I can't figure this out: Please help!

They Live

They Live

Well-known member
I'm trying to compress a 5 minute video down to a < 10 MB, ready for streaming on the web.

I've tried tons of combinations.

Straight out of FCP using QT Conversion, H.264, MPEG-4.

Using QT 7 Pro.

Using Compressor.

I've gotten it down to 10 mb, less in some cases, but the quality sucks.

Is there a link to the site with "Formulas" for compressing to the web? I'm new to this, obviously, and just want to be told how many KBPS, FPS, Video Size, etc. a movie should be to effectively work on the internet. With good quality. I know it can be done b/c I've seen plenty of movies on this site that look great. How is it done? Is there some secret society that holds all the secrets to good web compression?

Thanks guys,
Ben
 
I've tried tons of combination too, believe me. But not for streaming on the web just for sending short clips with e-mail. There's no "magical" settings I think.
MPEG-4...QT Pro does bad job, Procoder too (blocky videos) and only Nero Recode gives acceptable results for .mp4. It uses it's own codec I think. Very beautiful <10MB files if length 4...5min. Video bitrate ~300kb/s and audio AAC 96kb/s.
Now I'm using only .wmv for those "tiny" files. More compatible and better quality.
Two things are important: correct video resolution (max. 320x240) and frame rate. Sometimes I must use 15fps instead of 25fps (30fps->15fps for NTSC) because there's no other way if your video has very fast movements. Imagine...there's 2x less frames to encode. Obviously better quality.
"Cartoonish" movements - unfortunately yes.

Can you give me a link for something what you think is "great"..
 
What are your audio settings or do you have audio? Make sure its set to aac at 128 should be fine when doing h264 for the smallest files. What size is you video 640, 320 240?
 
320x240. For Audio I've been doing 32 khz, bit rates below 100 kbps, 8 bit. If I go any lower than that the audio gets real noisy, hard to explain.

sebastian. I can't recall off the top of my head, but I've seen lots of great streaming video on the web in general. If I download a file to my desktop, I can figure out a lot of info on it, as far as file size and video size. How big are most streaming movies? Like movie trailers, etc. Those have great quality, and stream well.
 
DVX-Ben said:
How big are most streaming movies? Like movie trailers, etc. Those have great quality, and stream well.
Click to expand...

Most of those I have downloaded recently have been in the 40-50MB range.
 
DVX-Ben said:
I'm trying to compress a 5 minute video down to a < 10 MB, ready for streaming on the web...
... I know it can be done b/c I've seen plenty of movies on this site that look great.
Click to expand...
Are the 'movies that look great' constrained to the same limitations that you're trying to create? That is, 5 minutes of video with a total file size of less than 10 MB. That's a serious limitation. Something gotta give when compressing that much data into such a small size. What gives is what you're seeing - the quality of the image. I've seen a lot of demo reels that look great on the web, but the total length is typically under 3 minutes and the file size is usually above 20 MB's.

Ben Waggoner is the industry guru regarding compression. If you really want to get your head around compression then you should get one of his books. Like this: http://www.amazon.com/Compression-Great-Digital-Video-Techniques/dp/157820111X/sr=1-1/qid=1165770262/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-0166518-9988673?ie=UTF8&s=books
I can't promise the reading will be easy, but the man knows his stuff. If you stick with it he'll teach you as much as you're willing to learn.
 
If you are stuck on a mac, dont forget the freeware program called Handbrake, located at http://handbrake.m0k.org/

If you have access to a windows PC, there are programs like MeGUI and StaxRip (for free) that will produce mp4 files to your size and and quality specifications.

However, depending on the ammount of movement, and audio data in your video, it may not be possible to fit 5 minutes in 10 megabytes. We're talking about a total data rate of 273KiloBits per second! (xKiloBitsPerSecond * 300seconds = 81920KiloBits) That includes your audio/data stream

(p.s. 273 total is your magic number for 10 megabytes)
 
Apple Pro Training Sereies, Compressor Quick-Reference Guide

It's an inexpensive little book that is totally worth getting...

In H.264 you can set things really low and still get great images. But you are pushing the file size limit for what you want. I think you need to re-think that file size limitation to something more realsistic.
 
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Codecs,

Have you tried Divx or a bit more expensive but does an excellent job, Sorsenson. Vegas comes with an older version of Sorsenson and does just about the best I've seen.

Thinking up upgrading to the latest and greatest
 
BenB is correct on this one folks. You'll have to punch the limit up on your MB. 3MB a minute is a great template to use for streaming video at about the 320x240 spot. Your looking at 15MB minimum for a decent quality file at 320x240 rez. Thats using H264 and keeping your settings proper.

I got a nice looking 5min section from a bond movie to 320x240 with 400kb/s bitrate, 32000khz, 96kps audio bitrate, AAC audio codec, H264 video codec, 48 keyframed, and it came to about 18MB. Any lower than those settings and things will start to look crappy, especially in highly detailed shots. Try that template and see how it comes out. 10MB is a dream for compression right now if you want any sort of quality.

-Kyle
 
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