Best codec for videos

[Suchy]

What is the best piece of softwere and codec to compress videos so that they will still have great quality and a 60 min video for example will take up something like 700 megs? Just like those videos on P2P networks. I am planing to digitilize my old tapes and want to keep their file size low while keeping good quality.

[azzey]

DivX:
http://www.divx.com/
http://www.programurl.com/dr-divx-three-step-divx-encoding-app-.htm

[pangea33]

Those are somewhat tight constraints. What you're describing can be achieved in a couple ways. Are you planning on keeping these on your machine for playback by computer only, or so you want to burn them to CD-R for playback in a standalone dvd player?

If you're keeping them on your machine, I would recommend DivX or XviD *.avi format. It's got pretty high quality from pretty large display sizes, and uses a nice variable encoding rate that you can tailor to hit your size parameters.

If you want to burn these on disk so that they can play in your dvd player, and have specified the approximate capacity of a CD-R, then you're basically describing VCDs. They are made from mpg files, and can play in standalone units on simple burnable CDs. The audio quality is great, and the video quality is good enough for standard def tvs through s-video or composite video.

These aren't the best choice for keeping on a computer when you can stream the video out directly to a teevee, because the resolution is only like 320x240 or something in that area. You can find a ton of info on both of these by seaching for avi or vcd on google, but definitely check out "videohelp.com".

If you provide a little more feedback on what you want to do, maybe i can offer some more useful suggestions.

[Starman*]

I would not skimp on quality, at all. If you can get good compression with quality, fine. Any visible reduction in quality, bad idea.

You have old tapes that you intend to digitize. You will know that if you have any tapes recorded at EP (seemed a good idea at the time?), the quality is crap. Don't repeat that at digitization. Todays best quality is tomorrow's "black and white".

The quality of vhs in general is poor so there's no point going overboard on high bitrates, but the cost of dvd blanks (for data or video dvds) is negligible. Whatever you decide on, do some short tests and compare the vhs playback with the final digital format playback.

I recently purchased some dvds online, which were in fact vcd (and clearly bootlegged!). The quality was noticeably below my own recordings in 720x480 mpeg2. I complained and got the dvds for free but they are junk because of the quality.

Starman*

[pangea33]

The quality of vhs in general is poor so there's no point going overboard on high bitrates, but the cost of dvd blanks (for data or video dvds) is negligible. Whatever you decide on, do some short tests and compare the vhs playback with the final digital format playback.

I recently purchased some dvds online, which were in fact vcd (and clearly bootlegged!). The quality was noticeably below my own recordings in 720x480 mpeg2. I complained and got the dvds for free but they are junk because of the quality.

Starman*Agreed, but you're also comparing the vcds you bought to store bought dvds. You're not going to be able to increase the original size of the vhs tape without degredation. Probably calls for a little experimenting. Plus the stated contstraints of 700megs for an hour. How big are the recordings that you mentioned, Starman*?

[Starman*]

I checked the "vcds" and they are in fact half-width mpeg2 352x480 @ 9+Mbps. I was comparing with my own mpeg2 recordings from tv. The video is cleaner than I get (tv reception) but there is a lack of sharpness. VCD is going to be poorer quality still.

Re comparison with commercial dvds, a lot of those are appalling quality, saved only by viewing across a room and persistence of vision!

The point I was making was to put quality first with high compression as a "nice to have". If you look at dvd, typically they are 6-8 Mbps. The rate Suchy quoted is about 0.8 Mbps. That's a big difference, not that you necessarily want to make a dvd from vhs at commercial bitrates.

I've done quite a few wmv videos 320x240 @ about 0.5 Mbps and 1 sec between I frames. The quality is not great. Marginal playing on a pc at 1024x768, about 800x600 is max. Wmv is quite good for low quality video.

Bottom line is check the quality and decide if that's what you want to look at in 10 years time when you are used to watching HD.

Starman*

[saphalline]

I agree that I would want high quality for my own videos, especially as they relate to old home moves. But that's mostly because I use my PC almost exclusively for all my content. Yeah, I go to movie theatres. And I watch movies on a TV with set-top DVD player with friends. But if it's just me, to my computer I go!

It does depend a lot on where Suchy will be viewing these digitized movies, as well as the format and quality expected. If the old home movies are something worthy of extra effort for quality, then a time-intensive noise reduction program could be run on raw uncompressed AVI video before being compressed with a codec. This would obviously take much longer, but would make for a more efficient and better looking/sounding compressed video, even without a variable bit rate.