I wonder how to make my video filesize larger

[alacrity]

Hello, God help me, how do I make a larger video file with Xvid???

using XviD-04102002-1, gknot, & vdub, muxing audio after.

I'm ripping a tv series off dvd. These are 40 min shows and the vobs are ~1.8gigs each. I set my size to 350mb each show including sound. my video size is 302mb. the first four episodes were on the money and great vid, love Xvid!!! The fifth will not go above 267mb with the settings I used for the first four. The quality seems to be the same and there is relatively not much action as compared to the others. My resolution is 544 x304 down from 720 by 480. I would like to keep the resolution constant throughout the series.

my default 2-pass, 2nd pass external using stats reader
lumi masking on,
motion search 6,
quant type h.263,
min/max I & P 2/31,
no credits,
no curve compression

This is really driving me crazy! And I am a noob so I honestly don't know for sure what I'm doing. I've changed my settings to the point of:
2nd pass internal,
lumi masking off,
high/low bitrate 0/0,
payback delay 1,
Keyframe boost 100%,
min/max I & P 2/3,
iframe bitrate reduction 0,
curve aggression low,

All this and I've told Xvid I want a 500mb file instead of 302mb(hoping to raise the bitrate), and I still can't do larger than 272mb!

I cannot find any guides that really explain all the settings well enough for me ;) I've read doom's and xvid's forums for hours, everything is slanted to getting a smaller file, so I try to reverse to get a bigger file. I believe I am headed in the right direction to make the file less compressed. What am I doing wrong? Is there a possibility I cannot get a larger size??? With mpg2/svcd I could just raise the bitrate and add padding to get any size, Xvid is a different beast :)

Is there a way to add padding? I don't do any cropping.

If someone could offer me a way to get larger filesize, this would be great. I mean, are there like default settings in Xvid to get the largest filesize/least compression, then I can work backwards from where I am now...

Thanks

[Acaila]

Hi,

First thing to do if determine if your file is saturated or not. To do this you could try 1-pass constant quantizer mode at 2 (this is least compression, biggest filesize).

1) If it comes out at approx. the same size it is now then your current video is already at maximum quality.
Things to do to get a bigger file when this happens:
- Increase the resolution (also gives higher quality).
- Add a sharpener filter (search for MSharpen, it's a great filter to use). This will make your video sharper, bigger but not better quality.
- Use MPEG quantier instead of H.263. This will (arguably) increase the detail a little and add some noise as well. This noise aids a lot in making the file bigger.
- Add an extra audio track, or use a bigger audio file.

2) If it comes out (much) larger than your current file, then that means your video is not at maximum quality and something is not working correctly with either the settings you used or XviD's internals.

Could you please determine which is the case with you?

[alacrity]

Yep, hit it on the head, Saturated.

1-pass constant quantizer mode at 2 equated to 272mb

The bad thing was my effeminate side was whispering to me that it was saturated, while the bi-polar part was screaming for more MORE MORE!!! Guess I should become more in touch with my feminine side :D At any rate, I learned alot more about the codec properties.

Thanks for your help, I will try the Msharpen which looks like a good addition, and I had no idea there were so many different filters available for vdub. Mr. Graft has got quite a cool deal going on http://shelob.mordor.net/dgraft/