What Encode From Compressor?

[ColoScott]

Hello all,

 

I am trying to find the secret recipe to encode an HDV 1440x1080i asset in Compressor such that Toast 9 Titanium will not need to re-encode. I have tried this one:

 

File Extension: m2v

Video Encoder

Format: M2V

Width: 1920

Height: 1080

Pixel aspect ratio: square

Crop: None

Frame rate: 29.97

Frame Controls:

Retiming: Nearest Frame

Resize Filter: Linear Filter

Deinterlace Filter: Line Averaging

Adaptive Details: On

Antialias: 0

Detail Level: 0

Field Output: Same as Source

Aspect ratio: 16:9

Field dominance: Top first

Average data rate: 21.1 (Mbps)

1 Pass VBR enabled

Maximum data rate: 25 (Mbps)

High quality

Best motion estimation

Closed GOP Size: 15, Structure: IBBP

 

I have tried doing a .M2T as well with no luck.

This setting is accepted but Toast re-encodes it which takes about 4 hours and I assume is probably not adding to my final video quality.

 

Has anyone found any compressor settings that Toast will take and then just MUX and record?

 

Thanks!

 

Scott

[opalla]

My experience: Compressor isn't able to produce H.264 needed in any way - it doesn't has the proper encoder profiles. See what Toast uses (and I think Blue-ray standards demand that): a "high" profile; Compressor uses "main" or "basic", what ever that might be ...

 

In addition: My experiences are about Compressor 2; Compressor 3 seems to have some advantages over 2 ... About encoding for blue-ray with Compressor 3 see:

 

http://www.pixelcorps.tv/macbreak_studio

 

 

 

[Jasonaug]

Good question! I've been trying to figure this out too, and haven't been able to come up with a compressor setting in either MPEG2 or MPEG4 that works.

[bryankraftworks]

I'm trying to figure out the best compression to bring HD video into Toast for blu ray burning

ie, with dvd you can burn MPEG2-DVD and bypass the encoding process. How can I compress my video from final cut/compressor to bring into Toast and burn instantly?

 

Is there an easy answer to this?

 

Thanks

[Jasonaug]

I was able to use the "MPEG-2 for HD-DVD" preset in Compressor - modified to a higher bitrate - to encode a 720p DVCPRO HD movie that Toast can use without re-encoding. But when Toast mulitplexes the video, it creates some unacceptable blockiness in the bottom portion of the screen that ruins the video. This blockiness seems to occur in areas where the bitrate maybe spiking, i.e. parts of the video with lots of movement or very fine details that are hard to compress.

 

On the other hand, I've have not been able to figure out how to encode to MPEG4/AVCHD in Compressor. I made a sweet-looking H.264 movie in Compressor, but Toast wants to re-encode it.

[ColoScott]

I was able to use the "MPEG-2 for HD-DVD" preset in Compressor - modified to a higher bitrate - to encode a 720p DVCPRO HD movie that Toast can use without re-encoding. But when Toast mulitplexes the video, it creates some unacceptable blockiness in the bottom portion of the screen that ruins the video. This blockiness seems to occur in areas where the bitrate maybe spiking, i.e. parts of the video with lots of movement or very fine details that are hard to compress.

 

On the other hand, I've have not been able to figure out how to encode to MPEG4/AVCHD in Compressor. I made a sweet-looking H.264 movie in Compressor, but Toast wants to re-encode it.

 

 

I think you are on to something on the MPEG4 mode. I did a custom setting in Compressor over the past weekend and encoded H.264 with an .m4v extension. I did this encode via the Export to Compressor menu in FCP. The encode took about 35+ hours and is inefficient in that it only used about 30% of each of the 8 procs on a Mac Pro but it looks great playing in QuickTime. I then put this file into Toast and yes, it did re-encode, but the BluRay disk output looks fantastic...much better than any of the dozen or so mpeg encodes and much better than any other method I've used. Since I have about 3 weeks into this project I am calling it good.

 

The other thing I noticed about this method is that the colors are much more vibrant, pleasing, and richer than going mpeg or even goint FCP to Quicktime ProRes422 to Toast. Skipping the Quicktime output has made the colors stay more true, like watching the HDV output right from tape on the camera using component outputs.

 

Scott

[patatrox]

Hello all,

 

I am trying to find the secret recipe to encode an HDV 1440x1080i asset in Compressor such that Toast 9 Titanium will not need to re-encode. I have tried this one:

 

Hi Scott

 

If you have time to look at the beta post at the top of this forum and jump in there, I'd love to get some feedback on your experiences with this.

 

thanks

 

Patrick

[wallybarthman]

I'm trying to figure out the best compression to bring HD video into Toast for blu ray burning

ie, with dvd you can burn MPEG2-DVD and bypass the encoding process. How can I compress my video from final cut/compressor to bring into Toast and burn instantly?

 

Is there an easy answer to this?

 

Thanks

 

The only format I've gotten to work is if I take .mts files directly off of my Canon HF10 camera (which are 1920*1080 AVC, Stereo Dolby Digital) and put them into toast it doesn't re-encode. Now what on earth can create that combination of AVC and Dolby Digital in an .mts file?

[vdmsss]

Patrick,

 

Hi Scott

 

If you have time to look at the beta post at the top of this forum and jump in there, I'd love to get some feedback on your experiences with this.

 

thanks

 

Patrick

 

as you seem to be working on this, please allow me to mention the following: can please Roxio publish the precise conditions that trigger a re-encode? I don't think it would be revealing any commercial secret, and would help advanced users considerable. Actually, I dare say that unless you do so, Toast is utterly useless for all but beginners. Let me explain.

 

I spend long hours and huge machine time to author AVC sequences the way I want them, very carefully. I then feed them to Toast with the only purpose mux them in EVO, author a HDDVD and create a disk image. And Toast throws away all I did and re-encodes everything its own way. This is invariably at much worse quality than I had (there isn't much control at all on encoding parameters, after all). If we could be told what triggers re-encodes, life would be easier.

 

After trying again and again, I should say that I am finding Toast rather buggy and unpredictable: for test I have tried to author a HDDVD using one of the EVO files created by a re-encode, and at times Toast will start to re-encode it again! A file that was created by Toast itself! (Ah, and of course I have set Re-encoding to "never".) Either Toast encodes are not complaint, or there is bug in the code that decide on whether to re-encode...

 

I have already given up on Toast for DVDs for similar issues (because for DVDs it is much easier to find alternative authoring tools than to try and tame Toast!), but can't yet find alternatives for HD/BD....