Compression time for H.264

[Adam White]

What settings are you using for this? i.e. frame controls, video dimensions e.t.c.

Take a look at this list of optimal dimensions for compressed video;
https://www.flashsupport.com/books/fvst/files/tools/video_sizes.html

That page references Flash, but I’ve always used it as a reference for H264 and these sizes always give a great image and reduce transcoding times. The trick is to use width/height dimensions that are divisible by 8 or 16 – for some reason video encoding software will always work better with these dimensions.

If your dimensions are correct, maybe there is another setting that’s causing the lag? Finally – where are your export files being sent to (i.e. FireWire HD/RAID/Internal HD)?

[Michael Gissing]

It also depends on the codec and sequence settings and the H264 options. Yes the old machines are slow on H264 but without any info on codecs and settings I can’t advise if there may be something wrong.

[Marten Benatar]

I am using the exact same settings for the h264 as in Ken Stones redux. As for the sequence settings tell me what information I can give you and I will make it so.

Thanks

Marten Benatar
Rio Media Services

[Sven Giebel]

Hi Marten,
10 minutes ago I made a compression test with H.264 on my workstation (MP 3Ghz Quad Core Intel Xeon). It took Compressor 3:50min to crunch a anamorphic 720X576 DVCPro50 sequence with four audiotracks with a length of 2:47 into a H.264 of the same pixel dimension. The result looks great btw in 75% and 100% setting. Both percentage settings took the same time. I hope this info is helpful in some way.
all the best,
sven

[Walter Biscardi]

I’ve actually got a demo unit of that Compress HD from Matrox sitting here and plan to install it tonight for testing. A 92 minute feature doc takes approx. 3 hours to compress to 640×360 using a one pass at about medium quality and 22khz audio. Good for the client to review on the web. I’m curious to see that the Compress HD is able to do in terms of cutting way back on the render time

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Editor, Colorist, Director, Writer, Consultant, Author.
HD Post and Production
Biscardi Creative Media

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[Jason Brown]

I’m using Matrox MXO2 with max…which they brag as *faster than real-time* h264 encoding. I know it does depend on your sequence codec…but I’ve had AWESEOME experience with it. I make short 2-3 minute videos and it encodes in under a minute…using HDV content in my sequence…it’s really nice. I believe the Compress HD card uses similar technology?

-Jason

[Rafael Amador]

Hi Marten,
Are importing to Compressor your movie, or you sending your time-line to Compressor?
When making H264, you must to be aware that “Multi-pass” it doesn’t means “Two Passes”, but three.
If you send fro FC, that means rendering your sequence three times.
Rafael

http://www.nagavideo.com

[Marten Benatar]

Thank you everyone for the great information.

Rafael that was a good reply. I tried that and it cut the render time in half.

Thank you!

Marten Benatar
Rio Media Services