I know editing programs like Adobe Premiere have Media Encoder and Final Cut has Compressor, to help facilitate transcoding videos to various formats. But I'm curious to know what most game capture experts use when converting their videos for upload to YouTube. Are you guys just converting through your editing suite or are you using a 3rd party program like MediaCoder, which is what I've been reading reviews on.

I don't know how the compression quality compares between your editing program and a freeware program like Format Factory (which is what Bandicam suggests on their website) - so I wanted to ask what other people use and if you have experimented with other applications.

Thanks for your feedback.

I personally use Avidemux. I've used VirtualDub in the past.
If you're handling avi containers, VirtualDub works well.
If you want to save as mp4, AviDemux is the way to go.

I am part of a three-man Let's Play channel on Youtube.
Because of how little knowledge on codecs, transcoding and everything in between is available, I had to figure everything out myself.
I've got Bandicam set up to record in x264, which is not only today's standard for video (as it's the best, so far, if you don't go lossless), it's also the video codec YT uses.
The more you upload with YT's standards, the less time it takes for your footage to transcode/'process' on their website.

The guys over at Bandicam said they're working on getting a feature in where you can select AAC for the audio track and MP4 as the container. That way, you won't have to do any transcoding/remuxing whatsoever to get your footage online. You just need a tool that can video edit without transcoding.
Which is a huge flaw in most premium video editing/transcoding software, as they don't have the option to do direct stream copying! They do not offer near enough customizability on the transcoding end!

Anything that uses x264 as AVC encoder and offers you its easy and advanced GUI settings is excellent for a good compression.

Popular is Handbrake. I use the portable version (mostly with those settings. But I mainly encode for my tv or computer or archiving, not for streaming).
If you want to cut you can use Avidemux (I suggest a nightly version though, not only is it portable it also comes with the easier x264 GUI).
A popular advanced encoder is MeGUI. It's too much hassle for me. I also sometimes use Hybrid, but that mainly for a Blu-Ray to AVC MKV conversion. For simple video compression I rather use Handbrake.

All those encoders can be set to bring out the very same result because they all use x264 and its simple GUI (with the option for advanced settings).
Means you can set the same settings in all those converters to get the same file out.
It is personal preference what you choose to use.
People who often encode different stuff from different sources for different purposes will have more than one converter.

But... here comes the big but... as for YouTube, things are different. Creating a video for playing on your computer is differently from creating a video for streaming.
I sometimes notice that my perfect encoded videos get ruined by YT's re-encoding. Not only does YT make them larger in file size but also uglier, esp. in fast motion areas. ;_;
YouTube suggests those settings: https://support.google.com/youtube/answ ... 1?hl=en-GB
I assume if you manage to deliver such a file YT won't re-encode it.

I've yet to find a suitable converter to create a file YT doesn't touch and publishes as uploaded.

Just to pop in with my two cents worth, for uploading to YouTube, I was mostly just sending the compressed/rendered output from editors like Vegas or PowerDirector, but I too have gotten tired of the longer upload times and have started to pre-compress my videos before uploading. I generally switch between a few different utilities, depending on what I want to do or how deep I want to control the settings. For somewhat-'batch'-oriented converting, here are some of what I use:

» Handbrake is a good (and popular) free one, but you have to select each file one by one and set the quality you desire for each. For YouTube (not keeping for long-term archiving purposes), most people should be fine with just setting CRF=20 and letting'er rip, without changing anything else at all from the Defaults. Then, upload the now-smaller output. It is 'decent' quality and should be much smaller than a high-quality, large-size editor render output. If you are converting some videos for yourself to keep, you can delve into a lot more settings, too

» WinFF is an interface for the FFMPEG utility, which I started using back in Linux, but it has a program for Windows too, and it's free. My favourite thing about WinFF is that once you set your profile (which keeps your settings, compression quality, etc), then you can BATCH select a whole bunch of files to convert at once and just let'er rip. Set it once, then forget it. The only drawback is that it can't use hardware rendering/compression, but that means it will end up with somewhat better quality anyway

» Nero Recode is much better these days than their older version, with the same ability to choose a whole batch of files at once and just tell it to 'go', after you set your profile/settings one time. It can use hardware rendering and you can easily set the Deblocking and other advanced H.264/AVC options. I bought the suite from Nero a couple years ago and still run it once in a while

» CyberLink's MediaEspresso came free with my recent purchase of PowerDirector, and I have only started using it a bit. It seems to be easy to use, batch select in one shot and pick a profile (PS3, PSP, and so on) and it can use hardware rendering/compression and even do a little noise reduction/filtering, all with one input from the user. It seems fast, but the quality seems to be a little behind the other programs at the same rendering options/settings. I might bring that up with CyberLink

» Bandiconvert doesn't exist yet, but I am hoping and dreaming at night about a program that can let you make a setting for compression and quality, then select a whole batch of files at once and tell it to compress them all in one step - I submitted this idea of mine to Bandisoft and I'm rooting for them to make it happen!

Hopefully that gives you more ideas on programs to try

» Handbrake is a good (and popular) free one, but you have to select each file one by one and set the quality you desire for each.

Hey there GameTips,
I'm not sure what you mean exactly perhaps I'm misunderstanding you but you seem to imply that you can only process one video at a time and you have to redo the HandBrake settings for each one.

Anyway this isn't the case. I use HandBrake most of the time. Here's a quick rundown of Batch Processing. The important thing to remember is that you should first Add a Custom Preset for HandBrake.

In the Source Tab, select folder or Ctrl+Shift+O to open a folder. The first time you do this you might have to navigate to the folder but HB remembers the last accessed folder so Ctrl+Shift+O will take you right to it. Then click Select Folder.

HandBrake will begin scanning the folder for appropriate files to transcode. Then select a Custom Preset, 1 click.

Then in Add to Queue simply click Add All. Check the Queue, delete ones you dont want etc..
Finally Press Encode and you're done.

Incidentally in the Queue Box you can tell HB to do a variety of things on completion of the Transcoding tasks including Shutdown, which I often do late at night. This way I have Encoded over 50 videos at a time overnight and when I get up the job is done and my system is off ready for a new day.

PS If anyone wants any tips on settings for HandBrake, just shout and I'll oblige.

Yeah I use handbrake as well and you can easily do more than one without redoing settings.

» Handbrake is a good (and popular) free one, but you have to select each file one by one and set the quality you desire for each.

Hey there GameTips,
I'm not sure what you mean exactly perhaps I'm misunderstanding you but you seem to imply that you can only process one video at a time and you have to redo the HandBrake settings for each one.

Anyway this isn't the case. I use HandBrake most of the time. Here's a quick rundown of Batch Processing. The important thing to remember is that you should first Add a Custom Preset for HandBrake.

In the Source Tab, select folder or Ctrl+Shift+O to open a folder. The first time you do this you might have to navigate to the folder but HB remembers the last accessed folder so Ctrl+Shift+O will take you right to it. Then click Select Folder.

HandBrake will begin scanning the folder for appropriate files to transcode. Then select a Custom Preset, 1 click.

Then in Add to Queue simply click Add All. Check the Queue, delete ones you dont want etc..
Finally Press Encode and you're done.

Incidentally in the Queue Box you can tell HB to do a variety of things on completion of the Transcoding tasks including Shutdown, which I often do late at night. This way I have Encoded over 50 videos at a time overnight and when I get up the job is done and my system is off ready for a new day.

PS If anyone wants any tips on settings for HandBrake, just shout and I'll oblige.

That's awesome! I haven't used Handbrake in a while, it's great that they have 'open a folder'

Thanks for letting me know

No worries there Mr Tips, glad to be of help!

I know editing programs like Adobe Premiere have Media Encoder and Final Cut has Compressor, to help facilitate transcoding videos to various formats. But I'm curious to know what most game capture experts use when converting their videos for upload to YouTube. Are you guys just converting through your editing suite or are you using a 3rd party program like MediaCoder, which is what I've been reading reviews on.

I don't know how the compression quality compares between your editing program and a freeware program like Format Factory (which is what Bandicam suggests on their website) - so I wanted to ask what other people use and if you have experimented with other applications.

Thanks for your feedback.

Hi,

I really don't see the logic in some workflows, may be I am getting too old.

If I plan to upload a video, say to Youtube, straight, not editing it, using Bandicam as recording tool I would use the tools already provided with it to get the video in the quality I like, and since 2.1.0 we have MP4 wrapper, so not any need to transcode.

If I plan to edit the video, then I will feed my editing software with the best quality video that my rig and Bandicam will allow me to use. In my case Motion MPEG is my choice for it, then will encode it to the format recommended by the sharing videos site.

If you transcode a video it will always get some quality lose. Frames encoded by Bandicam or any other recording software will be interpreted by the transcoder decoder and then encoded newly to a different format. I think is really silly to have an MP4 generated by Bandicam, then decode it and encode it again to MP4 to be uploaded to Youtube.

I know editing programs like Adobe Premiere have Media Encoder and Final Cut has Compressor, to help facilitate transcoding videos to various formats. But I'm curious to know what most game capture experts use when converting their videos for upload to YouTube. Are you guys just converting through your editing suite or are you using a 3rd party program like MediaCoder, which is what I've been reading reviews on.

I don't know how the compression quality compares between your editing program and a freeware program like Format Factory (which is what Bandicam suggests on their website) - so I wanted to ask what other people use and if you have experimented with other applications.

Thanks for your feedback.

Hi,

I really don't see the logic in some workflows, may be I am getting too old.

If I plan to upload a video, say to Youtube, straight, not editing it, using Bandicam as recording tool I would use the tools already provided with it to get the video in the quality I like, and since 2.1.0 we have MP4 wrapper, so not any need to transcode.

If I plan to edit the video, then I will feed my editing software with the best quality video that my rig and Bandicam will allow me to use. In my case Motion MPEG is my choice for it, then will encode it to the format recommended by the sharing videos site.

If you transcode a video it will always get some quality lose. Frames encoded by Bandicam or any other recording software will be interpreted by the transcoder decoder and then encoded newly to a different format. I think is really silly to have an MP4 generated by Bandicam, then decode it and encode it again to MP4 to be uploaded to Youtube.

If I may pop back in to address this a bit, I think most people are mainly doing it to save Upload Time - at least I know that I do it for that reason. I have tried uploading very high bitrate/quality videos, but they just end up getting mangled by the re-compression that YouTube does anyway. So, I gave up on the 2-4 hour uploads and found a nice balance of taking my Final Render from my video editing program and putting it through something like a CRF20 H.264/AVC transcode. This gives 'decent' quality and much smaller filesize. Since the original Render quality is going to be lost once it is uploaded, this gives the benefit of a shorter upload time.

You are entirely correct, that any extra processing degrades video, and that any extra transcoding/compression degrades video. I like to keep a High Quality/Bitrate copy for Archival purposes for myself, but I make a temporary smaller file just for the upload, and once it is done, I usually delete it. I am assuming a bit here of course, but I think many others are doing it as well, as that is how it sounds like people are talking, on this forum and others.
I am currently experimenting with 2K and 4K UHD uploads - perhaps that will change my approach above, if YouTube can maintain the Quality that it is given, in the future.