YouTube - WMV works OK (in High Quality View)

Soniclight wrote on 1/14/2009, 1:29 PM
I've avoided using YouTube for obvious reason (degradation of video), but since they now offer "view in high quality" mode, even a WMV upload looks acceptable.

It being my birthday today, I figured, whuddahell, let's upload this old video/Particleillusion effects test ditty from its .WMV version.

That said, the embedded one here is in

The only problem is that I wasn't give a choice of frames to represent it.
It chose one way into the video. Odd.

Yeah, some of you have seen this before (please don't groan :)
But here it is in its last, a tad more polished version.

Nowhere near a professional as the recently discussed "Playing for Change" video here at the forum, but in the same general why-can't-we-just-get-along spirit.

Especially considering what's going on in that part of the world right now. Again. :(

Comments

AtomicGreymon wrote on 1/14/2009, 3:00 PM
I'd say H.264 would be the more ideal format for uploading, as that's the format Youtube itself uses for the new HD option, and the regular High Quality view.

I uploaded this one in H.264 @1280x720 (using the newer Mainconcept encoder available in TMPGEnc 4.0 Xpress), VBR with an average bitrate of 8000kbps. I can't use URL tags, or it appears in the outdated Youtube box.



Not a perfect image (the original 1080p looks much better), but a massive improvement over previous Youtube quality.
Soniclight wrote on 1/15/2009, 2:45 PM
Thanks for reply.

My project was only in old SD res, so can't make it as nifty as your tribute trailer for WALL.E. Which is really well made, BTW.

I don't have TMPGEn, but did make an MPEG4, and may upload it to see if it makes any difference. I also have the video at an other site which doesn't mash it up like YouTube, so I'm not really concerned.

Now, for a copyright/legal question:

-- Is a fan tribute trailer such as that considered "fair use"? I ask this since you are using actual footage from the film.

I'm so anally ethic-compulsive about using anything that I may or may not be limiting my pool of resources, hence the question.
AtomicGreymon wrote on 1/15/2009, 11:30 PM
Well, hopefully the next version of Vegas sees an update to the built-in Mainconcept H.264 codec... according to various people on the boards, the one in 8.0 is quite old. I bought TMPGEnc in the first place because I found the HD render options in Vegas severely lacking. I'm considering picking up 1 or 2 other TMPGEnc products... their MPEG editor, for one; they seem to make produce good software.

-- Is a fan tribute trailer such as that considered "fair use"? I ask this since you are using actual footage from the film.

That's a good question, lol. Given the number of that type of video on Youtube, and the fact they're never removed (whereas those same studios will jump on absolutely anything else), I'd say that nobody really seems to care. As long as it isn't the actual film, short subject, etc. in its entirety... the studios seem to take it more as a tribute rather than some kind of copyright violation.

Actually getting the footage to make the videos is usually where the violations are... bypassing CSS for DVDs, or AACS (and BD+, in some cases) for Blu-Ray... and if you're in the US, I believe that does technically violate the DMCA. But the DMCA is draconian, and seems to want to eliminate fair use altogether. Unfortunately, Canada's current government is trying to implement similar laws... one of the reasons I didn't vote Conservative, lol.

I don't think anyone will ever crack down on that particular use of footage, though. If anything, it may increase rental and sales; if people happen to want to see the movie in question.

Disney surely got their money out of me for WALL-E, though... I saw it several times at the theatre, and bought the Blu-Ray (which is where that footage came from).
NickHope wrote on 1/16/2009, 7:37 AM
>> Well, hopefully the next version of Vegas sees an update to the built-in Mainconcept H.264 codec... according to various people on the boards, the one in 8.0 is quite old. <<

That was me. Apparently Elecard Converter Studio uses a fairly recent MainConcept H.264 encoder as well as TMPG Xpress, but I couldn't find the version when I had a search the other day.

But beside MainConcept you've also got open source x264 which you can use through the Megui GUI, and then there are also DivX 7 which now encodes H.264 apparently (correct me if i'm wrong pls someone), and On2's forthcoming VP8 which apparently is also switching to H.264 from FLV (correct me if i'm wrong pls someone). So there seem to be some good options arising!
fldave wrote on 1/16/2009, 8:31 AM
Atomic, what audio setting did you use for your Wall-E clip? Looks and sounds great, and I have TMPGEnc!
AtomicGreymon wrote on 1/16/2009, 9:42 AM
I did the actual mixing in Vegas, to avoid clipping and stuff as I layered the music and various bits of dialogue onto eachother. After rendering an uncompressed AVI from Vegas (with PCM audio, 48kHz, 16-bit stereo) I ran that through TMPGEnc 4.0 Xpress. The only choice it gives you when encoding to H.264 is to have AAC audio... I went with the Main Profile, same sample rate as the original, and a bitrate of 320kbps.

The video was originally High Profile, Level 4.1 AVC on the Blu-Ray. Artifacts showed up in the Vegas preview window occassionally with the original m2ts files, so I used TMPGEnc to convert them to uncompressed AVI. When I rendered the final trailer (again to AVI), I did a seperate one for Youtube resized to 1280x720 using the Best setting in Vegas (which I've read is meant for resized things). When I put that through TMPGEnc, I used these settings after a bit of experimentation:

Profile: High
Level: Auto (for 4.1 and below)
Size: 1280x720
PAR: 1:1
Framerate: 23.976

Rate control mode: 2-pass Variable
Avg: 8000kbps
Max: 16000kbps
Motion Search Range: 16
Bitrate Buffer: 0 (Auto)
Video System: Auto

GOP Length: 72
B Frame Count: 0
Reference Frame Count: 1
Quantization I Picture: 1
Quantization P Picture: 1
Quantization B Picture: 1
Entropy coding mode: CABAC
Motion Estimation subpel mode: Quarter Pixel

No doubt I could've got away with lower video (and audio, probably) bitrate, but I wanted to give Youtube a fairly high ceiling to work with when they transcoded it themselves.
fldave wrote on 1/16/2009, 9:56 AM
Great info, thanks! Looks great!
AtomicGreymon wrote on 1/16/2009, 11:52 AM
That was me. Apparently Elecard Converter Studio uses a fairly recent MainConcept H.264 encoder as well as TMPG Xpress, but I couldn't find the version when I had a search the other day.

I looked through the folder for TMPGEnc Xpress, and it looks like the H.264 encoder is 7.3.0.19115
NickHope wrote on 1/16/2009, 11:22 PM
>> I looked through the folder for TMPGEnc Xpress, and it looks like the H.264 encoder is 7.3.0.19115 <<

Atomic, I think that's mcmpeg4vdec.dll which I assume is the decoder. I'm thinking that mcmpeg4vout.dll is the encoder and that's at version 7.20.0.19115. That's a couple of years old already.

But actually what I couldn't find is the version in Elecard Converter Studio. I know it's 7.something.

Interesting comparison on H.264 codecs is here. But the latest free pdf is from December 2007.
AtomicGreymon wrote on 1/17/2009, 12:12 AM
The file I was reporting the version number of (7.3.0.19155) was mch264vout.dll which is described as a "H.264/AVC Video Encoder Wrapper". The "H.264/AVC Video Decoder" seems to be mcstdh264dec.dll, which is version 7.5.0.27713. I think the mpeg4 DLLs may just be the MPEG-4 Part 2 encoders/decoders.

In any case, Vegas also seems to have a mch264vout.dll... version 2.0.1889.0, lol. Just a *tad* dated, I think.
NickHope wrote on 1/17/2009, 1:24 AM
Ah yes sorry Atomic, I missed that mch264vout.dll. You're right, I'm looking at the wrong files. Anyway as you say the TMPEG version is 7.3.0.19155 dated 7th September 2007 and the Vegas version is 2.0.1889.0 dated 5th January 2006. That's a lot of versions different!

Maybe SCS will gazump em all with a new version of their own H.264 codec. In the meantime it's a 3rd party encoder for me.