Does anyone else get blocking with Nero AVC?

[InorganicMatter]

Hey all,

I'm trying to find a way to compress my DVD collection to something a little more space efficient than uncompressed VOB dumps. I'm looking at H.264. I tried x264 with meGUI, and although the results were fantastic, there was just too much user interaction required for one conversion. I'm looking at Nero Recode now, since it's GUI is much nicer and it is easier to que up lots of movies with minimal input.

Unfortunately, I'm getting a lot of blocking around the edges of stuff with my converts. I'm compressing a DVD down to Standard AVC at 2mbps. I've got the deblocking strength set at -1, should I increase it to -2? I've seemed to notice all that does is fuzz up the film.

[Manao]

2 mbps is a relatively high bitrate, so you shouldn't get any visible artifacts. The fact that you do see artifacts let me think something is going wrong. Can you post a screen shot showing the issue ?

Apart from that, the higher the deblocking strength, the stronger the inloop deblocking, so if you have blocking, increase the strength, don't reduce it.

[JohnV]

What other settings you are using? 2pass best/extra decision?
Changing deblock strength to -2 is not increasing the strength, on the contrary it decreases it..
Try setting it to 0. You could also try HDTV AVC and enable 8x8 transform.

[InorganicMatter]

What other settings you are using? 2pass best/extra decision?
Changing deblock strength to -2 is not increasing the strength, on the contrary it decreases it..
Try setting it to 0. You could also try HDTV AVC and enable 8x8 transform.

2-pass.
Best.
2 Reference Frames
300 GOP
3 B-frames

[JohnV]

What's your source material? Screenshots?

[InorganicMatter]

What's your source material? Screenshots?

Rush R30. Here, normal sized with deblocking disabled as suggested:

http://inorganicmatter.cortiaus.net/SmallBlocking.jpg

Notice how around Geddy Lee's head and shirt there is blocking? A bigger image that better shows it:

http://inorganicmatter.cortiaus.net/BigBlocking.jpg

I would expect that kind of blocking from a 500kbps encode, but NOT at 2mbps! What gives?

[ToS_Maverick]

welcome to AVC, the codec that blocks in flat areas ;)

[JohnV]

Rush R30. Here, normal sized with deblocking disabled as suggested:I didn't suggest you disable deblocking, but set the strenght to value 0. Try 8x8 for that clip.

What version of Recode you are using? Are you able to put a short source clip online? Wonder if the clip has got properly deinterlaced.

[InorganicMatter]

welcome to AVC, the codec that blocks in flat areas ;)
What do you mean by flat? And what other codec would you suggest? I'm using AVC because I've had the best results with it, and my PSP can play the files it create.

Edit - something else, and its kind of stupid that I didn't say this originally since that was the whole purpose of me starting this thread (:p): I only get this in Nero, x264 with the same general settings looks FLAWLESS.
I didn't suggest you disable deblocking, but set the strenght to value 0. Try 8x8 for that clip.

What version of Recode you are using? Are you able to put a short source clip online? Wonder if the clip has got properly deinterlaced.
Here the the clip with the above settings:
http://inorganicmatter.cortiaus.net/R30.mp4 (bear with my connection, Comcast sucks)
I'm trying to avoid 8x8 since my PSP won't play AVC with 8x8, but I'll give it a whirl in a second.

[InorganicMatter]

Here it is with 8x8:
http://inorganicmatter.cortiaus.net/R308x8.mp4
Yeah, all the problems gone. And the convert times shot up. And it won't work on my PSP. :(

[JohnV]

If you can't use 8x8, have you tried if extra decision quality makes any difference?
Also one thing you can try is disabling some/all psychovisual enhancements.

[Dark Shikari]

Try using x264 with the AQ patch; it helps avoid blocking in flat areas at the cost of increased bitrate.

Use --aq-strength 0.5 or higher and see if that helps.