Fast & Dirty Vid for CD: Best Codec for WM/XP OS?

Soniclight wrote on 10/5/2008, 1:11 AM
I'm doing a no frills, non-artistic 2-3 min. 640x480 video to document plants and shrubs at my apartment complex to submit to powers-that-be. I use VP8.

Due to my old/low-mid quality SD cam, doing a .wmv (my most used codec) isn't an option: render looks blocky, horrible.
So I have to find some other solution.

I have to stick with A) a native WM/XP codec and B) it has to fit on a CD (not DVD) since it's a real estate/property office--not a video studio--person who will be viewing this.

MPEG-2 looks good, but from what I read at listing in page below, only MPEG-1 is native to WM.
Render in -1 isn't as crisp as in -2, but OK. Just looking for more options.



Thanks.

Windows Media Player Files

(Oh and for the few that know me here, yes, I've been away from here for months on end. Been busy with life, moving to nice new place, etc.)

Comments

riredale wrote on 10/5/2008, 1:51 AM
3 minutes is 180 seconds. You have 700MB to play with; that gives a maximum possible average bitrate of almost 4MB/sec, or 32Mb/sec.

Regular DVDs run typically at 5-8Mb/sec, using MPEG2. MPEG1 is a much less sophisticated codec, but, still, you have tons of bandwidth.

The official VCD format specifies a max of 1.15Mb/sec for a 240x320 window. Your window is 4 times the area, so for equivalent quality you'd be looking at 4.6Mb/sec. Why not encode with MPEG1 at a non-standard CBR of, say, 10Mb/sec?

Try it out and see if it plays. I think it should, even though it's not an "official" bitrate.

BTW welcome back.
Chienworks wrote on 10/5/2008, 5:13 AM
Yep, lots of folks i've discussed MPEG-1 with seem to think it's limited to 1.5Mbps or some odd low figure in that range. Up the bitrate to 6Mbps or higher and it looks very nice indeed! Another benefit is that MPEG-1 seems to tax the playback processor much less than most other codecs so you get a video that plays well even on non-optimal PCs. I've also noticed that rendering to MPEG-1 seems to invoke some amazing deinterlace routine in Vegas that results in some of the smoothest progressive from interlaced images it ever makes.
Soniclight wrote on 10/5/2008, 10:19 AM
Thanks, guys. I've noticed the smoothness in my first test render, and I haven't done the bitrate tweak yet, so promising.
corug7 wrote on 10/5/2008, 8:04 PM
I'm not quite sure why you can't use WMV. Trying to playback 6 Mbps or so off of a CD is asking for trouble. You could have a pretty decent WMV at 1.8 Mbps with 192 kbps audio that would play back off a CD just fine. Try these parameters:

Frame Size: 640x480
Quality: Best
Video Bitrate: 1800 K
Audio Bitrate: 192 K
Keyframe every 3 seconds
Sharpness: 90

Try 1 pass CBR or 2 pass bitrate VBR. This should really be overkill for a WMV of this size. If there is a lot of motion, you can try boosting the bitrate to 2500 kbps or so. Deinterlace if necessary.

Good luck!
Soniclight wrote on 10/6/2008, 4:08 PM
Well, looks like my "docu-campaign" may not need a supporting video (ball is rolling in other ways to get desired results). But in case it may add some umph, I'll probably stick with MPEG-1 since it's only a 2-3 minute vid. Cuz...

MPEG-1 vs. WMV in this instance:

There IS motion, lot of it -- I'm either walking with my DIY steadycam rig or tripod-panning, and so far MPEG @ 5 Mbps does a far better render (I use Smart Deinterlace too).

Though I will probably do a test in .WMV as suggested, as well as a lower, i.e. 2.x Mbps MPEG-1 and see what happens.