Real World Video Compression - Comments

Florence Artur comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Florence Artur — Mon, 23 May 2011 09:07:34 +0000

Hi! Thank you for this information. I am a video artist and your book, and now this blog which I just discovered, have been a lifesaver for me.

I don't have too much problem with the quality of H.264 encoding in QuickTime movies, but I am looking for a more universal file type, one that could be read on Android tablets for instance. I wonder if you would consider making a blog post on this? I have been struggling for days with Compressor and QuickTime's MP4 settings, without much success.

Andrew comments on How I Watch "TV"

Andrew — Thu, 19 May 2011 11:27:42 +0000

It's great to hear that how we watch TV is moving forward and that we can now watch what we want when we want, particularly as there is so much rubbish on TV (mostly reality) that clogs up channels.

First of all I should say I'm from the UK. I too have been experimenting with different methods of watching TV. A couple of years ago I started my careers as a runner in London. With my job I could only afford a small room, so I had to consider carefully what I would take with me from my old house when I moved. I took my IMac and ditched my TV.

For the next 18 months I watched the fabulous BBC Iplayer, www.tvcatchup.com and rented movies from Itunes on my IMac, using my iphone with the airmouse app to control it like a remote control. This worked out great. Now however I've moved into a 2 bed flat, 1 of the rooms has become my office and the IMac lives in there. In the lounge I have my old TV, which has no HDMI socket, so once again I'm back to 'watch whatever is on' mode and in general there is nothing on!

So now I'm looking for a new solution. First of all I am definitely going to purchase a new TV with an HDMI socket. Then as for hardware I like the sound of Apple TV for renting movies but I also would like to be able to watch BBC Iplayer and other on-demand tv services.

In reality I'm searching for a mini computer that supports apps that play on demand tv/movies in the UK and can be controlled by an iphone or airmouse or dedicated controller.

W'ere quite a way behind in the UK but I've looked into 'Boxee' (uk version) quite a bit and it looks good http://www.wired.co.uk/reviews/tvs-and-home-cinema/2010-12/d-link-boxee-box-uk. Does any have first hand experience or know of another solution that might work well in the UK.

Cheers
Andrew

Jason A comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Jason A — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 19:15:59 +0000

Hi, I came across the info for this codec in your piece on MacBreak studio. thanks for the info!
Although the settings are a bit confusing to me, I've gone through and made an impressive size reduction for not a huge loss of quality.
Thank you so much for your tutorial on this!

The one problem I'm having, though, is that after export, the file will not properly play in QT. It will hang after about 3 seconds.
Funny thing is, if I use preview (spacebar on mac) to view the file, it plays fine all the way through. Also, uploading it to youtube yields a decent video file.
So it seems the file is fine, but QT has a problem with this. Is this a known issue? Or a setting I am unfamiliar with?

Thanks again for this info!

Shiloh comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Shiloh — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 00:45:13 +0000

Thank you.
I've been enjoying using x264 for youtube and qt movies. Thank you for translating all the technical details for us who don't speak that language. I am now curious about using x264 for Blu-Ray encoding. Is there anywhere you know of that a simpleton like me can find a breakdown of the x264 settings for creating professional Blu-Ray compliant files? I realize these files would still need to be authored but using x264 to encode the streams would be a nice step in the right direction.
Thanks Again.

Andy Beach comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Andy Beach — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 05:43:36 +0000

Hi John -

Quite right - my setting is designed to only use one core for encoding for maximum quality. dividing the image up over the multiple cores can cause some quality degradation. If you want to enable multiple cores, change the worker threads drop down from single to auto and it will use all the cores available on your machine to encode.

hope this helps,

andy

John W. comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

John W. — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 04:04:33 +0000

I tried your x264 settings, but compressor takes a long time. I noticed only 1 core of my quad-core cpu is used. When I tried apple tv's h.264 setting, all 4 cores worked. Do i need to change some setting? By the way, I'm using x264Encoder 1.2.20.

Joel Godin comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Joel Godin — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 19:04:20 +0000

No, I just compressed something yesterday with it fine.
Did you check to see if it is in the right place? and still there?

Ben comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Ben — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 18:40:15 +0000

I've been able to compress few files with compressor and x264 codec... Now it say that the submitted job Failed because "codec not installed"
Anybody got this issue?

Oliver comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Oliver — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 03:31:28 +0000

Hello, hope all is well

I have tried several times to export, and each time with the x.264 encoder I get dark grey blatches all over my screencast next to and among the images. I didn't use Screenflow to record my screen, only images with transitions the whole way through, except the audio from my mic. Is this the problem? I have also reinstalled the plugin, and no luck. If there are any other settings you recommend, I would appreciate a reply, thank you.

Best Regards,
Oliver

Wiley Wiggins comments on Using x264 Plugin in Compressor

Wiley Wiggins — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 15:27:52 +0000

I was shocked at how good your 'youtube' config looks, but I'd like to use that file as an html5 embed instead of uploading it to another service, and there doesn't seem to be any fast loading turned on in that preset. What should I adjust to get similar quality but not have to wait for the entire file to load to get it to start playing in a browser?