Good settings for Blu Rays?

[mknabster]

I'm going to start encoding Blu Rays in a month or so, but i was wondering, which is the best way to encode them, use constant quality or average bitrate? Depending on your answer, please say which of either you use for yours. I don't want the files to be too huge, but i do want the quality to be good that most won't notice a difference in quality. Thanks

[Smithcraft]

I use High Profile. Depending on the content, I use High Profile with the appropriate tune.

I would imagine that most people here use Constant Quality. I use CQ because I would rather have the bits distributed where they are needed rather than a fixed amount per frame. Typically I set it for 22 to 24 for HD content.

For the audio, I always use the appropriate pass through option.

SC

[mknabster]

Is High Profile an option for CQ, or is that somewhere in the advanced options?

[mduell]

Everyone sane uses constant quality for ratecontrol. Some movies will be larger than others. Find a value that looks good enough to you.

High Profile is a preset that specifies a lot of things in addition to the ratecontrol.

[Smithcraft]

High Profile is a preset that is in the Preset list.

CQ is an option for all presets, and it's in the Video tab.

SC

[mknabster]

All right cool, i'll mess around with settings then and see what i can come up with as the best for me. Thanks

[IrishPrince]

I used the Apple TV2 preset as a basis and then tweaked it from there. Many Blu-rays will look just fine with a CQ 22 and at 720p. For more recent Blu-ray discs that have excellent transfers you should consider 1080p or 900p (1600 x 900 pixels). Again, CQ of 22 is just fine, no need to use a CQ of 19 or 20, IMO. Probably want to check the "Large file size" and "Web optimize" as well.

You should know that 1080p transcodes will generally take a long time even with a top-end CPU.

[mduell]

I used the Apple TV2 preset as a basis and then tweaked it from there. Many Blu-rays will look just fine with a CQ 22 and at 720p. For more recent Blu-ray discs that have excellent transfers you should consider 1080p or 900p (1600 x 900 pixels). Again, CQ of 22 is just fine, no need to use a CQ of 19 or 20, IMO. Probably want to check the "Large file size" and "Web optimize" as well.

You should know that 1080p transcodes will generally take a long time even with a top-end CPU.

Unless you have hardware that can't take 1080p, there's not much reason to go to 720p and no reason to go 900p. If you want smaller files, increase the RF and keep it at 1080p for a better result until the RF gets quite high (32+).

[IrishPrince]

Unless you have hardware that can't take 1080p, there's not much reason to go to 720p and no reason to go 900p. If you want smaller files, increase the RF and keep it at 1080p for a better result until the RF gets quite high (32+).

I'm not really concerned about the file sizes, and my hardware (Apple TV v3) can handle the 1080p, it's just that 1080p encodes can take twice as long to encode a BD rip. My 1080p Handbrake encodes generate between 5 FPS and 13 FPS depending on the movie.

Many times, I can't see much of a difference between 1080p, 900p and 720p. On higher quality BD discs (UP, Cars 2, Toy Story 3) 1080p looks great so I go with that. Movies like Jurassic Park didn't seem to look any better at 1080p than at 720p, but that's just me.

[mknabster]

My machine can handle 1080p just fine, as i do have a few movies on there currently, but i didn't encode them myself. I do use Handbrake to make my video camcorder's home movies smaller, and i have noticed that the encoding is considerably slower with 1080p than with normal 480p, so i have seen that. I so agree that some of the older movies that are converted to HD aren't noticeable, like the older Star Wars, but the newer ones are. Does anyone know why Handbrake takes longer to encode, because mine does about 15 fps on a good day with the home movies.

[mduell]

Unless you have hardware that can't take 1080p, there's not much reason to go to 720p and no reason to go 900p. If you want smaller files, increase the RF and keep it at 1080p for a better result until the RF gets quite high (32+).

I'm not really concerned about the file sizes, and my hardware (Apple TV v3) can handle the 1080p, it's just that 1080p encodes can take twice as long to encode a BD rip. My 1080p Handbrake encodes generate between 5 FPS and 13 FPS depending on the movie.

Use faster settings if you want more speed.

My machine can handle 1080p just fine, as i do have a few movies on there currently, but i didn't encode them myself. I do use Handbrake to make my video camcorder's home movies smaller, and i have noticed that the encoding is considerably slower with 1080p than with normal 480p, so i have seen that. I so agree that some of the older movies that are converted to HD aren't noticeable, like the older Star Wars, but the newer ones are. Does anyone know why Handbrake takes longer to encode, because mine does about 15 fps on a good day with the home movies.

Encoding speed depends on resolution, settings, and CPU.

[Smithcraft]

Maybe because there are up to six times as many pixels to deal with?

SC

[IrishPrince]

I just bought the Lord of the Rings extended edition on Amazon.com, they have a great price on this set now. I'm converting them at full 1080p, I'll be darned how long it takes... So it's all about the quality of the movie versus the time to encode. For good quality movies, I'll do the encodes over night, so it's not that much of a big deal.

Handbrake is just awesome....
-IP

[Tree Dude]

My settings for BR:
Resolution: source with anamorphic strict, cropping on auto (movies with changing aspect ratios like Tron 2, The Dark Knight, and Transformers you need to turn cropping off or the IMAX scenes will get cropped)
Filters: all off (greyscale on if B&W movie)
CQ: 21
Audio: AC3 6 channel @ 640kbps
Advanced:
Digital - b-adapt=2:rc-lookahead=60:ref=4:bframes=6:no-dct-decimate=1:me=umh:vbv-bufsize=25000:vbv-maxrate=25000
Animated - b-adapt=2:rc-lookahead=60:ref=4:bframes=6:no-dct-decimate=1:me=umh:aq-strength=0.6:psy-rd=0.40,0.00:deblock=1,1:vbv-bufsize=25000:vbv-maxrate=25000
Film - b-adapt=2:rc-lookahead=60:ref=4:bframes=6:no-dct-decimate=1:me=umh:aq-strength=0.5:psy-rd=1.00,0.25:deblock=-2,-2:vbv-bufsize=25000:vbv-maxrate=25000

I have a 42" TV and can only see a difference very close to it. If you have a larger TV you may want to bump the CQ to 20 (I have a friend with a 55" TV who says he can see the difference at normal viewing distance with a CQ of 21). If you have high end audio equipment you can passthru the audio, but full HD audio is very big. If the movie is DTS-HD you can take just the core which usually has a bitrate of 1536kbps. I use my TV speakers so I really don't care that much. I may invest in a sound bar at some point which is why I keep the 6 channel sound.

The bufsize and maxrate settings keep the file in line with the 4.0 profile which is technically the highest the Apple TV 3 supports (though I have read of it playing uncompressed BR rips without trouble and those can be up to 40mbps, but I say better safe than sorry).

[IrishPrince]

My settings for BR:
Resolution: source with anamorphic strict, cropping on auto (movies with changing aspect ratios like Tron 2, The Dark Knight, and Transformers you need to turn cropping off or the IMAX scenes will get cropped)
Filters: all off (greyscale on if B&W movie)
CQ: 21
Audio: AC3 6 channel @ 640kbps
Advanced:
Digital - b-adapt=2:rc-lookahead=60:ref=4:bframes=6:no-dct-decimate=1:me=umh:vbv-bufsize=25000:vbv-maxrate=25000
Animated - b-adapt=2:rc-lookahead=60:ref=4:bframes=6:no-dct-decimate=1:me=umh:aq-strength=0.6:psy-rd=0.40,0.00:deblock=1,1:vbv-bufsize=25000:vbv-maxrate=25000
Film - b-adapt=2:rc-lookahead=60:ref=4:bframes=6:no-dct-decimate=1:me=umh:aq-strength=0.5:psy-rd=1.00,0.25:deblock=-2,-2:vbv-bufsize=25000:vbv-maxrate=25000

What kind of encode times are you usually experiencing? What's an average FPS for film and animation?
-IP

[Tree Dude]

What kind of encode times are you usually experiencing? What's an average FPS for film and animation?
-IP

I have a old C2D E6300 @ 2.4ghz overclocked, so my encode times are not very good. They are somewhere in the range of 14-22 hours. A buddy of mine had a first gen i7 and he encoded The Fifth Element in about 7 hours with these settings.