Log in

View Full Version : Converting High Def to SD Xvid files


laserfan
6th November 2005, 20:44
I've been making Xvid files from my 1920x1080 ATSC HDTV transport stream captures and have struggled with lack of motion smoothness in the end results. I thought this might be due to "standalone support" not working (I make these Xvids for my Sigma-based ShowCenter players) but I believe now that it's something unrelated. Note I'm generally taking a 15Mbps 4.8Gb file and reducing it to a 350Mb file at 1100Kbps and something less than 720x480 e.g. 640x368 (that's up to AGK as I use two-pass mode). These tend to be 44min files.

When I look at the HD-to-SD logs of files that look jittery, I notice that "Source is considered to be hybrid" (not every capture is this way, some are deemed FILM, and for these they look smooth; no particular problems). After lots of reading here, I decide to try CTRL-F9 and "Force IVTC". Well, this output does not appear to have the twitchyness problem! Here's a log excerpt:

[10/27/2005 10:46:24 PM] Source has percentage of interlacing in motion areas: 40.61
[10/27/2005 10:46:24 PM] Source has percentage of telecined patterns: 90.50
[10/27/2005 10:46:24 PM] Source has percentage of progressive patterns: 3.46
[10/27/2005 10:46:24 PM] Source has percentage of interlaced patterns: 6.03
[10/27/2005 10:46:24 PM] Source is considered to be hybrid (mostly FILM).
[10/27/2005 10:46:24 PM] Looking for optimal hybrid thresholds.
[10/27/2005 10:50:36 PM] Found threshold of: 1.98

I have no idea why there are so many different patterns in these shows (this is from "Boston Legal"). Anyway if I leave AGK alone it does this:

Telecide(movie,order=1,guide=1,post=2).Decimate(mode=3,threshold=1.98)

The result looks very jittery in motion & pans. If I "Force IVTC" then AGK does this, and the result looks much, much better:

Telecide(movie,order=1,guide=1,post=2).Decimate(0)

OK so Decimate seems to be decimating my conversions (!), and "Force IVTC" seems to be the answer; but then I try one test for the heck of it with "Force Deinterlacing" and expect it to look horrible, and it does not!!??

This stuff is making my brain hurt; can anyone here who understands better than I these analysis results suggest how best to process them? Is Forcing IVTC the best compromise? I just need a pat on the head then.

Actually the smoothest result seems to come by converting the HD program to SD first by using a tool like HDTV2DVD and then AGK-ing the result, which is "pure Progressive" in nature. But this is a lot of extra messing around I'd rather not have to do.

len0x
8th November 2005, 00:10
This stuff is making my brain hurt; can anyone here who understands better than I these analysis results suggest how best to process them? Is Forcing IVTC the best compromise? I just need a pat on the head then.

Forcing IVTC is the option to use if you have hight percentage of FILM material (i.e. telecined patterns). I don't usually work with HD material, so I can't tell if it can really be hybrid these days or just detected like one for some reason. One thing for sure - you should not be using deinterlace for mostly film material (even if you don't see the difference, you are wasting 25% of bitrate).

laserfan
8th November 2005, 05:46
Thanks len0x, I will keep on forcing IVTC. I'm surprised these HD shows are detected as Mostly FILM since I really can't imagine film is used for them--they gotta be shot w/HD video equipment... :confused:

Hey thanks also for this great tool. Hope you are enjoying your...retirement? hiatus? vacation?

len0x
10th November 2005, 20:38
FILM is not what is used - its rather what FPS is used (which can be the same as SD).

laserfan
12th November 2005, 14:56
Since discovering that Telecide (decimate) butchers my HD ts files (deemed Hybrid during analysis) I do now routinely use "Force IVTC when hybrid is detected". This works well, but AGK still "looks for optimal hybrid thresholds" which takes at least 6-8 minutes typically for a 44min HD file. Since this threshold data is not used w/the "Force IVTC", I wonder if there is any way to bypass the "optimal hybrid" process if "Force IVTC" is checked.

I don't know how AGK and CTRL-F9 stuff interacts, and expect in any case that a (not soon forthcoming) change to AGK would be required, but thought I'd throw this out anyway...