Batch convert H265

panyan

panyan

panyan

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Ive got a bunch of home movies that are in H264 and id like to convert them to H265 to save some space (we dont watch them that frequently)

The file size is more important than the quality - they are pretty grainy even at 1080p

I was wondering:

1) what is the best free converter that can do batches?

2) is gpu acceleration worth it? what software would be best for this?
(I have access to a 2x7970 rig and another rig with a K40)

I am on windows

thanks :)
 
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Not sure it's the best but the recent version of Handbrake has h.265 encoding, I had a play with it and was pretty surprised at the file sizes with good quality settings.

I tried GPU acceleration with my 7950 and while it was faster, the quality compared to CPU encoding was not as good. But that was with h.264, I haven't tested with h.265 and not even sure if it will work considering there's no h.265 encoder on the GPU.
 
If you can, encode from the originals, not the current H.264 files.

I've personally used Handbrake to do H.265 encoding directly from DVDs, like yourself, to replace my H.264 files and reduce size. During my research and testing, the biggest change I did was to change the denoise filter from hqdn3d to NLMeans. The output files look much better and because there is less noise for the encoder to deal with, the file sizes are reduced further, too. I can't emphasise this enough, but the quality of the NLMeans encoder is visually FAR better than hqdn3d. Do some testing on your own sources and I'm sure you'll agree.

I don't know what target size you have in mind, but I can very comfortably encode around 90 minutes in to a 308 MB file. Of course when you're looking at stills, the final encode might not look impressive - but when you're watching from over 6ft away, you will be very hard pushed to see any artefacting.

If you're encoding bluray sources, remember you're going to need to increase the quality from what you'd normally use for DVDs, to allow for the extra detail. If you try to use the same quality, the output will be noticeably blurrier.
 
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Orcvader said:
Not sure it's the best but the recent version of Handbrake has h.265 encoding, I had a play with it and was pretty surprised at the file sizes with good quality settings.

I tried GPU acceleration with my 7950 and while it was faster, the quality compared to CPU encoding was not as good. But that was with h.264, I haven't tested with h.265 and not even sure if it will work considering there's no h.265 encoder on the GPU.
Click to expand...

Thanks - do you know if handbrake can do batch conversions of h265 with the gpu? that would be ideal :)

darael said:
If you can, encode from the originals, not the current H.264 files.

I've personally used Handbrake to do H.265 encoding directly from DVDs, like yourself, to replace my H.264 files and reduce size. During my research and testing, the biggest change I did was to change the denoise filter from hqdn3d to NLMeans. The output files look much better and because there is less noise for the encoder to deal with, the file sizes are reduced further, too. I can't emphasise this enough, but the quality of the NLMeans encoder is visually FAR better than hqdn3d. Do some testing on your own sources and I'm sure you'll agree.

I don't know what target size you have in mind, but I can very comfortably encode around 90 minutes in to a 308 MB file. Of course when you're looking at stills, the final encode might not look impressive - but when you're watching from over 6ft away, you will be very hard pushed to see any artefacting.

If you're encoding bluray sources, remember you're going to need to increase the quality from what you'd normally use for DVDs, to allow for the extra detail. If you try to use the same quality, the output will be noticeably blurrier.
Click to expand...

Ah right - thanks for the tips and ill certainly look into NLMeans :)
 
panyan said:
Thanks - do you know if handbrake can do batch conversions of h265 with the gpu? that would be ideal :)
Click to expand...
It can certainly do batch encodes, but add your files slowly if you there is an encoding task already in progress or it can crash, especially with large queues.

I don't think it uses the GPU, but I don't normally notice it encoding in the background anyway, unless I'm using something CPU intensive.
 
As above it can do batch encodes, with no problems.

I just checked the GPU acceleration, it doesn't support h.265:

NeBIWvg.png
 
darael said:
If you can, encode from the originals, not the current H.264 files.

I've personally used Handbrake to do H.265 encoding directly from DVDs, like yourself, to replace my H.264 files and reduce size. During my research and testing, the biggest change I did was to change the denoise filter from hqdn3d to NLMeans. The output files look much better and because there is less noise for the encoder to deal with, the file sizes are reduced further, too. I can't emphasise this enough, but the quality of the NLMeans encoder is visually FAR better than hqdn3d. Do some testing on your own sources and I'm sure you'll agree.

I don't know what target size you have in mind, but I can very comfortably encode around 90 minutes in to a 308 MB file. Of course when you're looking at stills, the final encode might not look impressive - but when you're watching from over 6ft away, you will be very hard pushed to see any artefacting.

If you're encoding bluray sources, remember you're going to need to increase the quality from what you'd normally use for DVDs, to allow for the extra detail. If you try to use the same quality, the output will be noticeably blurrier.
Click to expand...

What quality setting do you use for Blu Ray's? to get around 300MB. (and resolution)
Also what is your conversion time roughly?
 
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Rensin said:
What quality setting do you use for Blu Ray's? to get around 300MB. (and resolution)
Also what is your conversion time roughly?
Click to expand...
I should have been clearer - that was for DVDs. I have an example which is 89 minutes and 41 seconds long and the output resolution is 702x576 - the quality setting I used for H.265 was 27.
 
darael said:
I should have been clearer - that was for DVDs. I have an example which is 89 minutes and 41 seconds long and the output resolution is 702x576 - the quality setting I used for H.265 was 27.
Click to expand...

ah right was thinking 50GB to 300MB. Just finished a blu ray (1hr 43 min) using the settings in your orignal post except changed the Quality to 19 and Encode Settings to Medium.

Overall conversion took 2 hours 25 mins and around 1GB (from 35GB). Picture on a 40" tv looks very good.

Have some old tv shows on DVD so will try your settings for DVD.

thanks for the reply.
 
Information

I have made and used video software in the past, to achieve what you want for free with decent image quality and file size just use FFMPEG to re-encode the films to h.265 with a 2 pass method.

If needed i can build you a custom simple file converter for a small price, although learning it yourself is always a good thing. I would just make a Gui in c# for ffmpeg (most common and best software use FFMPEG as its base converter, its the best at what it dose for free).

If you need any more info or help just ask. (click ffmpeg for more info, redirects to ffmpeg manual pages)

Basic Guide

OK, So i got a little bored and this is one of my favourite things to do.... So i have made a basic guide on how to for you Panyan.

1). Get latest ffmepg with h256 encoder = https://ffmpeg.zeranoe.com/builds/

2). download and extract the ffmpeg into a folder, and open up a command window (run as admin).

3). Enter these commands replacing your files in the appropriate places.

CMD command { ffmpeg -i "C:\Users\AssassinUKG\Desktop\ffmpeg-20160826-bcd1153-win64-static\bin\Simpsons test\Original file\The Simpsons Movie - 1080p Trailer.mp4" -c:v libx265 -an -x265-params crf=25 "C:\Users\AssassinUKG\Desktop\ffmpeg-20160826-bcd1153-win64-static\bin\Simpsons test\Output\OUT.mp4" } -- Replace the input and output files to your own.

-- Everything between { } .


Input / Output

Filesize of original : 140 MB (147,399,359 bytes)
New filesize : 35.1 MB (36,808,439 bytes)

I have converted a simpson trailer for you to test , I have also uploaded the test video on my dropbox so you can check out the quality for the video. Again this is a simple 1 pass method (2 pass it better as it keeps a constant bitrate so quality stays at it highest with best compression qualities)


Original video for test (simpsons into movie, 140mb)

TEST VIDEO (after convert, click me) - seems to many people are looking ill upload elsewhere too.

Mirror for test out.mp4 Here... (goto site click download)

I hope this helps your brother, Again if you need any help of would like me to make something better for you just hit me up.
 
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Very good question, FFmpeg is an industary standard now and is constantly updated with new encoders and better encoding for all video/ sound needs. Its maintained by a lot of developers not just an in house team like handbreak. Open source is usually better due to more exposure bug fixs/ updates etc.

Hope that answers it for you buddy. For a computer illiterate person handbreak may be a better solution, but for people who take the little bit of time and knowledge you can achieve much better results. (won't use handbreaks settings as you will make your own better settings for bitrate etc)

Edit: I have only just checked out handbreak seems it too is open source, last time i checked it, it was a mac only thing. Nice to see its benefiting from the same open source model. looks like handbreak uses quiet a lot of open source third party dll's now, it includes ffmpeg (not sure which version)

Not sure if they have support yet for h265 - Handbreak forum post

Handbreak WIKI they may have it implemented on closer inspection

In any case ffmpeg is the bee's knees as you can see a lot of other software use it as its conversion utility. Its simply the best at its job. I would presonally use ffmpeg to keep upto date with all the new changes, rather then wait for handbreak to update/test and release its version.
 
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Indeed. Open source and offers support for h265. I've been using it to re-encode a number of files in my library; with great results, which is the reason I wondered about your reasoning to simply use FFmpeg :)
 
Seblirium said:
Indeed. Open source and offers support for h265. I've been using it to re-encode a number of files in my library; with great results, which is the reason I wondered about your reasoning to simply use FFmpeg :)
Click to expand...

I have actually just downloaded it and am very surprised to find it actually has an option to set a constant bitrate and use a 2 pass method. Honestly i could now recommend like you to use handbreak. I had no idea it has been updated so much and is actually really user friendly.

Thanks Seblirium.

In my case i would still use ffmpeg as i'm a developer and love to use the original persons work, I tend to stay away from third party apps unless i cannot make them myself lol.

Again thanks for the info and heads up, Hopefully the OP can make a well informed decision on how he wants to tackle this now (handbreak looks easiest bro).

the handbreak at the same setting seems to make the filesizes actually slighter bigger.
LVXrISe.png
 
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Handbrake, not Handbreak :p.

I still use ffmpeg, but only for music now with Foobar2000 as the GUI to convert music to FLAC/variable bitrate MP3.

I stuck with Handbrake as it's easy to use while still providing advance settings. I'm too lazy for command line as well as making a GUI for it.
 
Assassin_UKG said:
I have made and used video software in the past, to achieve what you want for free with decent image quality and file size just use FFMPEG to re-encode the films to h.265 with a 2 pass method.
Click to expand...

I really appreciate your guide. If I need to do some proper conversions in the future I will definitely use this method as it seems the most flexible.

Seblirium said:
Indeed. Open source and offers support for h265. I've been using it to re-encode a number of files in my library; with great results, which is the reason I wondered about your reasoning to simply use FFmpeg :)
Click to expand...

Handbrake has been what I used so far and it seems to work well. It has a batch feature which i find very useful as the FFmpeg cmd stuff I wouldnt know how to batch setup.

Assassin_UKG said:
I have actually just downloaded it and am very surprised to find it actually has an option to set a constant bitrate and use a 2 pass method. Honestly i could now recommend like you to use handbreak. I had no idea it has been updated so much and is actually really user friendly.
Click to expand...

Yes, this is what ive currently used, but if I need to do it again i might try to set up a batch ffmpeg command line setup :)



thanks for all your help guys :)
 
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