Encoding, Not Filling Discs, Etc...

[SomeoneElse]

I know some people get annoyed when people talk about content not filling a disc and they will go on a rant about how choosing a different profile to fill the disc is not always best. Well, what they seem to not think about is some people don't like when only half a disc is filled because they could add MORE content to it and it still wouldn't have filled the disc.

For convertxtoDVD, I did similar to a suggestion I read on the forums. I set custom size as high as it would go. I then would convert and SEE how big the result would be. Then I would know if more would have fit. This way I could still keep from filling a disc, but fit more content.

In convertxtoHD, it COULD take much longer to complete a project, but I guess there's not much else I can do but trial and error in this also?

And will automatic take into account whether I am using 1080, 720, 480 for resolution? Or is it still going to switch profiles based on the same minute counts, which would not be accurate?

Also, will there be any improvement taking an SD source and using 1080 when converting or is it not going to look any better than 480? My original plan was to take old tv shows I have on dvds and copy the to Blu-ray to SAVE space. Obviously, if I set to 1080 resolution, it will save less space. So I am trying to balance quality and saving space. But I wonder if 1080 resolution can even improve anything. It can't magically make old content have new details that weren't there in the original copy. But upconverting in some Blu-ray players apparently does improve old content. I am already using one of the best upconverting players out there, though.

I could make copies in 480 and 1080, but obviously that would waste discs.

I of course have SOME hd content and so there is no question I would want to put it at 1080 on those. But some old tv shows and videos from my old cameras etc are low quality and I am trying to figure out if ANY improvement would be made.

oh also, I assume using 1080 and very long profile would still be at least AS good as 480 quality very short profile? In other words, could auto long 1080p actually give WORSE quality than short profile 480? Or is the only difference going to be bitrate, which would make 1080 always more bitrate than 480, thus no worse than it?

[JJ]

Some answers to your multiple questions:

Upscaling does not improve quality in most cases. Some players are using different techniques that make upscaled picture seem better, but it is best to let that to player. No use wasting disc space upscaling.

Automatic _should_ count bitrate x time -this gives an estimate of total size. So resolution should not matter.
If you have HD (720p) originals then convert them to same resolution. No use to upscale to 1080p for reason above.

Your last question - it depends on original. Resizing will change the result. Downscaling always loses some detail, upscaling creates blockiness.
Personally I convert to same resolution as original, if it is supported by target player.

[SomeoneElse]

Some answers to your multiple questions:

Upscaling does not improve quality in most cases. Some players are using different techniques that make upscaled picture seem better, but it is best to let that to player. No use wasting disc space upscaling.

Automatic _should_ count bitrate x time -this gives an estimate of total size. So resolution should not matter.
If you have HD (720p) originals then convert them to same resolution. No use to upscale to 1080p for reason above.

Your last question - it depends on original. Resizing will change the result. Downscaling always loses some detail, upscaling creates blockiness.
Personally I convert to same resolution as original, if it is supported by target player.

But you just agreed 1080 video will obviously use more space than 480. So why should ituse the same number of minutes to estimate profile when clearly that same number of minutes would take up less space with 480? Resolution is obviously going to help determine how much can fit without quite filling the disc.

Let's say I have fifty 30 minute shows. Obviously I do NOT want to use automatic and it fill half a disc and waste the other half, causing me to use 2 discs for what could fit on 1. So in convertxtodvd I ended up estimating based on trial and error and then converting and put a very high custom disc size. Since the program was trying to make a huge file, it still did the best result and then no disc space was wasted. If I have 5 episodes of a show on a single layer dvd, well a double layer blu ray is TEN times as big, so all else being equal it would fit 10 times as many episodes, if they were the exact same files.

But forgetting resolution itself, is a higher bitrate always going to help, even if the original bitrate of the original file was lower? I figured it's still best to use short project, just in case it "could" help.

I also don't know if the files on Blu-ray AUTOMATICALLY use higher bitrate than convertxtodvd, either. If I use 480 in convertxtoHD, is it going to be different than a convertxtoDVD transfer of the same content?

I have a ton of old SD tv shows and also concert videos taken on old phones so obviously that would be even lower bitrate than SD shows. I then have some content from recent times which is obviously great quality. All I know is in convertxtoDVD it was sometimes only filling half a disc if I solely depended on auto and correct target size. So by trial and error I could double what would fit.

I am still unsure whether or not to use two passes, also. I try to NOT completely fill a disc and some help topics say double pass wont help much in cases like that, but it also says double pass helps with low bitrate content more than with high bitrate, so I am unsure and clearly a Blu-ray will take so long to convert and burn that I would rather stop using two passes if it's a waste.

An assumption I see made a lot on here is if someone complains about a disc being half full, they want to sue something to totally fill it. No, usually, they want to still not QUITE fill it, but they simply know many times when automatic chooses medium, it could have used short and still not filled a disc. Thus it would still use the same method, not switching to true VBR. That is why it's good to put a high custom disc size and you can see yourself what it can fit. But for Blu-ray that would be a lot of time spent.

This post is long and rambling. I just am trying to decide:
1. if short vs medium vs long makes a difference EVEN on very low bitrate content.
2. if bitrate in convertxtoHD will automatically be higher than convertxtoDVD, regardless of profile or resolution chosen.
3. if using 1080 on non-hd content will help much, which you believe no it won't. So I might as well set it at 480 (I assume my old camera vids would be worse than what 480 would usually be, I guess I could look at file details?).

Again, I do want the best quality, but also not to have half a disc wasted by finalizing with nothing there. I think I have got it all done well in convertxtoDVD, so now trying to learn the differences in convertxtoHD which I haven't yet purchased.

[SomeoneElse]

Actually, when it comes down to it, I could have probably made this short post asking truly the main thing I want to know. You said if taking a SD source and converting in 1080 it could cause artifacts/blockiness. The bottom line comes down to this.... does the same hold true if converting a low bitrate source to a higher one? Could it actually look WORSE to use short project instead of long project? Some shows, with convertxtodvd, I was pretty sure still looked better with short project even if it was using higher bitrate than the original source.

If some content would not look worse with long project than with short project, wow could I ever fit a ton of shows on one disc. I could turn like 20 discs into 1. lol. But I know in convertxtodvd it sure used mighty low bitrates with long project.

[JJ]

Bottom line is just that -
You can not improve quality by upscaling. You can use different filters to smooth out some blockiness, but you can not add detail that is not there.
One example is scene with newspaper on it. From FullHD original you can usually read that newspaper when paused.
From SD or lower you just see blobs in that newspaper. Converting that to FullHD will not make that text readable, just bigger blobs.

[ckhouston]

Hover your mouse cursor over the encoding options in settings and the conditions for which the times shown are given. Differences between your project and those conditions are accounted for by keeping the bitrate per pixel the same. For example, times will go up if your audio uses less bitrate or you increase target size, they will go down if your target resolution is greater or you add subtitles. The Automatic option generally does a good job and is what most people should stick with unless they are willing to spend some time trying to optimize settings as you are.

The scenery is what is most important in encoding, not other characteristics of your source -- see http://forums.vso-software.fr/post94648 ... age#p94648 for example -- and judging scenery is difficult for many people. Complex scenes that require high bitrate usually have many hard contrasting edges, action does not primarily determine complexity as most people think, what counts is what the encoder thinks.

I suggest that you:
1. Compare trial conversions using one single 1 hr episode or two 1/2 hr episodes (leave Video Resolution on Automatic until step 3). You can then divide your chosen target size by those converted sizes to find out how many episodes will fit on your disc without completely filling it.
2. Do conversions with Short, Medium and Long Projects. Compare their quality by playing them on your computer and try to not let converted size influence your decision.
3. Change resolution from Automatic to HD and compare it on your TV with conversions done at lower resolution to see if your player/TV does a better job of upscaling than ConvertX. You can burn a disc or put the converted folder on a memory stick or card.
4. If any of your sources are grainy, experiment with settings that may smooth the picture. Short Projects will always give you the best reproduction of the source as long as the target isn't filled (not necessarily if it is filled), Medium and Long will smooth the result some. High order resize filters like Lanczos also give the most faithful reproduction while lower order ones like Linear provide some smoothing.

[SomeoneElse]

I have read a lot of topics in the convertxtoDVD forum at some point or another, but some things are just still hard to figure out. I'd say mostly what is difficult to guess is whether to use 2 passes or not. In DVD, I always used it, just IN CASE, figuring it can't hurt, other than taking longer. But as long as it's surely going to take a Blu-ray to be done, I hate to waste so much time. I do NOT intend to fill the disc totally. So should I flat out not use two passes just by that fact alone? Or I still should consider the source?

Also, if my computer already makes all kinds of racket, sounding like it's going to die, should I probably not use multiple cores to convert multiple files at once? lol.

jj, yes I know it can't add detail. I just thought maybe it improves something which still helps one notice details easier.

ckhouston, so regardless of the original source short project (when not filling a disc) still will give an improved result, even if the original is low bitrate. I know with one show in particular I recorded it at VERY low bitrate originally. Also, I can do all of that, but many times I don't notice differences easily no matter what I use. And one may say well then it doesn't really matter if I don't notice them. The problem is once actually relaxed and watching something and not really looking for differences I will notice things and also many times if you add a lot of shows to a project SOME will look different with various settings and some wont, and it would be mighty hard/impossible to go through hundreds of shows one by one trying them with different settings. So all I can really do is a few tests and just guess. Also on this computer I cant tell much because the monitor is not so great, so I would definitely have to put it on a usb stick or something.

There was some question I forgot that I still was hoping for an answer to, but I can't remember offhand. It's hard foe me to know how to judge between simple and complex scenes. I THINK they would usually be simple. Also, you mean smoothing as in cutting out or hiding some of the noise or what exactly?

By content type examples, what are some suggestions? For instance which settings would you use for poorer and low bitrate content and what would you change when using great content? I never even played with the setting in convertxtoDVD where default is linear. Since it was called resizing or something similar to that I didn't know that it's always sued, thought it was related to resizing, as in dimensions. If any of these settings could help me, it would be nice. I kind of doubt much will improve quality, but who knows.

Thanks for the responses.

[ckhouston]

I do NOT intend to fill the disc totally. So should I flat out not use two passes just by that fact alone? Or I still should consider the source?

Two pass will have no noticeable effect as long as the disc is not filled so don't use it. And I doubt that the best quality setting is worthwhile.

It's hard foe me to know how to judge between simple and complex scenes. I THINK they would usually be simple. Also, you mean smoothing as in cutting out or hiding some of the noise or what exactly?

There is a section of http://forums.vso-software.fr/understan ... 13008.html that explains scene complexity, most TV shows have simple scenery as you suspect. And yes smoothing means making noise less noticeable -- ConvertX does not have a noise filter but the two parameters mentioned will have some effect.

By content type examples, what are some suggestions? For instance which settings would you use for poorer and low bitrate content and what would you change when using great content?

Your objective is to put as many episodes as possible on a disc at what you think is acceptable quality. Encoding is complicated so involves compromises that only you can make. The short tests suggested above are designed to help make those settings choices, you may need to do the tests for each different show. You will find that the MP setting allows you to put at least twice as many episodes on the disc as does SP, LP will allow even more. But, when the disc is not filled, SP gives the best reproduction of the original, MP slightly less and LP even lower. You have to make your own choices when not using Automatic encoding.

I never even played with the setting in convertxtoDVD where default is linear. Since it was called resizing or something similar to that I didn't know that it's always sued, thought it was related to resizing, as in dimensions.

Resizing is the changing of resolution. The tests above will help you decide whether to do resizing in ConvertX or let your player/TV do it.

[SomeoneElse]

The problem is I sometimes have a hard time noticing if SP gave a better result. Like I said, you may then say well if you can't tell, use something with lower bitrate to save space, BUT like I mentioned, on some content I do believe SP ends up with a better result, but it would be nearly impossible to test every show beforehand. I could test a few and guess. honestly the way I have felt lately is I should just always sue short project and then would have peace of mind that well I did the best I could, whether it took up more space or not. I mean in xtoDVD. I haven't yet converted with xtoHD. But in dvd, I know the actual conversion result sure dropped off a lot in bitrate from SP to MP, whereas MP to LP was a much smaller bitrate drop. So I almost feel like LP is as good as MP, due to not much difference in bitrate and fitting more space. The problem is, like you mentioned, MP will fit about double what SP will fit, so a show that would need 10 blu rays for SP would potentially need 5 for MP or maybe even only 2 or 3 for LP. That's a mighty big difference having to have 10 discs lying around vs. only a few.

SO, anyway, I am pretty sure I will end up using SP, but I'm not sure yet. I indeed think I will quit using two passes and I already read how much slower best quality ends up taking so will uncheck that most likely. Hopefully it will still do like xtoDVD where my higher target size setting will make it convert everything in the best quality while keeping automatic saying short project as well. I use that higher target size where it knows it's not going to fill a disc. In xtoHD it gives a warning that it's not possible to burn to disc at 100GB, but hopefully it will still convert as if it could be, since the final result will indeed fit. I wonder if technically you COULD burn to a 100GB disc, though, and the program simply didn't take those larger discs now available into account, or if the actual STRUCTURE won't be right for a 100GB disc. I am going to bur to 50GB discs, so am just assuming target size is irrelevant in how the structure of the result will be.

Oh, by the way, is there really any difference between very short project and short project? I assumed so or they wouldn't call it VERY short, but the actual results I got seemed to be the same size conversions with each of those! (again, in xtoDVD)

As for resizing, how do you choose if this program does it or not? I think there is no setting for "none" on resize filters.

[ckhouston]

Choose the encoding option you like most but consider the audience you are burning for. If it is primarily you then sounds like you want SP. If it is other people also then consider that most people don't notice a difference between SP and MP unless they are looking for it. So you might want to show them conversions at both SP and MP, without telling them the difference to avoid bias, to see which they prefer.

You are right about the size differences between the three encoding options. I tried to get VSO to add another option between SP and MP with no joy.

ConvertXtoDVD will always convert to a DVD compatible structure no matter what target size you choose. And ConvertXtoHD will always convert to a Blu-ray compatible structure.

Oh, by the way, is there really any difference between very short project and short project? I assumed so or they wouldn't call it VERY short, but the actual results I got seemed to be the same size conversions with each of those! (again, in xtoDVD)

I don't think there is any difference in the conversion, just in terminology. I have examined results thoroughly and can't find a difference, and SP uses the lowest quantization factor possible so no further quality increase is possible.

As for resizing, how do you choose if this program does it or not? I think there is no setting for "none" on resize filters.

There is no direct option choice, resizing is done only when the original and the chosen conversion resolutions are different.

[SomeoneElse]

As for resizing, how do you choose if this program does it or not? I think there is no setting for "none" on resize filters.

There is no direct option choice, resizing is done only when the original and the chosen conversion resolutions are different.

Hmm so basically if I chose 720, for example, if the original source were anything whatsoever other than the exact dimensions of a 720p movie, it would then take those resize settings into account?

It's tough to decide whether I "should" aim for resizing and see if I can improve anything with the mentioned smoothing. I remember seeing somewhere on here that many like the resizing option which starts with L and I forget the name, offhand. I am tempted to try just to see. I have some content which is noisy and some which isn't. I have an oppo player, known for good upconversion, but it's never seemed so great to me at it. Occasionally a dvd will look almost HD, but usually not.

I guess opinion varies from person to person, but for me it's tough to decide if Medium would be going too far down In quality or not. It would REALLY help me cut down on discs used, though.

VSO's software is so good, there's not much to suggest, but I do wish you could have some titles convert at a higher bitrate than other titles, in the same project. Then maybe I would use highr bitrate for episodes I care more about than others.

[ckhouston]

Hmm so basically if I chose 720, for example, if the original source were anything whatsoever other than the exact dimensions of a 720p movie, it would then take those resize settings into account?

Yes.

It's tough to decide whether I "should" aim for resizing and see if I can improve anything with the mentioned smoothing. I remember seeing somewhere on here that many like the resizing option which starts with L and I forget the name, offhand. I am tempted to try just to see. I have some content which is noisy and some which isn't. I have an oppo player, known for good upconversion, but it's never seemed so great to me at it. Occasionally a dvd will look almost HD, but usually not.

Item 4 of the tests I suggested above is designed to help you decide that. I suggest you re-read that post, the L resize is Lanczos for example as explained there, and do the suggested tests.

[SomeoneElse]

So far tests are showing even set at 480, the file sizes are much larger than with convertxtoDVD. In fact, the change from xtoDVD to xtoHD increases size of files more than going from 480 to 720 in resolution does within xtoHD. The difference in resolution makes a lot less impact than simply choosing one program over the other does. So I am not going to be able to cut down on discs nearly as much as I thought. I am basically going to have to use twice as many discs as I thought I would, even if I keep it at 480.

One thing's for sure... converting to 1080p sure takes way more time on my comp. About triple the time to convert, compared with 480. And it's tough for me to tell if I would benefit from it. Like I said, I am not good at noticing differences until random scenes where something stands out shows me one way is better than another, so I may never be sure what to burn it in. I use an OPPO Blu-ray player, known for its upconversion, so my GUESS is that I should keep it at 480. My tv keeps source material close to original, the player does some processing.

I haven't yet tried anything other than short. Judging by this taking up more space than xtoDVD projects, even when using 480, makes me assume bitrates are higher in xtoHD even for 480 content. So I assume medium and long in this program are higher bitrate than short in xtoDVD.

edit: actually the result files seem to have the same bitrate as convertxtoDVD produced, yet take up twice the space. And at least on my computer 1080 does seem to improve quality. I may have to indeed try both resolution files on the tv just to see. On the shows I like the most, I am tempted to burn them both ways no matter what just in case I don't notice something now and notice later that one way is better.

I'm really confused. When using medium it doesn't even seem to be going much lower on bitrate and thus file size. Even for 480 setting a file with medium is only about 12% smaller! What's up with that? I think in xtoDVD it would be 50% smaller file size. There's not much point lowering it to medium if you only save that tiny amount of file space.

[ckhouston]

I decided long ago to not burn to BD discs so may have given you bad advice. Now that you mention it, I seem to remember that converted sizes were about the same no matter what you try.

Please continue to let us know what you find out, it might help a lot of other users.

[SomeoneElse]

Well, I spent a lot of money for the drive, discs, software. So the last thing I want is to end up with a bad result after all of this. And so far in tests that is what's happening.

I burned some AVCHD discs, where I could test with actual discs and not be wasting more expensive blu-rays. Well when I tried to play discs in my Blu-ray player that had been converted with 480 resolution, THEY STRETCHED TO WIDESCREEN. I am almost POSITIVE I selected 4:3 yet when playing it, and pressing info for my player, it said 16:9. Is this a bug?

Yet when using 1080.... no stretching. It looked 4:3 due to having black bars. But I felt like the look was not better and maybe was worse than I remembered the regular dvds of these shows being. So I likely don't want to use 1080p, which causes conversions to be around triple the size. But I sure don't want stretching when I choose 480p 4:3!!!

I hope I just chose 16:9 by accident, but I really don't think so because I think I double checked it. If my only choices are stretching in 480 and huge file sizes with 1080p then I am going to be mad I spent so much money on all of this. My choices would be use MORE discs than before or have stretched picture.

I don't think it was due to any setting on my Blu-ray player, either. If it was that, it would have done this stretching for regular dvds from convertxtoDVD as well, but it didn't, it had those all the proper 4:3.

Also, the 1080 content had constant weird artifacts in strips across the bottom and navigating with forward and reverse was really bad with delayed responses.

When I burned a test 480 project that I didn't burn to disc, when viewing on my computer it looked 4:3 to me. So I dunno what is going on.

edit: For the 480 content I can put my tv wide setting to 4:3 to force it back to 4:3, but that is not ideal and I do NOT have to do that with anything burned from convertxtoDVD.

And I think the 480 conversion also had that noise at the bottom almost like how bad vhs tapes used to have. Like I said, I am going to be upset if I spent all of this money and time and then the results are going to have weird artifacts or be forced into a stretch.

Oh and yet another issue... out of nowhere it would give all these "access" errors, whatever that means. Forcing me to close the program. And windows explorer and windows update stopped working. Not sure if those were due to the new drive or this program.

[peter7769]

Oh and yet another issue... out of nowhere it would give all these "access" errors, whatever that means. Forcing me to close the program. And windows explorer and windows update stopped working. Not sure if those were due to the new drive or this program.

Hi
Thats funny you should say about the explorer problem, i have been having the exact same problem but i must admit i didnt put it down to this, seems like you might be onto something!!

Pete

[ckhouston]

I burned some AVCHD discs, where I could test with actual discs and not be wasting more expensive blu-rays. Well when I tried to play discs in my Blu-ray player that had been converted with 480 resolution, THEY STRETCHED TO WIDESCREEN. I am almost POSITIVE I selected 4:3 yet when playing it, and pressing info for my player, it said 16:9. Is this a bug?
...
...
...
When I burned a test 480 project that I didn't burn to disc, when viewing on my computer it looked 4:3 to me. So I dunno what is going on.

edit: For the 480 content I can put my tv wide setting to 4:3 to force it back to 4:3, but that is not ideal and I do NOT have to do that with anything burned from convertxtoDVD.

Log files are needed for problems like that -- see http://forums.vso-software.fr/where-do- ... 13680.html.

I won't be able to help more for several days but will do what I can when I can. Maybe someone else will help in the mean time. You can always submit problems directly to VSO but they can't help unless you give them enough info so they can duplicate the problem.

[SomeoneElse]

The log doesn't have anything useful. It says 4:3 in it, but I burned another test disc and indeed it's stretched and says 16:9 for file info on my tv. So basically I spent hundreds of dollars thinking I would cut out a lot of clutter by using less discs than I have and in reality I now have to choose either 1080 with horrible navigation (waits a while before it starts forwarding or reversing when pressing the button, all clunky) AND use the same number of disc or even MORE or I have to set the tv wide mode to 4:3 to force it to unstretch. That can't be good having one program stretch it and then use the tv to unstretch. I would assume that would affect the quality. Not to mention the annoyance of always having to change the wide mode. No matter which way I go I am going to have worse results than with the dvds I already have. And that doesn't even take into account the weird artifacts which were there when forwarding or reversing, not sure if they are there during playback.

[JJ]

Log shows what exact modes you are converting to.

For example - DVD 480p can be 4:3 or 16:9 and it has exact same amount of pixels. This is because DVD has anamorphic widescreen.
Converting to some other format than DVD but still using 480p might have different restrictions on bitrate etc.

So provide logs please.

[SomeoneElse]

I have so many logs it's hard to find which one now. But I already read through it and it said 480 4:3 in it. Everythign in the log looks right. If I watch the file on my computer, after conversion, BEFORE burning it, it looks 4:3 on my computer. It then says it is burning and then once burned it is 16:9 on my tv (not just due to the tv or player stretching it, the actual info of the video says 16:9 is its format) and I can't play the disc on my computer to see if it's 4:3 on here or not becaue I guess VLC wont even recognize AVCHD.

If you are saying that it will FORCE everything to be 16:9 when using 480p content on a non-sd formatted disc, well I don't know why it would do that, but if it does, that is bad for me because I have spent hundreds of dollars planning on burning in 480p to save disc space. If it's going to stretch everything I will have to use a higher resolution, thus causing artifacts most likely and taking up much more space.

Again, the same content converted to 1080 shows up in 4:3 properly. Also, I have my blu ray player set to UPCONVERT all discs to 1080 so as far as my tv is concerned it is a 1080 source. When I use a dvd burned with convertxtoDVD and it is upconverted to 1080p it shows fine in 4:3.

Also, I wonder if AVCHD or Blu-ray will have differences or if it's going to stretch on Blu-ray too.

Also normally I would be patient and relax until I figure this out (if even possible), but the annoying part of this is I paid extra per disc on my blank discs to get them sooner rather than buy from japan and wait longer, whereas now days go by with me not able to burn my discs anyway so I could have saved money just waiting on slow japan shipping if I had known there would be all of these issues. That is why I am in a hurry to figure out what to do. If it's always going to stretch then I would have no choice but not use 480 and waste a lot more disc space and probably have worse picture quality than on my original dvds which defeats the whole purpose f me doing this. I don't see why it being AVCHD instead of regular dvd matters, as it's still supposedly 480 4:3, upgraded to 1080p by the player, and in dot by dot mode which means no stretching.