like Uncompressed but it is not really a practical choice in your case.
L.

Need Compression advice

Hi-
I am new to DVDSP.
I created a project in FCP- 6 minutes long, three talking heads (one guy is animated), some Livetype screens and still images that were given some motion. Just talking, no music.
It was shot with miniDV.
My question- do I send to compressor and at what specific settings? I used DVD 90 minute at Best quality and it isn't looking amazing. Audio was compressed to Dolby. Sounds great.
Once in DVDSP, when I build and format, one pas , VBR one pass or two pass?
You are talking to a newbie, so speak sllllooooooowwwwly in English.
Don't assume I'll know everything. Please go step by step.
I'd appreciate NOT getting "RTFM" responses.
Thank you so much!

DVD 90 is going to be a safe bet for you. You can fiddle with it and get a bit more quality, but then you could run into issues where the DVD won't play on some DVD Players (it has to do with the "bit rate": how much information the player has to read at one time, so if your DVD player is a slow reader, like me, it get's lost with that much information going by at one time).
Two Pass VBR (variable bit rate) is going to give you a higher quality (that's why Best quality in Compressor is Two Pass) because the computer is looking at the data twice and seeing how it can make it better. ...I think.
Remember, a DVD is using a Compressed video file, which means it will look less amazing than your MiniDV footage in some ways.
Hope that helps!
~Luke

Need information/advice on dataware house compression on 11g

We have an initiative to compress our ever growing datawarehouse.
OS level is AIX, db version is 11gr1, and going to go to 11gr2.
We would like to know where I can get a link regarding what is best to apply regrading compression in datawarehouse db.
I tried oracle documentation, and not sure where to look .
and plus are the compression a licensed product? any performance concerns? and any practical advices are highly appreciated here.

Table compression does not require any additional licenses the key is that the only compression is done via direct insert pretty good for a data warehouse. To get and maintain compression for regular inserts and for updates an Advanced Compression license is required.
Performance for inserts using direct method does not appear to have any large impact to load performance, however updates and regular inserts do take a bit of a hit when using compression. Queries that have any significant IO operations appear to benefit the most from compression and the larger the number of IO operations the higher the performance impact tends to be. Keep in mind that compression does take a CPU hit for the compression and de-compression operations, while this does not appear to be really large it is a consideration if your system have CPU resource issues already.
I have found that partitioning and compression when used together offers the best performance when accessing using the partition key and partitioning offers benefits for management as well, found range/interval partitioning offered the best management benefits for a data warehouse.
Some references besides the documentation which is a decent place to start, also google searches on Oracle Advanced Compression returns tons of results:
http://www.techrepublic.com/whitepapers/oracle-database-11gr2-reduces-storage-costs-and-improves-performance/1728273
Looks at table compression and 11g Advanced compression
http://myeverydayoracle.blogspot.com/2010/11/oracle-10g-compression-vs-11gs-advanced.html
Basic Exaplinations and examples for compression
http://practical-tech.blogspot.com/2012/01/oracle-11gr2-table-level-compression.html
Partitioning
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/bi-datawarehousing/twp-partitioning-11gr2-2010-10-189137.pdf
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/options/partitioning/ds-partitioning-11gr2-2009-09-134551.pdf

Advice for modifying a compressed file without expanding its size?

Hello. Fairly new to video editing, so your advice is appreciated.
I've got a 720x480 WMV3 .AVI video clip which runs about 1/2 hour at a rate of 666kbps. The file size is about 75MB.
In trying to adjust the brightness/contrast on the file and resave it, the file sizes for different formats all shoot way up. The file has a heavy amount of compression to start with. My thinking is that 'high-quality' settings within a codec will actually store too much information, while 'low-quality' settings will further compress the file and result in loss of quality.
Is there any rule of thumb to dealing with an already-compressed file, editing it, and resaving it (without a significant loss of quality) and without greatly increasing file size?
Thanks in advance,
John

John,
You are starting with a heavily-compressed file, the WMV, so original data has been lost.
When you output your Timeline, you will again need to apply heavy-compression, to keep the file size down, and also experiment with the Bit-Rate.
The only aspects, that will address file size, is Duration (pretty much already set), and Bit-Rate. The lower the Bit-Rate, the smaller the file, BUT at the expense of Quality. As you have already taken a hit on Quality, with the initial WMV compression, and you will loose even more Quality, when your re-compress, you need to study the output files, to make sure that they are still satisfactory for delivery.
If you can do the editing required in Windows Movie Maker, it might be a better program to use, as it is built around the WMV specs. Not sure if it has the Effects and control that you need, however.
Good luck,
Hunt

I need some advice on compressing a FCP file to archive in Premiere

Here's the situation. I have edited a few projects on FCP - they range from 1 - 2 hours. The client wants a copy to archive on their PC, which has Premiere Pro. I had originally compressed these files to the highest quality H.264, but this resulted in HUGE file sizes that I can't burn onto a data DVD or transfer to the PC due to the FAT32 limitations. I would love some advice on if anyone's done this before and what settings you've used - it needs to look really good so that if needed, this video could be edited more in the future. Thanks for the advice!

Send them tape.

Advice on compressing screen capture movies for web ?

Hello everyone,
I just am curious about what is the best way to go for compressing screen captures so that they maintain the best clarity for text. I've gone back and forth between MP4 (improved) and quicktime movies set to h.264... I am just curious what the general opinion here of what is best to use? It seems that MP4 improved produces larger files with less quality... Also it was a little confusing to see that compressor's h264 option is for "apple devices" or "dvd studio pro" and thus doesn't offer streaming as an option as it does with mp4-- so the only way to properly produce h264 files for web is to use the quicktime option and select h264 as it's compression type? Is this correct?
-patrick

What is the frame size of your source clip, and what frame size have you chosen for your output?
Exactly what settings have you tried so far? Please share some details
I would recommend using the Apple > Other Workflows > Web > Download > QuickTime 7 compatible > H.264 LAN as a starting point.
Set a frame size (i.e. 1280x800, 1024x768 or 768x480, if you have a widescreen computer display) and adjust the video bitrate accordingly. The frame size you choose, should be divisible by 16, 8 or 4, for best quality. Have a look at this article for more info on that: http://www.flashsupport.com/books/fvst/files/tools/video_sizes.html
For more info about H.246 and macroblocks, have a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264
For more details on getting the most out of H.264, have a look at the Apple tutorial Creating Amazing Video Content with H.264.
1. Find the frame size you would like to end up with
2. Adjust the video bitrate accordingly (set the keyframe interval to automatic)
3. Enable Frame Controls in the Inspector window, and set the Resize Filter to Better or Best (gives you much better quality on downscaling, than without frame controls - do a test and see for your self)
An other good tip, is to set an in/out point in the Preview window in Compressor, with a duration of maybe about 10 secs. That way you do not need to encode the whole clip just to test your settings. Add multiple settings, before you submit the batch. When it is done, see which one you think looks the best compared to file size.

Workflow advice please -- NEF, DNG or NEG compressed

Thanks to kgelner and others I see that the DNG file format is not the 'universal' format that I thought it was. It still takes camera specific knowledge to develop a DNG file.
DNG does have two clear advantages over NEF or CR2 files--Adobe has provided a specification for where to embedd metadata into a DNG file. Something that Canon and Nikon don't provide for their RAW files. Aperture makes this advantage seem insignificant since it keeps its metadata in the internal database--sending out RAW files to clients or coworkers doesn't seem like something I want make part of my workflow.
The one advantage left to the DNG file for a committed Aperture user might be the fact that DNG supports a lossless compression. When I use this option on my D2x files they shrink from about 19Mb to 10~11Mb. A big storage advantage, it also speeds up hard-drive access time for loading files on my system! This does require an extra processing step before importing.
Nikon has a compressed NEF option that they say: "has almost no efffect on image quality." That doesn't sound lossless to me, but it does double the number of images you can fit on a CF card.
BIG QUESTION: Is there any reason to belive that Aperture will develop a better quality image if it begins with a NEF file rather than a DNG? Of course I can shoot a bunch of test images and compare for hours (still may do that) but that doesn't always reveal the truth either. (Some test images may compress well other important images shot later may compress badly.)
I am eager to see what the collective brain has to say to this.

BIG QUESTION: Is there any reason to belive that Aperture will develop a better quality image if it begins with a NEF file rather than a DNG?< </div>
No reason to speculate on or to wait for Apple to do anything.
Use the format you want to use, find an application that suits your needs, might not be Aperture.
bogiesan

Compression rate advice

I need to export a compressed file from FCP, that runs at just over 1hr, to iDVD via iMOVIE. (I haven't got my head around DVD Studio Pro yet!) What is the advised compression rate for this transfer? I usually use DVD PAL but it's too big and requires a dual-layer disc. I'm sure there is a different, more popular, choice of compression that I can use. The files will need to be able to stand alone and be importable into iMOVIE so that I can create a an iDVD project. Any ideas?

Make a QT Movie, not self contained, then drag the
file into iDVD. You dont need to use iMovie unless
there is something in there you want that FCP doesn't
offer... (Can't think of what that might be though.)
Thansk for replying. Before I do that - will a QT movie recognise chapter markers? I want to break it down in a scene selection menu.

Advice for compressing

I want to take DV NTSC video and export it for DVD SP. The video is basically a series of interviews, with no music, just voice narration. There will be many of these interviews, so I want to fit the maximum amount of video on each DVD because I will ultimately have hours and hours of it.
1. Is the encoder in FCP sufficient enough to compress this or should I still take it into Compressor?
2. Will importing it as a reference file instead of a self-contained movie into DVD SP make the final DVD file smaller?
3. Is there any reason to compress audio as AC3, being that it is voice narration?
Thank you.

1. Is the encoder in FCP sufficient enough to compress this or should I still take it into Compressor?
It is the same encoding engine, but going out self contained gives you more control. I would export self contained, and choose AC3/Dolby2 audio regardless because it permits more video minutes to be contained on each DVD. Aiff uncompressed audio occupies seven times more disc space than AC3.

Advice on Dolby speech compression settings seeked

I'm outputting talking head clips to DVD (mixed at -12dB and EQ'd in FCP with average level at - 6 and peaks approaching 0). I've used standard dolby settings and the sound is significantly lower in volume than an average TV show which might be a problem for people switching between the two. I think it's because I haven't properly tweaked all the variables in dolby inspector. Could someone advise me as to what what would be the best settings? Specifically:
Audio Coding Mode
Bit Stream Mode
Dialog Normalization
plus whatever is under Bitstream tab and under Preprocessing tab.
I know I should just experiment but I have a deadline, tons of other stuff to do and there are too many variables to play with.

So, in essence, it is the generated JPG from the RAW file that looks like crap when the tone compensation, sharpening, saturation, etc are all set to none in the D200??? I notice a big difference with the thumbnail view, I wasn't sure if it effected the actual RAW file. It seems to me though that I have noticed from time to time that some of my images do not need sharpening (since my camera settings are on 2+ sharpening), however, when I increase the sharpening in Lightroom I begin to see the halo effect due to the increase sharpening. With that being said, I set my camera sharpening back to normal and I will have to try it and see what I get (I have not shot the camera since the change).

No sound and am unable to compress

I have a Sony Handycam and have noticed that when I download my videos to my desktop there is no sound. I downloaded MPEG Streamclip and it pretty much took care of the problem, but it has also created new issues.
A. Once I convert the video through MPEG I am not able to put the movie into imovie, whereas if I don't convert it (leave it w/out sound) then I can.
B. If I were to try to import clips directly from my Sony Handycam the program says I still need to plug in my camera (even though it is). It's just not reading it. I don't see a way to set it to "VCR" as I've seen demonstrated in the demo.
I am ultimately trying to compress some videos to post on youtube and also would like to burn dvd's. But it seems that beacause I can't ge through imovie I am also not able to work w/the videos in idvd.
Also, is there a way to convert .mpg's from my sony digital camera (I took some small videos w/it. This isn't my video cam)? When I pulled those videos off the camera they were mpg's and I'm not seeing a way to convert them.
Any advice would be appreciated. I've been working on this for about 3 months and have made absolutely no progess. *pulls out hair*
Thanks!
nicollette

Sorry for all the edits, I'll just tack on the new question here.
With SC open to "export" my setting choices are as follows:
Compression - set to: DV (DV25)
Standard - set to: NTSC, 720x480,29.97fps with PAL option in drop-down box. I'm think PAL is for non-US DVD's?
*Aspect Ratio* - set to: 4:3 with a 16:9 option in drop-down box.
*I also have an option to "check" any of the following:*
Frame Blending
Better Downscaling (currently checked)
Deinterlace Video
Resample Audio to 48KHZ (currently checked)
Split DV stream in Segment (use this option to prepare the stream for imovie) currently not checked but I now realize it needs to be.
*"Deselect (the following) for progressive movies -*
Interlaced Scaling (currently checked)
Reinterlace Chroma (currently checked)
Rotation - set to: No
Zoom: 100% X/Y: 1 Center: 0,0
Cropping (currently unchecked)
Presets
*Reset All*
Adjustments...
I'm not sure what most of these settings do/affect. Is there something online that explains each of these steps? To export an mpg1 for use to burn as a dvd (just copy directly from desktop, not using a program) or for use in imovie/idvd I'm not sure where the settings need to be before I export.

Hardware Upgrade Advice for HD editing and CS4

Dear friends,
I realize that there are many posts on hardware requirements, recommendations, etc... Perhaps this is my problem, there is too much info.
Here is my scenario and I would love some expert advice.
What I Have:
I have been editing my home movies since Premiere 6.5 and have been using CS3 for the past couple of years.
My current PC is an HP 9100t which has a ...
Quad Core 6600 2.4GHz processor
3GB RAM (max RAM is 8GB according to the stats for the motherboard)
500 GB System Drive
I recently added a 1.5 TB SATA Seagate Barracuda drive
Also have external 1TB WD connected via USB
Windows Vista Home Premium (32-Bit) OS
What I Just Got:
Recently purchased a Sony HDR-XR 500v and just love the HD picture quality. But now I want to edit the AVCHD files and thus upgrade to CS4
What I'd like to Know:
I'm tired of buying a new PC every couple of years, this machine is 16 months old and runs just fine.
Do you think I can upgrade the processor, add RAM and move to Windows 7 64-bit and happily edit my HD movies?
Or, do I need to once again try and convince my wife to let me buy a new PC
My Upgrade thoughts: I could Buy these items...
Intel Quad Core 9600 processor 2.8Ghz (the HP motherboard supports the Intel Yorkfield processors)
Max out the RAM at 8GB
Upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit (I actually pre-ordered this for $49 a few weeks ago)
and of course upgrade to Premiere CS4
DO you think a few hundred dollars spent on upgrades will extend my editing life for another year or two?
Thanks so much!
Paul

but I was surprised to see you comment that it's pointless to upconvert video before working on it.
It can easily be you misunderstood my intention. It is somewhat like people often thinking that converting from a compressed format to a lossless format will restore the original quality. That is nonsense, because what has been thrown away during compression, can never be regained by uncompressing. That is an expectation similar to orange juice being uncompressed will restore the original oranges.
My intention with my remark was to emphasize that going from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2 will not restore original data or improve the image, only increase storage requirements.
But clearly that is not what you meant. You are talking about chroma keying and similar being best done on 4:2:2 or even better on 4:4:4 material. You are completely correct, but keep in mind, and that is what I tried to convey, is that starting out from 4:2:0 and upconverting to 4:2:2 or 4:4:4 will not restore original quality, it will still be (slightly less than) the 4:2:0 quality, because of the rounding errors in the algorithms. You will increase storage space significantly by this upconverting, but if you want to do any chroma keying, the quality of the keys will be significantly better than when performed on 4:2:0 material and the loss when again converting to 4:2:0 for final delivery will be significantly less than had you used chroma keys on 4:2:0 material.
I hope this explains it somewhat.

Please help-Trying to compress to Mpeg-2 for Convention, also resizing issues

Hello,
I just recently finished making an AMV in Adobe Premiere 5.5, and I am having trouble trying to figure out how to compress it into an Mpeg-2 source for a competition/convention.
I also have these massive black borders on the side of my video that I know is probably due to improper resizing on my part, and although I have tried to remedy this with a new avisynth script of the exported uncompressed AVI (before compressing to MPEG-2), whenever I try to run the avisynth script in either VirtualDubMod or TMPGEnc (the converting program recommended by: http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/mpegforcons/) it crashes, although the original video does work.
This is the avisynth script I have created for the post-video:
FFVideoSource("C:\Users\Freeman\Desktop\Fight the Power.avi")
FFCopyrightInfringement("C:\Users\Freeman\Desktop\Fight the Power.avi")
AssumeFPS("23.976")
SSRC(48000)
LanczosResize(720,352)
AddBorders(0,64,0,64)
per the recommendations from the guide listed below
I do not know if the resizing I have set up in the new avisynth script will fix my resizing issues, and I would like to improve that as much as possible, so if someone could clarify for me, that would be greatly appreciated.
You may also notice some audio issues throughout the video, however on further playback this never appears to happen in the same place. I believe this is caused by poor audio quality, and I have a friend of mine working on setting up a lossless source that I will try to recompress with the video before friday, however if someone else might know what is causing this, any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Here is the current MPEG-2 I have, however for obvious reasons, I do not consider it acceptable as of yet:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=IIKYWRXF
The original export from Premiere is Microsoft AVI Uncompressed, and then attempted to convert to MPEG-2 (I tried multiple settings, they all have the same sizing issues), and as I said before, no matter what I try to do with the avisynth script, it crashes.
I have even tried taking out every line from the new avisynth script except for the first two detailing the location of the video and audio, however this does nothing, it still crashes.
I had to convert all my original source avisynth scripts to AVI files (that are massive, as I am editing from 52 episodes of Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood), and so editing the original scripts is impossible at this point, because to my knowledge, that would mean I would have to reconvert them all to AVI, which took over 16 hours, and then that would probably make me have to re-edit this entire video (which if you look at it, based on length and how much work I've put into it: is impossible, especially given the time constraints).
So anything that I can do to fix this will have to be done to the export from Premiere, unless there is a way to work with the AVI's that I made from the avisynth scripts.
The source is primarily 16:9 DVD (Fullmetal Alchemist) and very few parts from a 4:3 DVD (Naruto). (You can recognize these parts in the video, it is whenever someone is rowing in a boat during the lyrics "Row Row")
The avisynth script for all the fullmetal alchemist DVD's is as follows:
mpeg2source("F:\DVD RIPS\Music Video Rips\Brotherhood\Disc 1 (1-7)\MainMovie\FMA_BROTHERHOOD_P1_D1\FMAB 1-7.d2v", cpu=4)
ConvertToYV12()
Spline36Resize(848,480)
#TTempSmooth()
FastLineDarkenMod()
LSFmod(strength=120)
LUTDeRainbow()
And the avisynth script for the one Naruto DVD is as follows:
mpeg2source("F:\DVD RIPS\Music Video Rips\Random\Row Row\MainMovie\ROW ROW\VTS_01_1.d2v")
TFM()
TDecimate()
Spline36Resize(848,636)
Crop(0,78, 0,-78)
These recommendations came from what I could figure out from:
http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtech31/
If anyone is curious, the song is "Libera me from Hell", and it is 44100 from what I could tell when I ran it in WINAMP (I converted it from mp3 to wav through WINAMP, if there is a better way that I am unaware of, please let me know).
I know this is extremely long, and thank you anyone who has taken their time to look through it, it is greatly appreciated.
The deadline for this is friday (5/20/11), so I need help with this ASAP and thanks,
Dexter

Dexter,
Those "black borders," if they are visible in the Program Monitor, are most likely due to a mis-match between the Source Files and the Sequence Preset.
If they are only showing up upon Export, then there is likely a mis-match between your Sequence and your Export, and could be either with the Aspect Ratio, or if using non-square pixels, the PAR (Pixel Aspect Ratio).
I'll defer any commens on AVISynth to the experts here.
Good luck,
Hunt

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