Converting to .mov

[Bewlay]

Hi there,

I take a lot of footage with my Android phone which I would then like to manipulate in Avenue. The videos are in MP4 format and play perfectly in Quicktime.
When I import them into Avenue, they play in a stop/start fashion and quickly crash the program.

So I converted a couple of videos to .mov, following the instructions here: (Using Quicktime 7)

https://resolume.com/support/en/rendering-to-dxv

First thing I noticed is that the file size increases by almost 10 fold!

So I have a 12 second, mp4 video at a size of 26.3MB that becomes 239MB after Quicktime conversion.
(I'm using the settings suggested in the article).

The .mov clips play smoothly in Resolume but are slightly distorted after conversion.
My main problem though is the file size, is there a more efficient way to convert?

Thanks.

[Arvol]

Hi Bewlay.

The reason mp4's suck is becuase they are compressed all to hell. This is great for when streaming online to a 7" cellphone. When you take that same footage and try to use it in a professional setting it really bog's down your system because the system has to decompress the file which takes a lot of system resources.
And now you want to add FX and modify the same footage in real time, which puts even mooooore strain on your system because it has to do this on top of decompressing a file.

The DXV codec is a uncompressed format that releaves much strain from that entire process and allows for a much smoother playback and ease of use when adding 12 FX and scaling it up and down 100 times per second.

Like everything in life, there is always a trade off. With the performance comes a larger file size. You have to give up system resources when decoding the file in exchange for a larger file size that doesn't need decoding.
You should see some of my file sizes. I literally have 4-6GB files all over my comp. It comes with the territory.

I'm not sure what your system specs are, but SSD's are always recommended. PCIe based even more so (m.2)
But again, with every thing in life there's a trade off. A 1TB m.2 SSD is much much more expensive than a 5,400 RPM 1TB 2.5" HDD. It's all about balancing your budget for your reward. What level are you at in your VJ game? Can you afford a $3,000 laptop with specs that will take you to the moon and back, or are you just getting into it and need to focus on upgrading your build or getting quality VJ clips?
There's a lot of debate about using external USB3 SSD's, but that is an option as well (much cheaper than a m.2 SSD because there are more built, thus the manufacturing price drops)

I would write down all you machine specs and see what you need to upgrade first if the file space is going ot be an issue.

If you're running an Intel Iris GPU, I would upgrade your machine spec's (specifically the GPU) before worrying about storage. If you have a decent GPU and need space, maybe see if you can upgrade internal storage first and compare the price of that to an external option. (always go internal when possible, nothing worse than having bass rattle your cable loose and your show stops because you don't have any clips connected haha)

Sorry, I feel like I'm rambling on at this point.

If you want, post your system specs and we can give you a bit of advice.

But to answer your original question. Yes the files are going to be much larger, and no I wouldn't change that or worry about changing that. there is a reason they're larger. you can load multiple 4k@60fps files and stack them and add 10 FX on top and still push out plenty of fps without crashing the system. If those files were mp4's I don't think I could get 2 to work at the same time.

Also, are you converting with normal or high quality selected on your codec settings? I would stick with normal to help reduce file size. It doesn't sound like High quality would benefit the clips you are converting.

[Bewlay]

Hey Arvol,

Thanks for the detailed response.

Here's a quote from the article linked above:

"We advise to do all encoding at Normal Quality. Only if you notice a lot of banding on gradients, should you use the High Quality setting. Expect file size to double when encoding to DXV3 HQ!"

I read that as meaning the file size would double in comparison to the MP4 so I was surprised to see my conversions coming in at 9 or 10 times the size!
Now I realise they were probably comparing the normal quality vs high quality, so it now makes more sense.

To answer your question, I'm actually not interested in VJ'ing at all.
I bought Avenue to pre-prepare some video/ visuals to play behind a band I play in.
So I, personally, don't actually need high quality videos at all. (Unless the program does of course.)

So if I have to live with the larger file size that's fine, I just wasn't sure if I was making some error somewhere along the way.
I can always delete them as I go along.

Thanks again.

[Joris]

If you're consistently crashing Resolume, with a file or otherwise, we'd love to see the crash repor. Boy, do we love them crash reports.

[Bewlay]

Sounds good, Joris, I will certainly send one on the next time it happens

[sufan8888]

[quote="Arvol"]Hi Bewlay.

"This is great for when streaming online to a 7" cellphone."

Hello Arvol. What if my primary purpose is to use Resolume to stream online? Should I use a 4-6M mp4 or a converted 40-60M dxv 3?

Thank you!