Batch conversion of multiple files, variable to constant frame rate

General questions or discussion about HandBrake, Video and/or audio transcoding, trends etc.
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jhyler
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Dec 14, 2020 7:27 pm

Batch conversion of multiple files, variable to constant frame rate

Post by jhyler »

I am a newcomer to handbrake and have a general newbie question about how to accomplish something.

I have a lot of mp4 videos encoded with a variable frame rate, and I need to convert them to a constant 29.97 frame rate. I neither need nor want to make any changes to any of the files beyond that. The files are all different in terms of what they contain. The videos are of varying dimensions. They have varying numbers of audio tracks using varying codecs. Some have no subtitle tracks, other have multiple different sets of subtitles in varying languages.

What I want is a "one size fits all" solution, I drop a bunch of VFR video files in one end and get CFR video files out the other, where for each input/output pair nothing gets changed except the frame rate. Is that possible? From what I have seen so far, it looks I would have to go file-by-file and set dimensions, audio tracks, subtitles for each file in turn. That's not practical for me.

How can I go about accomplishing this? Or can't I?

Thanks!
jhyler
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Dec 14, 2020 7:27 pm

Re: Batch conversion of multiple files, variable to constant frame rate

Post by jhyler »

By the way, forgive me for not posting logs, but I'm concerned if I did folks might be tempted to reply in context of the details of the files appearing in the logs. Whatever files I might use for the logs, I also have others that are quite different. I am trying to make this a question about the general case - whatever the way things are in the input file, I want them to be as much as possible the same way in the output. Except of course for the changes necessary to go from VFR to CFR. The only points of commonality is that they are in .mp4 containers, and all will end up with a constant 29.97 frame rate.
mduell
Veteran User
Posts: 8187
Joined: Sat Apr 21, 2007 8:54 pm

Re: Batch conversion of multiple files, variable to constant frame rate

Post by mduell »

Try to create a preset that caters to all your permutations of audio and subtitles, give up on the angry spaghetti GUI, and just use the CLI to passthrough all the audio and subtitles with whatever video encoding settings you want.

A log for an attempted encode with each permutation of difficulty you encounter would be helpful for anything more specific.
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