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Old 14th May 2013, 13:41   #12  |  Link
osgZach
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Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: USA
Posts: 676
If you want to record PC footage, you are going to have to suffer through the color loss. Unless you have some really fancy hardware, or filtering scripts / know-how to do a proper downsampling of the color and make corrections, etc.. Which is more trouble than its worth most of the time.

If you are recording something you intend to archive, then by all means record in Lagarith RGB 4:4:4 and keep it stored that way. Because if this is something you will distribute for years you can always go back and use the lossless source down the road, to create a new H264 or w/e codec we're using then, when devices finally support more color formats.

On a lesser note, if you are simply recording desktop activities to show off stuff and the clip is disposable. You may be better served encoding to Lagarith in YV12 - it will take a lot less of a hit on your CPU / Performance during recording.
/rant
I don't think anyone knows what Youtube really uses, other than that they have some stupid and convoluted system that almost always re-encodes uploaded videos (even if they would play fine) with some custom settings and locked to 30 FPS.

At most they probably support High Profile 4.1 for something like 1080p (or 3D?) content. But in general Main Profile, I guess, is intended to be the minimum industry standard for compatability and thus everyone encodes for the lowest common denominator to reach as many potential customers / consumers as possible.

It's really sad that we have no real mass-appeal video hosting like Youtube and similar sites, that supports modern features for videos such as support for different FPS video files, VFR video files, 4:4:4 color (seriously at least support 4:2:2!). Youtube supporters like to argue about reaching the most people and making sure everything works on every device, which I get to a certain extent.. But it should not be that hard to support a fall-back compatability encode, while allowing more advanced stuff for 480p/720p/1080p etc. if the device reports it can handle playback.

Even better yet, serve the standard compatability encode, and just like you have a "HD" button to watch in HD -- add an "ADV" button for "Advanced Video Features". The worst that can happen is the video stops playing because your device sucks.. Oh well, go back to the standard encode you were watching.

Granted there are a FEW sites out there which allow more advanced videos to be uploaded, without touching them and sometimes even stream them. But they are either woefully inadequate for a general Public service like Youtube provides, or they cost money and probably come with all kinds of restrictions on space/bandwidth or some such.
/rant

Last edited by osgZach; 14th May 2013 at 13:45.
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