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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

X264 vs. H264...

Jannard

Jannard

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The only reason we haven't posted the "Tattoo" movie yet is because it is almost impossible to post a correct H264 movie that looks right. We have had much better luck with X264. The problem is that you all will need to download and install an X264 codec to play the file.

This really showcases gamma issues. We all know what that means. Jarred has the files and will point you to the codec to install it.

It is the best way (for now) to view high quality images.. This is really weird.

We have spent days working on this. Quicktime H.264 really sucks... sorry to say. Anyone figure out how to make this work? We have great looking 4K files and are trying to get files for everyone to download and they look like shit.

X264 gives the best results. That is just wrong.

Jim
 
QuickTime is just ridiculous. I hate having to deliver QuickTime deliverables to distributors and clients as the gamma issues are just inconsistent and a big waste of time and effort. X264 is a better choice just not as wide spread and easy to share. It's really unfortunate that apple has known about this issue for years and hasn't addressed it yet with a fix.
 
In the past I've seen u post prores LT, or is that not an option?
Either way looking forward to seeing it
 
mikeburton said:
QuickTime is just ridiculous. I hate having to deliver QuickTime deliverables to distributors and clients as the gamma issues are just inconsistent and a big waste of time and effort. X264 is a better choice just not as wide spread and easy to share. It's really unfortunate that apple has known about this issue for years and hasn't addressed it yet with a fix.
Click to expand...

h264 in mp4 gives better results than h264 in mov
 
Jarred Land said:
Correct Michel.. for the most part. Ill be posting the 1K TATTOO in a few minutes.. and a link to the X264 component for people to install as needed... everyone should be using X264 to encode.
Click to expand...


oh man...make it full HD at least ...xh264 can handle it .... PS :what platform you used for this x264 encoding ? on teh mac using compressor and x264 component or on a PC (that for my understanding have more versatility ...)

thanks

g
 
x264 is a superb codec and far and away the best H.264 implementation out there. It is extremely flexible too - with a variety of presets to get the right compression efficiency vs. speed trade-off. It has 10-bit, intraframe and lossless iterations too and is a regular part of my post-production workflow.

Here's a detailed comparison test for the various H.264 implementations: http://compression.ru/video/codec_comparison/h264_2010/.

For Windows users - there's a VfW version which works with directly with all modern NLEs.
 
Subhadip Sen said:
x264 is a superb codec and far and away the best H.264 implementation out there. It is extremely flexible too - with a variety of presets to get the right compression efficiency vs. speed trade-off. It has 10-bit, intraframe and lossless iterations too and is a regular part of my post-production workflow.
Click to expand...

you guys use it on the mac ? because it seems that the PC version as more option.. or maybe i am wrong ...

ps:eek:n the mac work through compressor?

thanks

g
 
Jarred Land said:
Correct Michel.. for the most part. Ill be posting the 1K TATTOO in a few minutes.. and a link to the X264 component for people to install as needed... everyone should be using X264 to encode.
Click to expand...
I have been using x264 myself and it's very efficient when properly parametrised. This BD
http://www.amazon.com/Disney-WOW-World-Wonder-Blu-ray/dp/B0045ASBLG/
has an encoder stress test with 600 tiffs on it (they use random noise, CGI and live image elements combined in the same frame to trip up encoders) and I could easily get better results with x264 than the compressed version by the encoder Disney used on the BD itself provided. I lose more detail by color subsampling to 4:2:0 than by compression compared to the uncompressed 4:4:4 master.
 
J Davis said:
h264 in mp4 gives better results than h264 in mov
Click to expand...

Yes agreed. We use H264 in Mp4 at Adobe TV to encode all our internal videos. But, even ProRes of all flavors can be victim to the gamma shifts which is why I dislike having ProRes deliverables so much on films, commercials etc. Sadly so it's also one of the the most common accepted formats now which is unfortunate when having to deal with these issues.
 
If you want a correct H264 file with no gamma and color shifts, the only solution is to encode it in the Adobe Suite (media Encoder for instance) with the latest update and export directly to MP4 (not Quicktime). Use then VLC to play the MP4 correctly. Well, that's what my boyfriend found after a hard work ;-)
 
Use Sorrenson Squeeze. I found it is the best way to encode anything and you can manually adjust gamma, etc. Compressor SUX DIX
 
Gabriele Turchi said:
you guys use it on the mac ? because it seems that the PC version as more option.. or maybe i am wrong ...

ps:eek:n the mac work through compressor?

thanks

g
Click to expand...

I use it on Windows - and yes, it is true, it has a vast multitude of options (across an array of GUIs) on the Windows platform, including 10-bit, lossless or intraframe etc.. The Very Slow preset with 10-bit is particularly exceptional - offering ProRes HQ quality for a fraction of the size. Or even the Lossless preset. The Mac platform is heavily crippled by the underlying (obsolete) Quicktime architecture, unfortunately.
 
Imagine you have a short (like "Tattoo") and want to post it. You need a small file so you try to encode in H264 but it looks like shit. What to do. Post it with X264? Then everyone has to download a codec.

This is not right.

Jim
 
Subhadip Sen said:
I use it on Windows - and yes, it is true, it has a vast multitude of options (across an array of GUIs) on the Windows platform, including 10-bit, lossless or intraframe etc.. The Very Slow preset with 10-bit is particularly exceptional - offering ProRes HQ quality for a fraction of the size. Or even the Lossless preset. The Mac platform is heavily crippled by the underlying (obsolete) Quicktime architecture, unfortunately.
Click to expand...

thanks!

what GUI do you use , and what source material (like avi or mov etc...)you use ?

thanks

g
 
Adam Eden said:
Use Sorrenson Squeeze. I found it is the best way to encode anything and you can manually adjust gamma, etc. Compressor SUX DIX
Click to expand...

Squeeze 7 is good.. there are better ones out there though. . If your forced to use H264 The main concept H264 does a decent ( but not great ) job as long as you use enough passes... but be careful which one you use. The CUDA accelerated QT wrapped H.264 output from Squeeze has the same Gamma issues that Quicktime does.

If you have the X264 component installed, then you can use programs like DV Kitchen to very easily beat any program that is encoding via normal H264.
 
If some one doesn't figure this stuff out.. we will.

Jim
 
Any recommended players? I find VLC works better than Mpeg Streamclip for playing a variety of formats but have always wondered which was most accurate for color/gamma, if there actually is a difference.
 
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