Some of you know me some of you dont, some of you like me others don't. But I've decided to make a post here anyway...

BEfore 1.4 came out me and riggs were working on a bulletproof movie, but once 1.4 came out alot of the people quit playing so we canceled it. After that i went back to css and played that competitively for a couple months.. mind i was playing with/against some of the best teams in the world (team 3d, EFG) it was fun and everything, and i learned a helluva lot playing it. But recently I decided to come back to fc to get ready for crysis and i heard about this XT mod or somthing.. I also decided to make 1 last fc movie to remember fc of, lol.

http://files.filefront.com/bpwAravi/;6636482;;/fileinfo.html

edit: oh yeah i probably should of posted this in the movie section but i dont think anyone reads that lol

edit2: also who plans on upgrading for crysis? or even playing it?

nice movie m8, omg the shot on jungle vs sniper
But 230mb for a 3 min movie?!!?!?

loL^

yeah I boosted the quality a bit, was going to make it longer but I didn't feel like recording anymore, and because of fraps.. kinda hard to play while getting 15-20 fps.. oh and since most of the servers only play custom maps and I didn't want like urbanwar or some other custom map to be in it.

Don't I know you unreal? I swear iv played with you before.

kinda offtopic: but does anyone know when the full version of XT will be released? or if they are even working on it?

Yeh you know me

When you were playing in Cyber Revolution I was in <PAC> and X.fs for your weakly taste of pwnage My nick then was Jason The Gr8 (Original ey?)
Ow and you came in a server the other night when I was in and refused to say hi

@ XT. We are aiming to get it out by the end of feb, but atm are having problems, so thats just a guestimate

Hey War, nice film and all but the title took over a quarter of the time. Hows about more action. Maybe talk to Sixgun about moviemaking tweaks. He's the pro around here.

Argggh, all these people showing their big file movies just after I bumped my ISP speed back down to 1.5MB from 7MB!

Well, maybe when I get time I'll take a look at it but yeah, 230MB for a 3 minute movie is generally way more than you need.

My best example of efficiency in file size lately has been a FEAR vid I did that is 7:30 in length and 118MB. It's 640x400 res but can easily be zoomed to 200% in WMP (1280x800) with no detectable loss in image quality.

That kind of results requires tools like VirtualDub, Xvid/LAME codecs, a system that can capture at a minimum of 25-30 FPS (preferrably 30), some carefully calculated settings and 2 Twopass compressions, which can be time consuming.

yeah, i used virtual dub and Xvid codec, set it to originally 3, but since my movie was so short i changed it to 2. then transfered the clips into vegas. virtual dub got the original fraps clips from like 200 mb down to 20 mb

quote:

Originally posted by bkrause172:
yeah, i used virtual dub and Xvid codec, set it to originally 3, but since my movie was so short i changed it to 2. then transfered the clips into vegas. virtual dub got the original fraps clips from like 200 mb down to 20 mb

Not really very specific there. Do you mean set the bit rate calculator to 3 minutes???

You need to note that with Xvid if you try to do a compression in which you go below 20% of the file size you are going to get sub par results.

On edited projects that start in the 1.5 to 2.5GB range (generally 7-10 minutes) I will use 2 Twopass compressions, the first at 25%, the second at 28%. This will typically keep the 1st compresssion over 7Mbps bit rate and the 2nd over 1700kbps.

The above parameters will yield very good results if using Fraps at 30 FPS. It's not uncommon to be able to zoom a 640x400 video using such settings to 200% in WMP (1280x800) with little to no loss in image quality.

If the project is 3GB or more you may want to give up the ability to zoom to 200% and go for a more practical file size. I try to not go below 20% the 1st compression and 23% the 2nd.

Sometimes 20%/23% will give you undesirable results depending on file length. Typically if the 2nd compression results in bit rates below 1500kbps average you will see some blurriness. A lot of it depends on the quality of the game's graphics though and the in game settings you use while recording.

ya you lost me about half way in that lol..

In the compression of Xvid I hit configure and set the quality to normally 3. but since it was so short i changed it to 2 I believe.. If I would of left it at 3 then im sure it would of only been around 150ish or so mb. I have a css movie to which is 6:58 at 330 mb.

heres my css movie if anyone wants to take a look at it..
http://files.filefront.com/w4rri0remptyshellavi/;6344720;;/fileinfo.html

quote:

Originally posted by bkrause172:
In the compression of Xvid I hit configure and set the quality to normally 3.

Well, now you're getting a bit more specific, but Xvid uses more complex dialouge than that, so still a bit odd wording.

I take it you mean the "VHQ" setting on the "Motion" page accessed via More>Quality preset:>[(User defined)v]>[more...] on the "Main Settings" page.

Then selecting in the drop down box list next to "VHQ mode:" one of the following:
0 - Off
1 - Mode Decision
2 - Limited Search
3 - Medium Search
4 - Wide Search

These are settings to define how actively Xvid searches for onscreen motion, which is more dectable to the eye than scenes with little or no motion therefore needing more bit rate.

Microsoft does something similar with their WMV9 codec which they call "Psychovisuals". You should be able to set that setting and the one above it ("Motion search precision:") at the highest setting without getting huge file size if you adjust everything else right and just compress twice (2 Twopass compressions).

With Xvid, it's better to compress twice with high settings than once with low settings. People used to using WMV often make that mistake, as WMV does not respond well to two compressions. WMV9 is more of a convenience codec than a quality codec when you compare it to Xvid.

Take a look at the long post about using Xvid in VirtualDub I made under the name >Omen< on this thread. It may help you more easily see how to set up the Xvid GUI: http://forums.filefront.com/showthread.php?t=298985

WaRiOr is FC+ which = gheyness lol

nono I did it like this lol

* Under the "Video" Menu, ensure that "Full Processing Mode" is selected
* Under the "Audio" Menu, select "Full Processing Mode" once again.
* You also want to make sure that the FPS setting in VirtualDub ("Video" --> "Frame Rate...") is the same as the FPS you used to create the images (default is 30 in the movie.cfg)

The next thing we want to select is a codec to compress the avi file (XviD is recommended for video, MP3 for audio).

* To select a video codec, select "Video" --> "Compression..." --> Scroll down and select "XviD MPEG-4 Codec" (as seen in the screen shot in the previous section.)
* You can adjust the quality of your video by changing the Target Quantizer found by clicking the "Configure" button with the XviD codec highlighted.

quote:

Originally posted by bkrause172:
Some of you know me

Well this is a blast from the past. How you been Warrior? I enjoyed your video. Almost makes me want to clean my SAW and go at it again.

I played a bit of Tremulous for awhile, but the players are young, dumb and rude and the forum is full of dropouts from anger management classes. I miss the old days of Far Cry.

You take care,

Gman

quote:

Originally posted by bkrause172:
nono I did it like this...
* You can adjust the quality of your video by changing the Target Quantizer found by clicking the "Configure" button with the XviD codec highlighted.

LOL indeed, sounds like you are using an old version of Xvid, the current GUI doesn't work like that.

Here is the list of codecs page, which has a Quality adjuster in the lower left that is grayed out in newer versions due to more complex and thorough methods used since then. The area mentioned is highlighted in red.


Here is the page you SHOULD be seeing after clicking the Configure button called Main Settings. The lower part of it highlighted in red is where you access the VHQ settings (Q stands for quality).


This is the page it brings up where the Motion search precision and VHQ mode are adjusted.


This is the build version I'm referring to, accessed via the About button on the first page shown above.

maybe..

but in my release notes it says this

Xvid-1.1.2-01112006 _Final Release_

http://www.xvidmovies.com/codec/

Regardless, if you're not seeing the second page shown above after hitting Configure there's something definitely strange. You should be getting better results than you're describing as far as file size without significant loss in image quality.

Something tells me the way you're describing the use of it is misleading.

no idea

some css pro movie maker made a thread on the cal forums and it's stickied "how to make a css movie"

if u make an account u can look at it urself

http://forums.caleague.com/showthread.php?t=7776

Nah, think I'll pass on that, I don't play CSS. I could steer you to a couple sites that show visual tutorials on how to use Xvid in VDub, but they are older ones that don't show the current GUI.

Unless this one you're speaking of is a visual tutorial that shows the current GUI, you're probably better off just referring to the one of mine I linked to above.

I'm assuming the one you're speaking of isn't a visual guide because after showing you the above GUI pages and the even longer set of pages available in the link you didn't indicate how the pages and settings in his guide looked by comparison.

There are many more settings other than just for quality in the Xvid GUI, but most of them are a one time thing to set up. After that you only need adjust bit rate for each project using the bit rate calculator.

(Edited)
OK, just found out what the confusion was about. That button called "Target Quantizer" is only available if you limit yourself to Singlepass mode Under Encoding type.

If his tutorial only told you how to make Singlepass compressions, where a constant bit rate is used, you are not making full use of Xvid's potential.

In Twopass mode the bit rate is variable. The 1st pass is a video analysis run to determine via onscreen motion, brightness levels, etc, where the higher bit rate will be needed.

Bottom line, it takes a bit longer to compress in Twopass mode but you wind up with better image quality at a very reasonable file size due to the efficiency of variable bit rate compression.

Since I only do Twopass compressions any more I'd forgotten there even was a button called Target Quantizer. It's really just a fancy way of saying "we'll give you a simple slider if you don't want to learn how to use the bit rate calculator". LOL

lol, well glad we got this figured out..

pz

If at some point you think you're ready to step up to Twopass compressions and take full advantage of Xvid, let me know. It's really not that hard and you get the best file size to quality ratio that way.

I've been making videos for well over two years now. The main reason I waited until now to use VirtualDub and Xvid are that they work best with Fraps.

For some time I had a problem with Fraps not recording audio in sync with the video, due to either audio drivers or prior Fraps build versions causing confilcts between my audio hardware and Fraps.

Now that I have this combination of tools to use I find myself wishing many of the videos I made a while back had been made this way.

In other words, if you learn the methods that give you optimum results early on, you avoid regretting not doing so after making many projects.

It would be a shame if the only thing holding you back from taking that step is doubting that you'll understand how. In my case it was compatibility issues beyond my control.