What settings to use to maintain DVD quality? [Archive]

View Full Version : What settings to use to maintain DVD quality?

unfortunateson

5th March 2006, 20:55

Does anyone know the best x264 encoder settings to maintain dvd quality? I use MeGUI and have encoded a DVD using the "HQ - Slowest" preset @ 1000kbps, but the result looked a bit washed out, smeared, had macroblocks, etc.

I upped the kbps to 1800, and it did not seem to look any better (although the filesize got 400MB bigger).

And another question(s) - Should I let the avisynth script generator automatically resize my video? Would that cause quality degradation? What is "Retain anamorphic resolution and set SAR in encoder"? Will I get higher quality using a noise filter/mpeg2 deblocking/color correction?

Revgen

5th March 2006, 22:52

It really depends upon the movie your encoding. One movie I have looks worse if I encode it anywhere below 4000 Kbps, despite the fact that it was originally encoded at 5000Kbps in Mpeg2.

Other films can do fine at 1500kbps. Anime and cartoons can look great at 700kbps. My Beavis and Butthead encode really doesn't look any different than the DVD at this bitrate.

Bottom Line: Just experiment with the settings untill it works the way you want it.

bond

5th March 2006, 23:44

reencoding will always hurt the quality

Sharktooth

5th March 2006, 23:45

qp 0... will mantain exactly the same quality... but it will be bigger than the original :)

bond

5th March 2006, 23:50

ok ;)

Sagittaire

6th March 2006, 02:36

And another question(s) - Should I let the avisynth script generator automatically resize my video? Would that cause quality degradation? What is "Retain anamorphic resolution and set SAR in encoder"? Will I get higher quality using a noise filter/mpeg2 deblocking/color correction?

Anamorphic encoding don't use square pixel. DVD PAL 16/9 (DAR) use 720*576 with 16:11 pixel form (PAR).

IMO I you want original DVD quality (in practice for my eyes) with good final size use 720*576 native resolution with --crf 20 --sar 16:11

Little example (http://multimediacom.free.fr/Video/sample.mp4)

Oline 61

6th March 2006, 03:29

What kind of processing did you do on that clip before encoding? Denoise, sharpen, etc?

unfortunateson

6th March 2006, 03:51

The DVD I am encoding is a live concert, the video seems to have been passed through a sepia filter, and has many dark places, which macroblocks are easily spotted after encoding, even when using MeGUI's MPEG2 deblocking filter. These were simple to see, even on my last test @ 4200kbps.

IMO I you want original DVD quality (in practice for my eyes) with good final size use 720*576 native resolution with --crf 20 --sar 16:11

I am a bit of a newbie here, could you explain how and where to set up those parameters? Also my DVD is NTSC (IIRC that means a resolution of 720x480?)

kotrtim

6th March 2006, 04:32

unfortunateson

6th March 2006, 04:46

Did you resize the source?
It is recommended to resize like 720x480 -> 704x480 or something to remove the MPEG-2 blocks, that's what the pro said so i just listen

get the calculator here
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=107039&highlight=aspect+ratio+calculator

key in width x height of the encoded size: 720x480
MAR = 1.823 : 1 (ITU standard) for DVD-video, without cropping

finally you get --sar 254:209

thats a lot to get my head around, and where would I type the code in? The avisynth script? :confused:

The DVD is full screen, but MeGUI wants to resize it to 640x480. I unclicked the suggest resolution and set it back to 720x480.

Sagittaire

6th March 2006, 06:28

1) Use the same avisynth script without resize and crop
2) Use --crf 20 --sar 12:11 in your x264 CLI

unfortunateson

6th March 2006, 07:18

well, i tried that, but the video did not turn out any better. The macroblocks around the very dark areas were still clearly visible, and I am noticing interlace artifacts occuring every few seconds.
:confused:

kotrtim

6th March 2006, 07:39

--sar is not gonna affect the video quality, it is just an information needed by the player, to strecth your video into correct frame size

720x480 is 3x2
but the coorect size should be 16x9, not 3x2, --sar is stroed so that the player can play the video corectly, if you don't specify sar, evrything will thinner and taller

try to read this

http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/aspectratios.htm

Sharktooth

6th March 2006, 10:37

what x264 build are you using?