unfoldingmetal
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This topic is mainly for Creel but anyone can post.
As I was watching Black Night, Creel’s movie. I noticed how large and clear the file was. And it was only 19 Megabytes. Creel, what capture program do you use?
Thanks.
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Cometgreen
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Well…it was only three minutes if I’m not mistaken. 16 mb is quite big for that, even at 640×480.
And your main question is with his compression, not his capture software.
Cometgreen
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Blunty
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Comet’s right – it is quite large considering it’s length…
comet’s wrong – it’s 720×480
comet’s right – it IS about compression, not the capture SW
two from three… not bad I suppose 8)
the movie is compressed using DivX, at a data rate of 84Kbbs at 29 frames per second (though this framerate is not neccisarily indicitive of the framerate that the film was animated at)
the audio is compressed using the Microsoft ADPCM at a bit rate of 354Kbps…. 
THIS is why the file is so big… a massive datarate (compartively) using a audio codec that does not offer a particularly good compression ratio.
I only ever use MS ADPCM for my “archive” copy – the file I make my “distribution” copy from – and the file I keep safely tucked away – it’s BIG because I compress it very little, to preserve the quality as much as possible, without ending up with an unuseable multi Gig file.
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Cometgreen
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It’s 720×480? Odd. I thought he would change it to square pixels. That’s probably why you said it looked squished, Bluntman, the movie was most likely using rectangular (.9) pixels instead of square pixels. That can look a little screwed up on a comp.
Cometgreen, the pixel man
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CreelUnderground
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I used the shareware Dodcap for much of the film, but I am also working on my own capture software. SMA would not work with my analog capture card.
The video was captured at 720×480 using my JVC analog video camera. That’s the size that my analog capture card does. I now have an Intel CS330 that I will be using. The camcorder is difficult to place due to its size.
It was animated at 15 fps, converted to 29 in Premiere bacause I also dump to tape and/or dvd. Compressed with Divx because I like the quality it gives with good compression.
I did not know that the ADPCM had a poor compression ratio. What audio compressor would you suggest? Sound is not really my thing. 
BTW, my original file with no video or audio compression is 1,394,325 KB! Having seen some ridiculously large short films, I didn’t think 16 meg was so bad. I will experiment with different compressors to see what sizes I can get in the future.
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unfoldingmetal
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BTW, my original file with no video or audio compression is 1,394,325 KB!
Thank you everyone. I will use your advice to try and upgrade my films. 
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Buxton
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For what it’s worth, I archived all the raw files for Out Of Time (dialog, video, foleys, etc) to ten CDs.
That’s a lot of disk space freed up.
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CreelUnderground
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“Buxton” wrote: For what it’s worth, I archived all the raw files for Out Of Time (dialog, video, foleys, etc) to ten CDs.
That’s a lot of disk space freed up.
To archive Black Knight, I zipped the uncompressed files and then saved to DVD.
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Brian of Gep
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“CreelUnderground” wrote: I did not know that the ADPCM had a poor compression ratio. What audio compressor would you suggest? Sound is not really my thing.
Personally, I use MP4…. It comes with DIVx.
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unfoldingmetal
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Actually, You guys are really melting me.
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Cometgreen
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Attack of the Clone: About 2 gigs of source files, 6 gigs of rendered sequences. Six gigabytes compressed down to 20 mb. Not too shabby if I do say so myself. Man, I need to put them on CDs.
The sound codec applies to your format. If you’re using Quicktime, IMA is usually preferred. If DivX, most likely MP4 as Brian stated. RealOne comes with its own, and is quite good.
Cometgreen
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unfoldingmetal
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Ok ok. How much space is there on your computer? There is only 6 gigs on ours. So… yeah, we need a new computer.
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Firelance
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Comet, you seem to use Digital Video I think; Considering the amount of disk space you use for a rather short film like AOTC… Or am I wrong?
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Cometgreen
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Well, it was shot with a VHS-C camcorder, but I used Videowave to capture, and it only captures stills at 320×240. But since the entire thing was bluescreened, there was a lot of 3d stuff made. In the end, the “rendered sequences” were six finished stages rendered with the Quicktime Animation codec*, and then put into one project. I watched the RM version last night, and I’m so disappointed at the compression. It really destroys the lightsabers and other certain effects.
*The Quicktime Animation codec is a lossless format, which means that it’s compressed video, but is as good as uncompressed video. The only problem is that it takes up huge amounts of space. There’s a new lossless Quicktime codec out that supposedly is as good but uses less disk space, but I forgot what it’s called.
Cometgreen
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Stefan
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Work is being done on lossless codecs for video and still images. Jpeg 2000, Motion Jpeg 2000 (part 3 of the Jpeg 2000 standard), PNG and MNG (the latter two are both finished products and in use in several programs).
These should provide ways of reducing the amount of disk space taken by your videos while retaining quality. For still images, though, 4:1 compression is already quite a lot. Don’t expect miracles!
Stefan.
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