Advent Children & Filesize

Earendil18 · Post by **Earendil18** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 7:29 am

It is almost 4:30 AM, and I'm trying to get my latest AMV to a reasonable filesize. It's 4 minutes, 25 seconds, and ALL Advent Children footage so I might as well be trying to compress live-action.

Either way, the lowest filesize I can achieve with quality results is...

70MB.

I want to try WMV because I've had amazing results before, but it does something that causes the beginning of my music track to click/artifact.

Xvid is great and all but 70 is the lowest I can get before I go crazy looking at the horrible BLOCKS on TIFA's FACE.

Ok, I exaggerate but...

Any compression gods that could help me out here or over IM would be greatly appreciated.

Or links even. I just want the darn characters faces to be smooth but an easily downloadable file size as well!

Thanks for any and all future help!

Willen · Post by **Willen** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 7:57 am

Without using a more advanced codec like H.264, i think 70MB is going to be the smallest quality file you can make unless you reduce the resolution of the video to something like 640 x 352. GCI anime is typically harder to compress, especially for something with lots of action.

Qyot27 · Post by **Qyot27** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 8:06 am

Have you tried using a temporal or spatial smoother on the footage (like deen)? That can help to reduce it, but if there are a lot of effects and high motion, it may not help much.

If you're comfortable using something like MKV instead of AVI, it's also possible to use 720x480 for your resolution and set the display flag to 848x480 so that you can save some space there as well (this is also possible in MP4, but I just have a personal preference for MKV). And of course there is always H.264 like Willen suggested.

Earendil18 · Post by **Earendil18** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 9:12 am

What H.264 codecs are available? I can output in Quicktime but I want to make sure a large number of folks can play the AMV.

Incidentally, I tweaked some of the settings, and while I got 83MB now, it's actually VERY nice looking. You can hardly tell it's been compressed!

Is 83 a pretty reasonable filesize for a 41/2 minute AMV?

BasharOfTheAges · Post by **BasharOfTheAges** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 10:07 am

Earendil18 wrote: Is 83 a pretty reasonable filesize for a 41/2 minute AMV?

For something of the class of video you're talking about i'd say it would be good.

Did you compress the audio?

Earendil18 · Post by **Earendil18** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 10:20 am

Yes, I was able to keep the audio compressed too.

I also just noticed that technically I'm not allowed to submit this video because for some reason FF7:AC was classified as non-anime, whilst they still allow video game FMV's, which are basically the same visual quality etc. Not to mention Spirits Within, and the OTHER AMV that was done to this song that had clips from FF7AC...

But you guys'll still watch it right?

Willen · Post by **Willen** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 11:18 am

Earendil18 wrote:Yes, I was able to keep the audio compressed too.

I also just noticed that technically I'm not allowed to submit this video because for some reason FF7:AC was classified as non-anime, whilst they still allow video game FMV's, which are basically the same visual quality etc. Not to mention Spirits Within, and the OTHER AMV that was done to this song that had clips from FF7AC...

But you guys'll still watch it right?

One listing of FF7:AC was eliminated, but a legitimate entry still exists. Check the other Final Fantasy listings (it's listed as Final Fantasy 7 (VII): Advent Children (OVA)). I believe the other struck-out listing was just Final Fantasy: Advent Children (with no '7' or 'VII', making it incorrect).

Earendil18 · Post by **Earendil18** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 12:33 pm

Oh, I see, that does make more sense.