pwnsweet
11th May 2011, 17:13
Hi,
My brother recently made this little java app for me that has helped me out during my encoding and I figured it may also help some of you who want to do everything they can to optimize their image quality, so with his permission I have made it available for you all to use.
http://obeopg.sn2.livefilestore.com/y1p5DkYZM0LuS2sXcUt4AcP9Fhsnj0T0DP3KjspKborOWlVljFyR35Dg2cSJvyuqiuFVLWMd1yV-4GdSUQVNP4ZKPVGowUT4E7x/reference%20frames.jpg?psid=1
Why this app is useful
Now that I've started encoding, I realized early on that I was going to run into problems. In my particular case, I want to downsize my Blu-ray movies to ~720p whilst keeping file sizes around 4gb and maximizing image quality. In conjunction with the right x264 settings and to maximize compression efficiency, I knew it was preferable to resize down to a resolution that is mod 16 for the width and height and crop off the black borders on the top and bottom of the movie. I've been using MeGUI for my encoding, and the combination of the Clever anamorphic encoding option and the cropping function in the AVS script creator helped in accomplishing both of these tasks.
What MeGUI doesn't do however, is tell me how much each of those mod 16 resolutions that are ~921,600 pixels (ie,720p) differ to the source aspect ratio, and where the maximum reference frame thresholds occur. That's where this little app comes in.
How to use it
Let's say you're encoding Blood Diamond. The resolution of that movie after cropping the borders is 1920x796. Go to the program and put '1920' and '796' in the resolution field. A list will be generated, showing all mod 16 resolutions (customizable, 16 by default) that are between 700,000 and 1,100,000 pixels (customizable), along with the aspect ratio for each of those resolutions and how much that aspect ratio differs from the source aspect ratio which is, in this case, 1920/796 or 2.4121:1. There's also a column that shows when a new minimum difference occurs and how much that new difference is. And finally, there are 3 more columns showing you the total number of pixels in that resolution, what percentage that many pixels is of the source resolution and the maximum number of reference frames you can use with that particular resolution.
By using this information, you can make a more informed decision of which resolution to downsize to based on what you're trying to achieve. For example in the case of Blood Diamond my goal was to encode to a mod 16 ~720p resolution, that is, roughly 921,600 pixels whilst maintaining as close to the original aspect ratio as possible. Looking at the generated list, the resolution that is closest to the source aspect ratio is 1312x544 however the number of pixels is quite a bit lower than 921,600. So, looking at the pixel count column, I come to three resolutions that are all around 921,600 pixels: 1472x608, 1504x624 and 1584x656. 1472x608 gives me one more reference frame than the other two resolutions, but it is also significantly more different from the source aspect ratio than the other two resolutions. I ultimately decide on 1504x624 because it is the best aspect ratio that satisfies my conditions.
I've no doubt many of you will deride me, this program, or both as a useless tool not worthy of the time spent making it (which wasn't long anyway), but for those of you with OCD (like myself) intent on maximizing your encodes, this small tool should help in achieving that goal. All credit goes to my brother.
Download - here (http://www.gamefront.com/files/20323606/Reference_Frames.jar")
My brother recently made this little java app for me that has helped me out during my encoding and I figured it may also help some of you who want to do everything they can to optimize their image quality, so with his permission I have made it available for you all to use.
http://obeopg.sn2.livefilestore.com/y1p5DkYZM0LuS2sXcUt4AcP9Fhsnj0T0DP3KjspKborOWlVljFyR35Dg2cSJvyuqiuFVLWMd1yV-4GdSUQVNP4ZKPVGowUT4E7x/reference%20frames.jpg?psid=1
Why this app is useful
Now that I've started encoding, I realized early on that I was going to run into problems. In my particular case, I want to downsize my Blu-ray movies to ~720p whilst keeping file sizes around 4gb and maximizing image quality. In conjunction with the right x264 settings and to maximize compression efficiency, I knew it was preferable to resize down to a resolution that is mod 16 for the width and height and crop off the black borders on the top and bottom of the movie. I've been using MeGUI for my encoding, and the combination of the Clever anamorphic encoding option and the cropping function in the AVS script creator helped in accomplishing both of these tasks.
What MeGUI doesn't do however, is tell me how much each of those mod 16 resolutions that are ~921,600 pixels (ie,720p) differ to the source aspect ratio, and where the maximum reference frame thresholds occur. That's where this little app comes in.
How to use it
Let's say you're encoding Blood Diamond. The resolution of that movie after cropping the borders is 1920x796. Go to the program and put '1920' and '796' in the resolution field. A list will be generated, showing all mod 16 resolutions (customizable, 16 by default) that are between 700,000 and 1,100,000 pixels (customizable), along with the aspect ratio for each of those resolutions and how much that aspect ratio differs from the source aspect ratio which is, in this case, 1920/796 or 2.4121:1. There's also a column that shows when a new minimum difference occurs and how much that new difference is. And finally, there are 3 more columns showing you the total number of pixels in that resolution, what percentage that many pixels is of the source resolution and the maximum number of reference frames you can use with that particular resolution.
By using this information, you can make a more informed decision of which resolution to downsize to based on what you're trying to achieve. For example in the case of Blood Diamond my goal was to encode to a mod 16 ~720p resolution, that is, roughly 921,600 pixels whilst maintaining as close to the original aspect ratio as possible. Looking at the generated list, the resolution that is closest to the source aspect ratio is 1312x544 however the number of pixels is quite a bit lower than 921,600. So, looking at the pixel count column, I come to three resolutions that are all around 921,600 pixels: 1472x608, 1504x624 and 1584x656. 1472x608 gives me one more reference frame than the other two resolutions, but it is also significantly more different from the source aspect ratio than the other two resolutions. I ultimately decide on 1504x624 because it is the best aspect ratio that satisfies my conditions.
I've no doubt many of you will deride me, this program, or both as a useless tool not worthy of the time spent making it (which wasn't long anyway), but for those of you with OCD (like myself) intent on maximizing your encodes, this small tool should help in achieving that goal. All credit goes to my brother.
Download - here (http://www.gamefront.com/files/20323606/Reference_Frames.jar")