Handbrake Question

[Mike Kujbida]

Ron, Handbrake is much better if you need good low bitrate video. That’s where it shines as it’s far better than anything you can get out of Vegas.
Check out the link to the Sony site I posted in the Rendering MP4 for Video Download thread for a lot more information.

[Norman Black]

[Ron Whitaker] “Couldn’t I simply render from Vegas and get the result I desire?”

Maybe. It depends on bitrate.

At lower bitrates the AVC encoders in Vegas are not that good. The open source x264 encoder, which Handbrake uses, is really the best AVC encoder out there, period.

At medium to high bitrates x264 is still better but you cannot really see it and if you cannot see it then we don’t really care.

[Ron Whitaker]

Thanks. I’ll check the post out!

[Ron Whitaker]

Is there a tutorial somewhere on it? The interface can be quite intimidating!

I’ve checked out the online documentation on the Handbrake site, but like most docs, it’s somewhat useless.

[Norman Black]

[Ron Whitaker] “I’ve checked out the online documentation on the Handbrake site, but like most docs, it’s somewhat useless.”

Unfortunately, a common problem with Open source projects.

Google “handbrake tutorial” and work your way through that. Once you get a general idea, there are plenty of people here online, like me, that can answer more specific questions.

I don’t use much of the Handbrake interface. There are a lot of features, subtitles and chapters, people use to compress DVDs and Blu-rays to smaller files. I don’t use the Advanced video tab. I just use the simple controls on the video tab. The filters tab I have everything off since I have progressive source and progressive output.

[Abhi Nash]

Though I use Handbrake myself Ron,Like most people here,I have never used the “Advanced” Tab.

I have used it to compress big files(19.8 GB to 500MB) for uploading to media sharing site.
One of my friend types in a couple codes and Handbrake believe it or not compressed 50GB to 500MB with no loss of quality.

It’s really good if you have a codec which your NLE doesn’t support or you want to compress your large file to a small one for cloud storage or anything.

[Steve Rhoden]

Never tried it!

Steve Rhoden
(Cow Leader)
Film Editor & Compositor.
Filmex Creative Media.
https://www.facebook.com/FilmexCreativeMedia
1-876-461-9019

[Paul Gregory]

I have often used handbrake to reduce the file size of programs recorded off the air. I keep all of the files as Pal 720×576 at 700 which is acceptable for my purpose.

I recently recoded a program which was mid HD range 1440×1080. I(‘m unsure as to what settings I should try. Do I change the frame size,bit rate or both?

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance

[Mikhail Petrushin]

All my home videos I render into MP4 1080-50p (I have the same footage from my camcorder). Quite often the render takes a lot of time as I use neatvideo and others resources hungry plugins.

My relatives likes to watch my home videos so I share videos using dropbox-like file sharing services (no youtube etc as the quality is sux after real HD). So I transcode my 1080-50p into 720-50p with 10Mbps bitrate before sharing. I use Handbrake for transcoding as it is really fast and easy (drag&drop file into Handbrake, choose pre-defined profile, Go, and voilа).
Render from Vegas into different size/framerate is a bit overkill, imho. Also, it means that I have to keep all sources and projects (I do not keep them).

P.S. For rendering my results I do not use Sony AVC or Mainconcept AVC codecs. I render it using Debugmode frameserver + MeGUI (x264).