What to compress image sequences with...really...help!

[Mikokariadis]

So I was testing some render outs from exr to png and just noticed a certain media encoder from Adobe CS3 simply does not cut it (been told the one that comes with cs4 is the same thing, bloated crapola). What do people with those beautiful detail rich little videos on the web use to compress the sequences?
I notice a lot of material in H264, but from what software am I most certain to get a good result?

[Neilg]

Super, by a distance
http://www.erightsoft.org/GetFile.php?SUPERsetup.exe

Encodes anything to anything and it's completley free. The interface is a bit of a mess but you'll get how it works pretty quick.

I've tried quicktime pro and a number of other options and this has been the most reliable by far.


Keep everything uncompressed until the animation is completley finished as an .avi with .wav audio, then run it through this for a h.264 .mov
Worth doing a sample of 250 frames first to figure out bitrate and quality - you can multiply the file size by your total frames/250 to get a good idea of where it stands fairly quickly, otherwise you'll end up doing a few converts.

[Mikokariadis]

Thank you for the link cubiclegangster. Will use it for shure.

I really am in shock of how bad media encoder is...like colors shifted to something else...bad definition...a complete mess.

[egz]

Super looks pretty amazing. Thanks for the link!

[jacksc02]

I really like Adobe media encoder.
Great for spitting out WMVs quickly and with really good quality. No file bloat in sight either

[percydaman]

I'm going to try this super program. I've had a love hate relationship with adobe media encoder. But since we do alot more quicktime these days, I haven't used it as much.

[Morne]

I'm going to try this super program. I've had a love hate relationship with adobe media encoder. But since we do alot more quicktime these days, I haven't used it as much.

please post your thoughts on this when you tried it. Last time around I could'nt get it to work and couldn't get around the encoding gamma issues of H264 mov files

[percydaman]

please post your thoughts on this when you tried it. Last time around I could'nt get it to work and couldn't get around the encoding gamma issues of H264 mov files

Ahh well, it might be a bit till I try it. When I encode to .mov, I always do uncompressed out of premiere or whatever and then recompress in quicktime pro. Doesn't stop the stupid gamma issue though. *sigh....

[Neilg]

Super is the only one i've used where I dont get the gamma issue - had it with quicktime pro, straight from combustion and adobe media encoder.

[sv]

Super is the only one i've used where I dont get the gamma issue - had it with quicktime pro, straight from combustion and adobe media encoder.

it's because the APPLE h.264 encoder has had a bug in it for about 3 years which forces a gamma 1.8 into the resulting encoded file - lots of programs use Apple's encoder, for example Affect Effects uses it. Apple haven't fixed this bug....

Programs which don't use this particular encoder don't have the problem, for instance Nuke's h.264 writer doesn't have this problem

[Mikokariadis]

I really like Adobe media encoder.
Great for spitting out WMVs quickly and with really good quality. No file bloat in sight either

Hi Jacksc02.

The "bloated crapola" was referenced to Adobe Media Encoder itself and not the resulting files. It shure is great for quickly creating a .wmv and most other formats.

In fact I am having an issue with 720p sized sequenced files that just do not compress well in AME. Sequence to uncompressed .avi is sorta not working good all the time, sometimes it holds the first frame for about 3 to 4 times the duration of the original sequence. Weird.

Comparing a rendered sequence in a 8 bit format with the resulting "uncompressed" .avi out of Adobe Media Encoder is really an eye opening test. We do have 10/12 bit options that take care of that, but I don't want to disrupt an editor each time I want to run a file from an EXR sequence to a "final format".

Also the results do look a tiny bit "smoother" and a bit more "washed out" then other files compressed through other applications.

As to the gamma problem referenced by cubiclegangster, percydaman and sv; I believe it can be fixed with the QuicktimeGammaStripper tool that I think was first posted by Frantic. Just put it in Google and you will get to it. (then again it could not even work with newer versions!)

Super did not alter final file gamma.

Super has a "messy" interface, but it does do the job. In a difference/merge test against the original material I am impressed by the quality of this freeware compressor. It gives far more control and there are more options then those provided in AME.

Someone at work told me to check out Sorenson Squeeze for vp6f goodness, going to check if there is a demo for that.