MeGUI Custom x264/AVC video profiles. [Archive] - Page 12

ScootyPuffJr

30th January 2007, 22:42

i think you didnt read the megui guide...
first of all you need to use the bitrate calculator (to set your desired filesize) or manually configure the profile to set your desired bitrate... obviously before encoding...
however you better :readguid:

Actually, I did read the guide (Berrinam's) and 2 others specific to iPod encoding, so maybe I'm just not understanding things correctly. All the guides referece ABR and setting a desired bitrate as you described above. I haven't seen any threads talking about using the Constant Quality setting, which is what I want, not a constant bitrate/filesize. I saw a couple of references to using -2pass to 'optimize' the file size, so I thought I'd try it since the documentation says that 1-pass encouding can have 'unpredictable' results on file sizes.

So I guess my actual question should have been 'Does anyone use the Constant Quality setting in MeGUI?' (especially for iPod Encoding) ... and would anyone give me pros and cons for it since I only see references to ABR in all the guides/posts?

thanks,
- spj

Hobojobo

30th January 2007, 23:47

I found a workaround.
I use megui 0.2.3.2193 to crop and set up the jobs and megui 0.2.4.xxxx (turn off avisynth preview) to do the encoding jobs.

:)
Thanks again to the devs of megui and x264.

migrena

31st January 2007, 01:20

i have the same problem but im writing scripts by hand so its not an issue, i will try TwoTad solution (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=926762#post926762) tomorrow and check what plugin may be causing troubles

@ScootyPuffJr im using lossless from time to time but thats not for ipod ;)

check

31st January 2007, 10:07

@scooty, what exactly is your problem with using cq for the ipod? It should work more or less identically to a 2pass encode as long as the bitrate doesnt' get too high.

ScootyPuffJr

1st February 2007, 08:24

@check,

I'm actually not having any problems with cq encoding so far in any of my tests - it's working really well. I was wondering if there were problems with it on the iPod only because all the posts and Guides I had seen referenced only ABR, never any cq. I am getting ready to encode a bunch of stuff, and was hoping to find out if there was some bug I havn't run across in my testing before I started (file compatability issues, etc..). It's try #2, and I'd like to avoid try #3 :D

I'm using cq's of 18-22, so I don't expect the bitrates to be too high - they were fine under ffmpeg, I just had audio sync problems with FF/IVTC'd content in ffmpeg so I switched to x264.

JarrettH

8th May 2007, 05:02

Is -2 -1 still recommended for the HQ profiles? They are the defaults still in the ones I have.

check

8th May 2007, 08:40

deblocking is heavily influenced by whether your tastes lean towards mosquito noise or smearing. Lower settings reduce smearing, but leave you with more residual crud (because the deblocker is used less), whereas higher settings do the opposite. I usually use values close to 0,0 myself, and when the final quantizers are above 20 it doesn't really make much difference anyway.

TwoToad

8th May 2007, 15:24

I don't suppose there is a PD-PSP 3.30+ profile in the works? I'm not sure what all the new firmware supports (or if it's just a resolution change).

edekba

19th May 2007, 17:54

I have a question. IN the profile PD-Xbox_Hires, is their a max bitrate?

In meGUI, i set a bitrate at about 1500kb/s i believe. However after the encoding was finished, the filesize corisponded to something like only 1000kb/s.

ie. file should've been 700mb compared to 500mb.

edekba

9th June 2007, 08:29

Is there a profile for the new Apple TV? Or do i just use the ipod profiles?

Deinorius

9th June 2007, 10:19

The Quicktime Profile up to 720p should be fine because it's Quicktime what Apple uses in AppleTV.

amix

9th June 2007, 23:20

Added "Common Encoding" profiles.
Added "Anime Encoding" profiles.
Added "1 Pass Encoding" profiles.
suggestions are welcome.

:thanks:

Hmmm...this is an older thread. Not sure how actual your offer still is. What I would like to see is a profile for different publishing tasks, like

* Webcast (very low size with maximum quality, only a face, moving sparingly, but needs details in the face, audio can be as low as 11KHz/8bit mono)
* Screencast (like Webcast, may be similare to Cartoon/Anime ?)
* and maybe something, that is best choice for later encoding into Flash Video (FLV)

Of course I can do this myself, but I know zero-nada-nothing about all the things behind the scenes and have zero experience. What I have found to be quite ok for Webcasts is a little profile I did with PSP9Video. But it may be even better if some Pro does it right. And since you asked... ;)

Also it is pretty difficult to get information on encoding for Webcasts. I asked on Usenet several times but got no reply.

With all these codecs I'd also be interested, what is the best to find being supported on the web-browsers. I guess x264 is ok, these days ? (decodable by Quicktime or WMP browser plugin ?)

outlaw55

14th June 2007, 14:35

I don't suppose there is a PD-PSP 3.30+ profile in the works? I'm not sure what all the new firmware supports (or if it's just a resolution change).
It would have to be a new one, I tried all I could to get an encode out but it wouldn't work, also the 720x480 videos use Level 3 (at least the PSP Video 9 encodes that WORK use Level 3).

EDIT: Found the problem, the PSP will not play files with b-frames at the resolution of 720x480 ;)!

michaelhill

21st June 2007, 20:08

Hey Shark,

thanks for the profiles, they helped me to learn the codec and its possibilities. I mostly use HQ slower with if needed 1 or 2 adjustments for your standard profile and it works fine, great results. Is it still not good to encode with 2 treads? My rips look crystal clear with 2 treads so i suppose it is safe to use now?

The other question i have is about the anime profiles. I use them exaclty as you provided them, only i changed the treads to 2. For movies like Cars from pixar, i used the AE good quality profile. I had a very good looking rip on 2cd's. Absolutlty stunning quality. Now i do read somewhere on this forum, forgot where exaclty, that it is advised to use one of the HQ profiles? Why is that? The results I got are good. But will i get better results with the HQ profiles?

thanks again for your work, since i discovered MeGui/x264 and your profiles I have banned xvid/divx for good from my pc.
Encoding takes long, but its worth the wait.:thanks:

SpAwN_gUy

22nd June 2007, 08:02

thanks for the profiles, they helped me to learn the codec and its possibilities. I mostly use HQ slower with if needed 1 or 2 adjustments for your standard profile and it works fine, great results. Is it still not good to encode with 2 treads? My rips look crystal clear with 2 treads so i suppose it is safe to use now?well,.. as in the source code of meGUI.. it does NOT matter.. what number of threads you use.. 'cause meGUI internally overrides (on Job addition) number of threads, determining(is it coorect in Eng ??? ) the number of Cores by using WinAPI function. and this number does NOT influences quality of the encode, just the speed. (some say in good way, some say it is not so "parralel" -> ELDER )

The other question i have is about the anime profiles. I use them exaclty as you provided them, only i changed the treads to 2. For movies like Cars from pixar, i used the AE good quality profile. I had a very good looking rip on 2cd's. Absolutlty stunning quality. Now i do read somewhere on this forum, forgot where exaclty, that it is advised to use one of the HQ profiles? Why is that? The results I got are good. But will i get better results with the HQ profiles?AE profiles are for anime .. and Pixar's Cars is NOT an Anime ... it is CG (Computer Grafix) .. so it is more like Movie (ex. Star Wars -> tons of CG = Movie)
so HQ - sutes best.. for Cars and Shreck.. and "all.the.Pixar"

anime profiles sute best for something like.. "Aladdin" ;) and "Darkwing Duck" .. oh,.. good old days of.. sorry :) .. and tons of Japanese animation (NARUTO, Howl's moving Castle, Spirited Away)

michaelhill

22nd June 2007, 12:25

thanks for your reply

I did have good encode with the anime profile for pixar's cars.
I am going to re-encode it with HQ-Slower and see if there is a anvious difference.

omf

17th July 2007, 17:55

Found the problem, the PSP will not play files with b-frames at the resolution of 720x480 ;)!

It will play 720x480 with b-frames. My PSP profile has 3 B-frames. Just turn off "B-Pyramid" and "RDO for B-frames"

Manao

17th July 2007, 18:13

Just turn off "B-Pyramid" and "RDO for B-frames"If B-RDO has an influence on PSP playback, it's a bug, and should be reported as such. But I really doubt it actually influences the playback.

omf

17th July 2007, 18:31

B-RDO is grayed-out when B-Pyramid is disabled, so I'm actually not sure if that makes a difference.

Manao

17th July 2007, 19:20

It shouldn't be disable, if it is it's a bug in MeGUI.

Spilt_milk

22nd July 2007, 00:20

what happens if i chose all of them

check

22nd July 2007, 10:46

B RDO is not dependant on B Pyramid, and this behavior is correct in MeGUI. Other related dependancies you might be confused with:
B RDO requires Subme >= 6
B RDO requires B frames >= 1
B Pyramid requires B frames >= 2

Kurtnoise

9th August 2007, 13:52

Hey,

Does anybody is interested by iPhone & Apple TV Profiles or not ?

Sharktooth

10th August 2007, 03:34

Just post them and i will add them ;)

Kurtnoise

10th August 2007, 07:42

ok...but before to summit them I've a question. I haven't checked carefully the sources, so forgive me my ignorance. Can we restrict some parameters for the end users by using profiles ? (i.e width & height, bitrate, etc...)

Sharktooth

10th August 2007, 12:32

Uhm... not properly. You can set a default bitrate in the profile but the user can always modify it (thru profile config editor or thru bitrate calculator).
Width and Height can be set in a avisynth profile but as for the bitrate, it can be changed by the user

buzzqw

10th August 2007, 12:45

the profiles bundled with automkv can set width/height and bitrate limit

BHH

Kurtnoise

16th August 2007, 10:13

Just post them and i will add them ;)
meGUI - Apple TV Profile (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=L6GS3NHC)
meGUI - iPhone Profile (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=I9A8U2P5)
It needs to be tested because I don't have such devices.

Uhm... not properly.
So, it needs to be tuned then. :cool: Let me play with the sources and I'll go back with something in a couple of days.

btw, here some extra infos extracted from here (http://developer.apple.com/technotes/tn2007/tn2188.html):

Apple TV has the ability to playback Main Profile (up to Level 3.1) H.264 progressive video with B-Frames up to 1280x720 (720p) at 24 fps and AAC-LC encoded stero audio with a maximum sampling rate of 44.1kHz.

iPhone has the ability to playback H.264 Baseline Profile (up to Level 3.0) video, up to 640x480 at 30 fps and AAC-LC encoded stereo audio with a maximum sampling rate of 48kHz. iPhone will also play movies or audio files that can play on an iPod. Note that B frames are not supported in the Baseline profile.

Furthermore, some tweakings are also needed for the muxing (thank you Apple :p) :
For AppleTV :
MP4Box -ipod -brand M4VH:1 -add myvideo.264:fps=xx -add myaudio.m4a outputfile.m4v
For iPhone :
MP4Box -ipod -brand M4VP -add myvideo.264:fps=xx -add myaudio.m4a outputfile.m4v

Sharktooth

16th August 2007, 13:10

V35:

- Added HQ-Fast (like HQ-Slow but no RDO)
- Added iPhone and AppleTV profiles by Kurtnoise13

Deckard2019

16th August 2007, 14:13

I would like to add Archos 605 (http://www.archos.com/products/gen_5/archos_605wifi/index.html?country=global&lang=en&culture=global-en&lang_temp=) profile but I'm lost with all parameters.
To start, the only thing I have is a DivXTest result (http://media.generationmp3.com/gmp3/tests/605wifi/tests-compatibilite-605.html).

As you can notice, it should support :
VID-4A test H264 Main Profil (MPEG4 AVC Main Profil + LC-AAC CBR)
VID-4C test MPEG4 AVC avec multi-bframe (MPEG4 AVC Bframe + LC-AAC CBR)
VID-4D test MPEG4 AVC avec multi-reference frame (MPEG4 AVC Reference Frame + LC-AAC CBR)
VID-4F test MPEG4 AVC avec weighted prediction (MPEG4 AVC weighted prediction + LC-AAC CBR)

CABAC, High Profile and custom matrix are not supported.

Any help to create the profile would be great. I can test it on my 605.
Thanks you !

Kurtnoise

16th August 2007, 17:32

@Sharktooh: sorry, I've made a mistake for the AppleTV & iPhone Profiles. Redownload them here (http://kurtnoise.free.fr/misc/).

@Deckard: try the PD-Archos 605 Profile (same link as above).

@foxace : try the PD-PS3 Profile (same link as above).

Deckard2019

16th August 2007, 18:39

Thank you Kurtnoise13.

One thing I don't understand in your profile is Baseline profile and no BFrames.
Main profile, BFrame and reference frame should be supported so why don't you select these parameters ?

Thx again !

Kurtnoise

16th August 2007, 19:44

It's just for some tests. Feel free to change/improve it.

JarrettH

17th August 2007, 07:08

hi sharktooth :p

I have a small change you could make to some of the profiles:

Max Keyframe Interval: 240
Min. GOP Size: 24

Since I understand these should closely match the input framerate which is PROBABLY going to be a DVD. I basically use HQ-Slower with all the Quant options and the parameters above.

Sharktooth

17th August 2007, 14:45

that is subjective. PAL = 250/25 while NTSC = 240/24 or 300/30 (depending on the source).

JarrettH

17th August 2007, 19:47

I guess it could be PAL too:D

Sharktooth

18th August 2007, 14:58

v36:

- Removed p4x4 from most of the profiles since it only hurts quality

ACrowley

19th August 2007, 14:06

v36:

- Removed p4x4 from most of the profiles since it only hurts quality

hurts Quality ? so you suggest to disable it ? Never noticed any Problems with analyze all

Sharktooth

19th August 2007, 14:07

read my previous post...

JarrettH

19th August 2007, 20:19

i thought those analyze options were only beneficial. i haven't read anywhere recommending to disable one of them.

Terranigma

19th August 2007, 21:00

i thought those analyze options were only beneficial. i haven't read anywhere recommending to disable one of them.

p4x4 doesn't hurt, it just doesn't help. At large resolutions, individual objects in the movie are bigger than 4x4 pixels, so there's no point in partitioning mvs that small. Typically it might be enabled in 0.5% of macroblocks, and improve compression by 0.1%, making it one of the worst compression-per-cpu tradeoffs.
(Original Post (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1032133#post1032133))

My Test:

Test 2:
--trellis 1 --bframes 16 --partitions p8x8,b8x8,i4x4,i8x8
SSIM Mean Y:09578236
PSNR Mean Y:38.914 U:41.756 V:42.604 AVG:39.734 Global 38.501 kb/s
(Final ratefactor: 24.07)
(Encode Speed: 3.51 fps)

Test 3:
--trellis 1 --bframes 16 --partitions all
SSIM Mean Y:09578077
PSNR Mean Y:38.906 U:41.752 V:42.602 AVG:39.727 Global 38.494 kb/s
(Final ratefactor: 24.07)
(Encode Speed: 3.52 fps)
(Original Post (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1033570#post1033570))

JarrettH

20th August 2007, 20:00

what resolution? a dvd? :thanks:

Terranigma

21st August 2007, 01:05

what resolution? a dvd? :thanks:

Oh, it looks like I left that tidbit out. Actually, not even a dvd res. That test was made using a VGA res of 640X480; so anything above this should still hold true.

Sharktooth

21st August 2007, 02:30

v37:

- HQ-Fast: Lowered the number of reference frames to 1

yukichigai

21st August 2007, 04:26

Just tried to encode a 90-minute flick using the iPhone preset. 480x208 @ 23.976fps, three passes instead of two, 450 average bitrate. No other changes made. iTunes claims the video is incompatible with the iPhone, both with and without the audio. I even made sure to manually mux the audio and video myself using mp4box.

Also, now that I think about it I was using the v35 profiles. I'll run another test with v36.

EDIT: Just did a normal automated 2pass using the default iPhone profile: same issue. I'm going to try some other stuff to make sure it's not some weird resolution problem, but as far as I can tell the iPhone profile is broken.