Ridiculously bad video quality =\

Tegeril · Post by **Tegeril** » Mon May 07, 2007 3:02 am

I'm trying to decide if I'm going to use Handbrake to convert my VIDEO_TS backups...and I've been trying various bitrates (I want to use h.264).

So, let's ignore the fact that it's Miss Congeniality (haha), I've tried Kingdom of Heaven and Devil Wears Prada as well, just trying various movies. Anyway, the query editor generates this:

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"C:\Program Files (x86)\Handbrake\hbcli.exe" -i "V:\DVD\Miss Congeniality\VIDEO_TS" -t 1 -o "C:\Users\Aaron\Desktop\Miss Congeniality.mp4" -e x264 -E faac --crop 0:0:0:0  -b 2048 -B 128 -R 44.1 -C 4

When this encode finishes, I'll get some screenshots up to compare. The previous two I did that were blocky were 2-pass (and have been deleted), this is a single pass encode and maybe something will change? Also, is this setting going to encode 5.1 AAC?

Anyway, just wondering if anyone else has some blocky encodes?

Tegeril · Post by **Tegeril** » Mon May 07, 2007 3:50 am

Ok, picture comparison can be found at http://www.dotstrosity.net/videocompare/

Is there something I can do about this? I can't imagine that the bitrate needs to be higher, but would I see something with a 3mbit encode?

Edit: Just did it at 3072kbit. Some of the blocky characteristics are gone, and instead I have what appears to be an image that is in need of some heavy antialiasing

Edit2: I actually am seeing varying results in different media players. Quicktime is ridiculously blocky whereas media player classic is what made it appear that antialiasing is needed. I just tried to stuff the 3mbit file into PowerDVD 7.2 and it looks perfect. Anyone have any ideas why it looks like crap in these other two programs?

Anheuser50 · Post by **Anheuser50** » Mon May 07, 2007 10:25 am

Judjing from the size of your screenshots, your running a res of 1600x1200 or higher and trying to view a 640x480 or 720x525...ish... video. Naturally stretching this would cause a blocky image, and it's up to the player to interpolate to try to make the video look nice. Other factors may be involved but that is my first take on your issue. HTH

Tegeril · Post by **Tegeril** » Mon May 07, 2007 2:23 pm

Yes, I am definitely scaling the image up dramatically, however the DVD does it gracefully independent of application. I honestly would have expected QuickTime to have less trouble

Thanks for the input.

jbrjake · Post by **jbrjake** » Mon May 07, 2007 4:23 pm

Use anamorphic, use a quality % instead of a bitrate (I suggest about 72%), and turn on CRF. If you're still not happy with the quality, research x264's options.

Tegeril · Post by **Tegeril** » Mon May 07, 2007 4:26 pm

Thanks! Gonna try those settings now.

Tegeril · Post by **Tegeril** » Mon May 07, 2007 5:25 pm

Ok, it finished. I must be doing something stupid regarding audio because it's only doing 2.0 AAC. Also, the blocky problem is just as bad in Quicktime and it still looks perfect in PowerDVD.

I am quite curious if anyone knows why Quicktime cannot scale this correctly...?

Edit: Forced it into Windows Media Player and it plays just fine (after it finds a keyframe (?)). When I seek to a location it stutters a bit and then is fine (no stutter with other media players). Getting it to recognize in Media Center should be fun, since the library wont even acknowledge that an mp4 is a video file. Looks PERFECT in WMP.

Edit2: Ok, trying again for the audio. Checked the box for enable audio mixdown and selected 6 discrete channels. Upped bitrate to 192 and matched sample rate to 48khz...put the slider at 75, checked the crf box, anamorphic, two pass. The last run through was ranging from 0.01mbit on full black screens to 7-7.5mbit on those lovely snowy scenes in Kingdom of Heaven.