QuEnc 0.72

[dragongodz]

new version is 0.72.

QuEnc 0.72
----------
.fixed separate not working with -close
.changed will not encode pulldown when interlaced disabled but pulldown enabled
.small tweak to 2 pass ratecontrol


changes from 0.70 to 0.71
-------------------------
.added 448kbps for audio encoding
.changed CLI parameter error message to timed(4 seconds), compatability with older programs
.added settings, changlog and PSP-IPod texts
.restricted MP2 and MP3 to encode to a maximum of 256kbps even if set higher
.small 2 pass ratecontrol tweaks


changes from 0.61 to 0.70
-------------------------
.improved 1 pass ratecontrol
.improved 2 pass ratecontrol
.improved ac3 encoding low volume problem
.fixed last frames at constant quant
.fixed if max bitrate higher than target bitrate
.fixed 24fps video encoding
.changed ac3 downmix levels to -3dB and dialnorm to -27dB (Dolbys reccomended settings)
.changed mpeg2mux(cli option) to automatically sets QuEnc to mpeg2 mode
.changed extreme setting to not use trellis, tick manually if you want that aswell
.changed other extreme settings
.changed auto max bitrate to x2 if over 3000kbps
.added mpeg1mux cli option ,automatically sets QuEnc to mpeg1 mode
.added mpeg4mux cli option ,automatically sets QuEnc to mpeg4 mode
.added pulldown option(must use interlaced encoding)
.added mpeg4 video mode(specifically PSP profile compatible)
.added aac audio encoding with mpeg4 mode
.added mp3 audio encoding with mpeg4 and snow modes
.added audiocodec cli options aac and mp3 for mpeg4 mode
.added separate mux option to mpeg2 encoding and mpeg2mux(cli)
.added source properties detection to some better display options
.removed -mpeg1 and -mpeg2 cli options, use their mux options instead
.increase mpeg1 buffer size to 224 if max bitrate over 1800kbps or constant quant
.increased buffer size to 392 if max bitrate over 9800kbps(DVD max)
.exposed snow mode (not reccomended for anything but experimentation)


a small note on the cli error change. while what QuEnc thinks is wrong commands, meaning starting with a - , will use a timed error gui plain rubbish will not. so for example
QuEnc.exe -abcd = timed error gui, QuEnc still runs
QuEnc.exe abcd = non-timed gui, QuEnc reports rubbish on the commandline

warning. do not expect me to answer questions on SNOW or MPEG4. i may do but dont expect it.

QuEnc 0.72 binary and source code can be found here(self extracting archives)
http://quenc.bitburners.com/
QuEnc 0.72 binary and source code can be found here(self extracting archives)
http://dragongodz2.googlepages.com/home

the source code to ffmpeg on bitburners is compressed with a different archiver(to self extracting archive). if you have any problems with it please report so and try the other from my googlepage.

enjoy.

[buzzqw]

:thanks: :thanks: :thanks:

very nice additions !!

BHH

[Axed]

Wow, amazing work! Thanks to all who worked on it!

[Rockas]

Thank you so much... I can't wait to test all the new stuff :)

[A_T]

thanks

[danpos]

@Dragongodz

Man, how much work you spend over this version ??? A lot of things was done ... Hmmm, I will give a it a try for sure! :)

Many thanks for yours time and efforts to deliver it to us.

Kept up,

[Mug Funky]

cool! i'll try this out ASAP (it's a bit late so i should probably not try it out just yet).

last frames @ constant quant fix sounds good.

[edit]

-mpeg2 from commandline doesn't seem to work anymore? has it been removed?

not a big deal. i changed my auto-batch already :)

[Revgen]

Looks like somebody is jealous about HCEnc 0.18.:D

Seriously, thanks for the hard work. I'll definitely be trying this out.

[dirio49]

NIce
thanks

[Zarxrax]

Wheeeee! I've been waiting for this :D

Now, here is some problems I'm still having with MPEG1:
I get these strange blocking artifacts at low quants: http://zarxrax.kicks-ass.net/quenc-error.png
This problem seems to have been in the old version too. Trellis and extreme are both disabled. Is this something that could maybe be fixed, or is there a specific quantizer at which these artifacts might begin to appear?

Other than that I still have the same old problems with buffer overflows. I'm getting them even with max bitrates as low as 1800! 1800 can be a decent bitrate for VCD-resolution material, but sometimes I would like to make an mpeg-1 at 640x480 or maybe even higher, and not have to use such a low bitrate that it looks like crap :(

[Sagittaire]

There are very good new function in libavcodec:
- new adaptative bframe decision
can save 4-6% of size
- new bframe refine
can save 2-4% of size

example at constant quant q3 (I,P and B)
reference at 2 no adaptive bframe: 2484 Kbps
new adaptative bframe: 2330 Kbps
new bframe refine: 2409 Kbps
combinaison: 2261 Kbps

Combinaison of new adaptative bframe and new bframe refine can save 6-10% of size (more than RDO ... !!?) with exactly the same quality ... :eek:

Moreover adaptative bframe is really good for visual quality with less bframe in high motion part. With that you can (IMO you must) choose higher ratio/offset for bframe and higher curve compression quantizer: overall visual quality will be really better. Personnaly for best visual quality I choose light ratio/offset at 0/1 for bframe and Adaptative Quantisation for intra/inter with inter quantizer masking at 25%. For example if intra are q4 then inter block for pframe will be q5 and bframe q6.

[Sagittaire]

Now, here is some problems I'm still having with MPEG1:
I get these strange blocking artifacts at low quants: http://zarxrax.kicks-ass.net/quenc-error.png
This problem seems to have been in the old version too. Trellis and extreme are both disabled. Is this something that could maybe be fixed, or is there a specific quantizer at which these artifacts might begin to appear?

What did you use like CQM?
What is your quant for this frame?

[Zarxrax]

What did you use like CQM?
What is your quant for this frame?

Here is the settings used:
http://zarxrax.kicks-ass.net/quenc-settings1.png
http://zarxrax.kicks-ass.net/quenc-settings2.png

Looks like it happens at quant 1 and 2. I haven't seen it so far on quant 3 or lower.

[Darksoul71]

Thnx, dragongodz,

new testing stuff for my multicore / multi CPU frontend for QuEnc :)

I´ll report back if I feel like I tested enough :D

[dragongodz]

Thanks to all who worked on it!
that would be Nic and i with the pulldown code from mean. :)

-mpeg2 from commandline doesn't seem to work anymore? has it been removed?
i quote from the change log in the first post ;)
.removed -mpeg1 and -mpeg2 cli options, use their mux options instead

here is some problems I'm still having with MPEG1
i do plan to play with mpeg1 more just not at the moment, so dont think i have forgot. :)

EDIT:
Looks like somebody is jealous about HCEnc 0.18. :D
what a strange idea. especially considering
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=811201#post811201
and if you read the thanks.txt that comes with HC you will see me mentioned aswell. :)

[danpos]

@Dragongodz

*Source: I cut off a small clip of AVI in order to test this new release out. It has: 8123 frames / 23.976 fps / XviD / MP3

*QuEnc settings: GOP 15 / B-frames 2 / Interlaced encoding (in order to enable built-in pulldown) / Aspect Ratio 4:3 / Max bitrate 9800 Kbps / Default QuEnc matrix / Profile DVD / Audio codec AC3 128 Kbps / 2 pass VBR - average bitrate 2180 Kbps.

*AVS Script:

AVISource("D:\Testes\clip.avi",true,fourCC="XVID")

eedi2().turnleft().eedi2().turnright()
BlindPP(quant=8, cpu2="xxxxoo", moderate_h=45, moderate_v=55)
Blockbuster(method="noise",detail_min=1,detail_max=3,variance=0.1,seed=1)

aSharp(2.5,4.5,0.25,hqbf=true)
YlevelsS(0,1.6,255,0,255)

LanczosResize(704,352,0,0,1280,704)
AddBorders(0,64,0,64)

*Author DVD: ended up the encoding, I just used the Author DVD tool built-in into QuEnc and it delivered to me the folders AUDIO_TS and VIDEO_TS.

*Playback of authored DVD:

- WinDVD: it plays fine but the time showed was 05 minutes 42 seconds instead of 05 minutes 38 seconds.
- VLC: it plays fine but the time showed was 01 minute 20 seconds instead of 05 minutes 38 seconds.
- MPC: it plays choppy, with several stuttering to long whole movie.

*Bitrate graph:

http://img481.imageshack.us/img481/7215/shot429vq.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

We can see that didn't happen any bitrate spike over the maximum for DVD spec (9800 Kbps) !!! :) So, the MPEG2 videostream is in compliance with DVD spec. ;)

*Quality of image: amazing! :)

This is the first time that I used this encoder since ages. The last time that did use it it wasn't really so good as much as now. I really liked of audio encoding integrated with video one, the quality of AC3 delivered, the built-in DVD author tool (good for simple authoring).

I consider this release a HUGE one and in fact QuEnc 0.7 is worth a try for sure.

My R$ 0,02 ... ;)

Kudos,

[Mug Funky]

one thing to note: bitrateview is not at all accurate in determining max bitrates. it gets the quants about right, but gives such variable results for bitrate spikes that it's only useful as a guide.

for example, all results displayed by it are /1.024. so your actual max is 9837.568... not too shabby though.

however, when you put that in an authoring app it'll probably report a much lower max rate...

@ DGZ or nic:

.changed ac3 downmix levels to -3dB and dialnorm to -27dB (Dolbys reccomended settings)

would it be possible to make these numbers accessible via command line? those are the values i usually use anyway, but sometimes a louder source comes along, or a really quiet one...

[ricardo.santos]

Hi everyone!

Thanks Nic and Dragongodz for this new beta, ive made some tests and altough im not an expert everything seems ok, no playback problems on most players, AC3 sounds ok to me altough as i live in Pal land i use Mpeg2 for audio on my conversions.

Just a quick question:

when converting to dvd i have to use avisynth or fitcd to resize to dvd resolution, isnt it possible for Quenc to resize?

[Rockas]

when converting to dvd i have to use avisynth or fitcd to resize to dvd resolution, isnt it possible for Quenc to resize?
No... you really need to use an AviSynth script.

[dragongodz]

danpos - yes the playback time is a known problem. the funny thing is not all players/filters/codecs have the problem. try burning it to a dvd-rw and see if your real dvd player can tell the real time or not. or you could even try authoring with something else and see if that changes it.

also max bitrate with pulldown should always be lowered and thats with all encoders. i know its been discussed a few times in the past how setting a high max bitrate has caused playback stutters with real dvd players, again this is not just QuEnc. so i would reccomend setting a max of something like 8000 or maybe even slightly lower.

isnt it possible for Quenc to resize?
as Rockas said QuEnc uses Avisynth for its input. so to add resizing in QuEnc aswell would be simply repeating what Avisynth can already do and bloating QuEnc.

[manolito]

Thanks DGZ for this new version. My favorite encoder ATM.

I just tested it with DVD-Rebuilder 0.97 free and DVD2SVCD 1.23 build1. DVD-RB works as usual (with the exception that the free version shuts down custom matrices), but DVD2SVCD bombs out with a "bad parameter" error. This is due to the now nonexistent -mpeg2 parameter.

Could you please change QuEnc's behavior for the next version so that it just ignores the -mpeg1 and -mpeg2 parameters without throwing an error? It is quite unlikely that there will be an updated version of DVD2SVCD in the forseeable future, and it's author went out of his way to add full support for QuEnc 0.61 to the current version (with a little help from myself).

For now I wrote a small wrapper for QuEnc 0.70 which makes it compatible with DVD2SVCD. Have a look here: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=825017#post825017


Cheers
manolito

[Revgen]

what a strange idea. especially considering
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=811201#post811201
and if you read the thanks.txt that comes with HC you will see me mentioned aswell. :)

I was kidding. I thought the smiley was a good hint.

[dragongodz]

Could you please change QuEnc's behavior for the next version so that it just ignores the -mpeg1 and -mpeg2 parameters without throwing an error?
yes i can do that. to be honest i knew it worked with DVD-RB but i didnt think about any other program.

I was kidding. I thought the smiley was a good hint.
hahaha yes i know you were just having a little dig so i decided to play back. thought the smiley i put at the end was a hint aswell. ;)

[kevin23]

Was trying the new version , quality is excellent though when Trellis Quant is enabled i had these wierd horizontal lines in some frames.

Eg

http://img325.imageshack.us/img325/9303/bscap0007hm.jpg

Here is without Trellis Quant

http://img325.imageshack.us/img325/1094/bscap0028pn.jpg

[dragongodz]

Trellis Quant is enabled i had these wierd horizontal lines in some frames.
can you show it with the actual same frame ? that is load the clips in to something like the mpeg2 version of virtualdub and save off the exact same frame. also what type of frame is this ? can you show I and P frames ?

upon a litle inspection trellis seems to be giving a lower file size while in 0.61 it pushed size up slightly. whether this is because changes made for ratecontrol or because its a newer version of libavcodec i cant say at the moment. i will have a look at this later and see if i can improve it. until then i probably wouldnt worry about using trellis.

[leiming2006]

That's very good.
Thanks for offering such good software.

[Trixter]

one thing to note: bitrateview is not at all accurate in determining max bitrates. it gets the quants about right, but gives such variable results for bitrate spikes that it's only useful as a guide.

I've noticed this too. Is there a better tool out there for this sort of thing, or is bitrateview it?

[Revgen]

Not one that's free.

There are commercial ones that cost into the $100's.

[Revgen]

I just recorded a 2hr 4 min movie at 4500kbps and 23.976fps. It came out at 3.20GB. Is this the right size? It seems too small to me.

Here are my settings:

quenc -i J:\star\star.avs -o J:\star\star.m2v -b 4500 -maxbitrate 8500 -dc 9 -priority 3 -2 -hq -vbr -scene -notrell -nocgop -nointerlaced -noextreme -gopsize 18 -maxbframes 2 -noqlb -nocmatrix -aspectratio 16:9

[Rockas]

I just recorded a 2hr 4 min movie at 4500kbps and 23.976fps. It came out at 3.20GB. Is this the right size? It seems too small to me.

Here are my settings:

quenc -i J:\star\star.avs -o J:\star\star.m2v -b 4500 -maxbitrate 8500 -dc 9 -priority 3 -2 -hq -vbr -scene -notrell -nocgop -nointerlaced -noextreme -gopsize 18 -maxbframes 2 -noqlb -nocmatrix -aspectratio 16:9
How did you got the bitrate values? what is your target size?

[dragongodz]

It came out at 3.20GB. Is this the right size? It seems too small to me.
yes for that bitrate it should have been something like 4gb. if you get the time could you see what QuEnc 0.61 does aswell with that same source ?

Is there a better tool out there for this sort of thing, or is bitrateview it?
mpeg streameye is much better. if you hunt around you should be able to find version 1.1 or you could download the very short period trial version 2.

[rhys87]

I used the following aviscript
AVISource("C:\movie.avi")
LanczosResize(720,576)
AssumeFPS(25.000, true)

and used the following settings
http://img135.imageshack.us/my.php?image=quenc7gt.jpg
http://img135.imageshack.us/my.php?image=quenc26sf.jpg

The end result was a mpeg file which was 0kb, any help would be appreciated :)

[dragongodz]

can you try playing the .avs with MediaPlayerClassic or similar player ? is it ok ?

also you could probably throw a converttoyv12() on the end of the script to make sure nothing has gone wrong there.

[Mug Funky]

@ revgen:

that's 3695 kbps... bit undersize. but that could mean the encoder is saturated (this is likely on a smooth source, possibly letterboxed, and when the QLB matrix is used). it could also mean an undersized encode too. though i don't like bitrateview, it will tell you which is which - if it's at quantiser 1 for most of the movie, you know that te encoder is saturated and a different matrix is needed (or you could apply some sharpening filters to the movie - that'll make it use more space).

@ rhys87:

it's possible quenc is crashing on the second pass - it'll re-load the script at the beginning of the 2nd pass, and any instabilities will result in a crash.

it you have virtualdubmod (the one with an avisynth script editor) you can try load a script, open the script editor, then hit F5 to re-load and seek to current frame. generally, if virtualdub crashes here, then it's not safe to do a 2-pass encode with quenc either. you're using a pretty basic script though... so i'd be worried. usually it's plugins that cause the crashes (smartdecimate does it for me, so i can only use it for 1-pass encodes...).

good news is that at the bitrate you've specified, 1 pass will look perfectly alright and save you a bunch of time :)

[Revgen]

@ revgen:

that's 3695 kbps... bit undersize. but that could mean the encoder is saturated (this is likely on a smooth source, possibly letterboxed, and when the QLB matrix is used). it could also mean an undersized encode too. though i don't like bitrateview, it will tell you which is which - if it's at quantiser 1 for most of the movie, you know that te encoder is saturated and a different matrix is needed (or you could apply some sharpening filters to the movie - that'll make it use more space).


The movie is Star Wars Episode 1 (NTSC). Would you categorize this as a smooth source?

[Zarxrax]

Dragongodz: I got that MPEG Streameye program that you mentioned, and noticed that on MPEG-1 files, if I enable the "use vbr" option, the final frame is always VERY large. Is this a known problem?

[dragongodz]

if you downloaded QuEnc 0.70 please redownload it. it should have 70b in the filename. this is for a very minor change which , for whatever reason, helped increase the bitrate on Revgens film. strangely enough it also increases the speed back to QuEnc 0.61's speed where the first 0.70 was running slower.

and noticed that on MPEG-1 files, if I enable the "use vbr" option, the final frame is always VERY large. Is this a known problem?
not unless it makes it go above max bitrate. i havent seen any problems mentioned about it so until then i have to assume its ok.

[Zarxrax]

not unless it makes it go above max bitrate. i havent seen any problems mentioned about it so until then i have to assume its ok.

Yes, it was indeed well over the max bitrate. But you know what? Since I just downloaded the .70b, I can't reproduce the problem anymore, so maybe its fixed now :)

Edit: Nevermind, a new file I encoded just had the problem. Ill keep testing to see exactly what is causing it. Im not so sure its just the VBR switch anymore.

Edit2: It seems to be the MP2 audio bitrate causing the problem. If I set it to 256 or lower, its fine. Setting it to 384 though causes the last frame to be huge.

[dragongodz]

Edit2: It seems to be the MP2 audio bitrate causing the problem. If I set it to 256 or lower, its fine. Setting it to 384 though causes the last frame to be huge.
how strange. the audio bitrate should have no effect at all on the video bitrate. will look in to this later.

[Revgen]

how strange. the audio bitrate should have no effect at all on the video bitrate. will look in to this later.

It could be a muxing issue. The decoder may be analysing both video and audio bitrate when it should be only doing video. This may make it appear to be larger than maxbitrate to this app. Remember that computers are dumb.:D The fact that the issue occurs at the end of the video only reinforces my suspicions.

[jul059]

Hi, and thanks for the great release!

I have found a minor "bug" that you might want to correct. when you pause the encoding for a while, it seems the encoder keeps counting the time, even though it is not actually encoding. This leads to a huge FPS drop when the process is resumed.

But anyway, thanks for this awesome encoder!

[petermg]

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=824601#post824601

Can someone respond to the buffer overflow problem? I love the quality of this application, but I stopped using it because my DVD MUXING would fail due to the buffer overflow issues. I'd love to know how to avoid this problem, is it a bug with the application or a simple DVD COMPLANCE settings issue that must be configured by the end user?

[Zarxrax]

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=824601#post824601

Can someone respond to the buffer overflow problem? I love the quality of this application, but I stopped using it because my DVD MUXING would fail due to the buffer overflow issues. I'd love to know how to avoid this problem, is it a bug with the application or a simple DVD COMPLANCE settings issue that must be configured by the end user?

For right now, I think about all you can do is use a lower max bitrate. If you are using mpeg2 with pulldown, use a max bitrate of 8000... without pulldown I think you can do about 9800, maybe a little less. For MPEG-1, you need to stop around 1500.

[manolito]

In my experience the buffer overflow problems for MPEG2 are completely solved since the rate control tweaks DGZ made in 0.62 Alpha5. There is the occasional hickup when I use Mplex for muxing, but this is most certainly the fault of Mplex. Muxman sometimes reports a max bitrate of about 10500, but it never complains about buffer problems. And if Muxman does not report problems, then the encode is DVD compliant...

Cheers
manolito

[Zarxrax]

I have a question regarding field order.
I used a 23.976 fps progressive source as input, and in QuEnc settings, I disabled interlaced encoding.

When I put the resulting MPEG2 file into dgindex, dgindex says it has "corrected" the field order. Does this mean there is a problem with my encode? Is it due to my settings?

[dragongodz]

Can someone respond to the buffer overflow problem? I love the quality of this application, but I stopped using it because my DVD MUXING would fail due to the buffer overflow issues.
the link you gave is about mpeg1 specifically. its a strange problem because i can not replicate it always. that is i can encode some things high bitrate mpeg1 and they are fine. however 1 test clip i got from Zarxrax doesnt work as good.

When I put the resulting MPEG2 file into dgindex, dgindex says it has "corrected" the field order. Does this mean there is a problem with my encode? Is it due to my settings?
hmm since you are encoding progressive i dont know offhand why it would be complaining about field order. try doing the same with some other encoders such as HC etc and see if you get the same message.

[Zarxrax]

Ok, I have figured out what is happening here, and it looks like a QuEnc bug.

- Interlaced box unchecked > Pulldown box "disabled" but still checked -> Causes dgindex to report the error.

- Interlaced box unchecked > Pulldown box unchecked -> No error.

- Interlaced box checked > Pulldown box checked -> Error.

So basically, when interlaced is not checked, it doesnt seem to disable the pulldown option automatically, even though the box is gray.

Also, it would seem that there is a problem with QuEnc's pulldown code, as dgindex reports an error when I use the pulldown in Quenc. If I do pulldown with Pulldown.exe, there is no error reported.

[dragongodz]

Zarxrax - thank you for narrowing that down. i will look in to that.

[Mug Funky]

the only samples that cause quenc to spike are of the "uncorrelated noise" type in my experience.

unfortunately this can include real video, like particle effects, bubbling water with strong reflections, and the "gateway" sequences in Cowboy Bebop.

i think quenc or most probably ffmpeg needs to allow (more?) skipped blocks in these cases. in the special case of bitrate above max, it can be assumed that quality is no longer important and all that matters is getting the bitrate down. this can look ugly i imagine...

[Zarxrax]

I recently found an old encoder based off QuEnc called NuEnc. It has some really awesome features, such as the status window that shows lots of useful statistics. Could some of this stuff be added into QuEnc? Especially some things like Peak bitrate, overflow count, and psnr. Those would be really useful. Also it lets you specify the VBV buffer size. It seems like that would be a useful thing as well.

I have noticed that QuEnc often overshoots the max bitrate that I specify, so being able to see this as it encodes is a lot more handy than having to load the mpeg2 up in some external program to check the bitrate after its done.

Also one other tiny request, its really more of an annoyance than anything else. When you are typing in the bitrate, could it be made to not throw up an error message until you change the focus from the bitrate text area? A lot of times I will delete the bitrate to type in something different, and as soon as i backspace over the last number it pops up an error message and i have to click on it.