What is the best format. What is the best video format?


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What is the best format. What is the best video format?

Video Formats

There are many different video file formats that allow you to store compressed video and audio information in a single file. Many people used to call the extension of the video file itself a video format, but in reality this extension is just a container in which videos of various formats can be stored. Some users may have faced such a situation that the downloaded video file with the familiar and familiar AVI extension did not want to play on the computer, because no suitable codec was found to play it.

Video File Formats

Generating audio compression
To clear up this fog, we are offering you an update for several destructive compressed audio formats. Obviously, with today’s internet speeds and phenomenal storage sizes, the above values ​​seem ridiculous. At the time, however, they had a real gamble: the main problem was being able to transfer and host these files with extremely slow storage capacity, bandwidth, or speeds. Thus the famous lossy compressed formats were born.

What is destructive sound compression?
Human auditory threshold. Fraunhofer Institute in Schmallenberg. However, the extension is associated with a codec, some of which even have the same name. Codecs have evolved over time, always with the aim of improving the perception of encoding quality and optimizing file weight.

Most of the video files distributed on the Internet are now created using the two most common containers, AVI and MKV. AVI container has been used for a long time and many different programs have been written to edit such video files, but with MKV things were quite different for a long time and users did not know how to cut an mkv file.

Consider another more appropriate sound analysis tool: the spectrogram. This measurement allows observing the evolution of energy as a function of frequency and time, thus highlighting certain defects created by destructive compression. Castanets, for example, a rich, accurate and fast percussion source, are particularly good at handling time-coding problems, particularly pre- and post-echo effects. But, unfortunately, the spectrogram also has its limits, not allowing to judge the full and complete transparency of the codec transparency.

The truth is that until now no measure has been able to fully define the transparency of a perceptual codec, and for good reason: everything is in the header. The final test remains, as the name suggests, a perception test.

To play or create each video format, an appropriate codec must be installed on your computer. The most popular codecs can be counted on one hand and we will consider some of their features below.

The XviD codec of the MPEG4 standard provides high definition images for dynamic scenes. It is distributed completely free of charge and is widely used by amateur video masters to encode any video.

Obviously, the different bit rates available have a direct impact on the quality and respect of the original audio file. Don’t confuse data compression with dynamic compression. Be careful, the term “compression” does not always mean to compress audio data. In fact, compression can also refer to the dynamics of the signal, such as reducing the gap between the loudest and weakest sounds, for example for music, movies, television or radio, for example, normally due to compression. of the dynamics of the pubs broadcast on television between films. , they are perceived much louder, while the listening volume does not change, since the difference between radio stations and music tracks.

DivX remains one of the most popular codecs and is compatible with all DVD players. By encoding, you get high-quality video with a high level of data compression, allowing you to get small video files. At the moment, the DivX codec pays for when used for encoding.


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The most important video formats in comparison

The most important video formats in comparison

video formats

AVI, WMV, MPEG, MOV, FLV, WebM: a guide through the terms of video formats, with all their pros and cons The most common video formats at a glance ‘

Videos basically consist of many individual images and associated sound. Four different values ​​are relevant to recording the image: The frame rate or the frame rate, which is displayed in hertz (Hz) or in frames per second (fps = frames per second).

Video Formats

The higher this value, the more frames will be used to create the video and the larger the file will be. The second value is the color depth, which contains information about the color and brightness values. Third, the movie format indicates the resolution of the image in pixels or the aspect ratio of the video (for example, 16: 9 or 4: 3). And fourth, the soundtrack, which contains the recorded sound. The higher the image resolution, quality and length of the video, the larger the file will be on the hard drive.

There are numerous video formats. The most common formats are:

  • AVI – Audio Video Interleaved – file.avi
  • WMV – Windows Media Player – file.wmv
  • MPEG I, MPEG II – Moving Images Expert Group – file.mpg
  • MOV – Movie – file.mov
  • FLV – Flash Video – file.flv, file.swf
  • MPEG IV – Moving Image Expert Group – file.mp4
  • WebM – Google – .webm file

Video players such as the VLC player can be used to play such files on the computer. A DVD is typically 8 gigabits in size, while Bluray DVDs can be significantly larger. These can then be reduced with a compressor, but both the sound and the image quality are a handful.

All video formats have their advantages and disadvantages. The MPEG 2 format is synonymous with good quality picture and sound. With the iPad, however, it has to be an MPEG 4 format or a special application to play the video. Then there are the AVI videos, which can be played on almost any device. However, they have the great disadvantage that they become very large if the quality is adequate. On the contrary, the FLV format is ideal if the video will be published on the Internet. Because it is precisely this format that is compatible with the browser or with Flash plugins.

3GP / 3G2 (file extension: .3gp, .3g2, .3gpp)

3gp is the name of a video file format for mobile devices such as third-generation cell phones or PDAs. This format was specified by the 3GPP organization. Files in this format have the file name extension “.3gp” or “.3gpp”. It is used in the UMTS (3G) standard.
3g2 is a mobile phone video file format that is functionally similar to the 3gp format. This format was specified by the 3GPP2 organization. Files in this format have the file name extension “.3g2”. It is used in the CDMA2000 standard.

AVI (audio video interleaved) * .avi

A video format developed by Microsoft in 1992. Widely used in software and hardware. Almost all multimedia programs and almost all DVD players can play this format. Also, most digital cameras record in this format. Unfortunately at the price of very high storage requirements (compared to WMV or MPEG up to 20 times more).

FLV (short for Flash Video) * .flv * .swf

With Flash Video is a container format developed by Adobe Systems, which is best used for streaming video content over the Internet. To play the videos, Adobe Flash Player version 6 or 7 or higher is required. By embedding Flash video files in a SWF (Small Web Format) file, a video file can be integrated into a website with relative ease. SWF is an ActionScript, vector graphics, and multimedia file format.

MJPEG

Motion JPEG (MJPEG) is a video codec in which each individual image is compressed separately as a JPEG image. Videos compressed with MJPEG, unlike those compressed with MPEG, have a quality that is independent of the movement of the image. This standard is often used in older digital cameras. Due to the individual compression of all individual images, with this format it is possible to cut a frame from a video clip precisely without the need for recoding, which is generally only possible with MPEG keyframes.

MPEG 1 and 2 (Moving Image Expert Group) * .mpg

Video format developed by a group of experts with standardized compression methods. The advantages of MPEG movies are the comparatively small files with good image quality, albeit with low resolution. In practice, MPEG-II movies are far superior to MPEG-I movies in terms of resolution and image quality.

MPEG 4 (Moving Pictures Expert Group) * .mp4

Video format developed by a group of experts with standardized compression methods.
Originally, the aim of MPEG-4 was to support systems with low resources or narrow bandwidths (mobile phones, videophones, …) with a relatively small loss of quality. Since H.263, an ITU standard for video compression and decoding, had already successfully met these requirements, it was integrated into MPEG-4 as Part 2 without major changes. Films
MPEG-4 is compressed even stronger and without any noticeable loss of quality, that is, very small files with very good resolution. In practice, MPEG-4 places somewhat higher demands on the performance of the computer, since highly compressed data must first be “decompressed” again when played back.

MPEG 7

MPEG-7 is an ISO standard (ISO / IEC 15938) that was adopted in 2002 and was defined by the Moving Picture Experts Group, or MPEG for short. MPEG-7 is not a real compression standard, but it is used to describe multimedia data with the help of meta information and is stored in the form of one or more XML documents. It can be attached to the time code, for example, to mark certain events or, for example, to synchronize the lyrics with a song.

MOV (movie) * .mov

MOV-type video files are based on the Apple Quicktime standard. Quicktime movies largely share the advantages and disadvantages of MPEG-4 movies for comparison: good movie quality with little space, but higher demands on computer performance. The container format for Apple’s QuickTime multimedia architecture typically has the file extension .mov or .qt. Depending on the functions, the endings .qtvr, .qti and .qtif are also used. Storage takes place in sequentially and hierarchically organized units of data, so-called atoms. In addition to chronological information and tracking data, you can also store structural and hierarchical information and relationships. A special sync layer also makes it suitable for streaming. In professional cinema- and post-production it is the usual format for the exchange of multimedia data (video, audio, subtitles, time codes, chapter marks, etc.) due to the aforementioned properties. It also serves as the basis for the ISO standardized MP4 MPEG-4 file format.

Ogg .ogg

Ogg is a container file format for multimedia files, so it can hold audio, video, and text data at the same time. Ogg was designed with the goal of offering a free and unrestricted software patent alternative to proprietary formats for efficient storage and streaming of multimedia content. The ability to transmit is the decisive design feature: everything that is packaged in an Ogg container can be transmitted without additional adjustments. This distinguishes Ogg from formats that are only capable of streaming in certain ways (like Matroska) or not capable of live streaming (like MP4). Ogg streams can be grouped and chained without having to adjust the individual stream.
Ogg Theora is not very common in the video field. However, it is enjoying increasing popularity in the open source scene. However, for HD videos, the Matroska format, which is also free, is gaining more and more acceptance outside of the open source scene, so it remains to be seen what role Ogg Theora will play in the future.

RM (Real Average) * .rm

A collective term for the file formats of the software maker RealNetworks, in particular the Real-Audio audio format and the Real-Video video format. It is used primarily in streaming applications. Real files are lossy, but the quality of real video files is still comparatively good, especially with high compression.
Files compressed with RealVideo are lossy. The quality of RealVideo files is generally comparatively good with high compression, older versions are poor with low compression compared to MPEG for example. However, the quality of the newer versions is comparable to MPEG-4 video codecs like Xvid or DivX, as well as Windows Media Video 9. RealVideo usually occurs in the RealMedia container and then has its file extension .rv, .ram, .rm, or .rmvb.

WebM

WebM is a container format for audio and video data, used for the VP8 and VP9 video codecs introduced by Google, which represent alternatives to the well-known H.264 codec. It was developed for websites in the HTML5 standard, where it is used as an alternative to the MP4 format. WebM was introduced by Google Inc. in May 2010 and is endorsed by the Mozilla Foundation and Opera Software, among others. For Internet Explorer 9 or higher, Google provides a browser extension for download. In April 2011, Google also introduced WebM on YouTube, where it has since been available as an alternate playback option using the HTML5 video tag built into the page without browser plugins such as the Flash player that was previously required. Another implementation example, which in the case of the VP8 video format also represents the description of the standard, was released as free software under the terms of a BSD license.

WMV (Windows Media Video) * .wmv

A video format developed by Microsoft that offers high compression with good quality. In addition to Windows Media Player and many other software players, some standalone hardware players can also decode WMV files. Files that contain WMV encoded video streams are generally embedded in Microsoft’s Advanced Streaming Format (ASF) container format. These files usually have the extension .asf, but in the case of a video file they can also have the extension .wmv. A new variant of WMV is the Windows Media Video High Definition (WMVHD) format.
The Windows Media format also supports the integration of Digital Rights Management (DRM), which is intended to allow copyright owners to regulate access rights to audio and video material. In practice, this technology is often used as a copy protection measure.

Which video format is better?

Which video format is better?

Surely, like me, you have often wondered which video format is best for recording, editing and exporting for YouTube or social networks. And there is not a single format for everything, but many, too many! Let’s see which ones you need for each task.

In what format to record on camera

The semi or professional video cameras that we can find in the market have recording options in the most common formats, in addition to some RAW formats that we can find in cameras with higher segments. For example, the BlackMagic 6K is capable of recording on Blackmag
ic RAW, the new format developed by BlackMagic Design.

It is always recommended to use the least compressed formats possible as long as we are going to work intensively with the color of that video. This is like a photograph: we will always have much more leeway with a RAW photo than with a compressed JPG photo.

For this reason, the cameras include slightly more compressed formats, such as ProRes, H.264 or H.265. ProRes is a mid-range format that offers a good balance of image quality and size and allows for color correction without loss of quality, making it suitable for professional environments. But undoubtedly the fastest and most suitable for ordinary mortals is the H.264. H.264 is the JPG of video, an off-road format accepted by the vast majority of online video players and services.

H.264 problem? That when editing is a resource eater, since the CPU has to decompress the signal. But if you have a fairly powerful PC you should have no problem. Oh, by the way, there are video editors capable of decoding H.264 and H.265 using the GPU, not at the software level, but at the GPU level. For example, in DaVinci Resole Studio we can activate this option by going to the preferences and in Decoding we activate Use hardware acceleration and NVIDIA or the graphics card we are using. I tell you that the speed jump is dramatic.

Also, there are some cameras capable of recording in H.265 format. For example, we can record in H.265 (also known as HEVC) on the Panasonic GH5, but only in a very specific recording format. It is noteworthy that this mode in the Panasonic allows HDR through HLG (Hybrid Log Gamma or high dynamic range). So if you have a monitor compatible with this system, use the original color space of these Rec2020 HLG clips, since selecting this color space in DaVinci Resolve you can get images with a great dynamic range, or change the color space later. to Rec709 to recover light levels of this standard space.

Okay, and up to this point the big question: in what format do we record? It depends. It is not the same if you are recording a short film than a video for YouTube. In my personal experience, for YouTube I do not complicate my life and use more or less standard configurations. In fact, right now I’m recording this using the GH5 H.264’s preset with 8bit color at 25fps and 100mb and with the Cinelike D color profile, not V-Log or anything like that, but Cinelike D. Note that YouTube then compresses the video, I do not see much sense in recording with more bitrate or more color depth, so I use this simple and busy preset.

VIDEO CONVERSION SOFTWARE

Then there are other formats like MP4 or AVCHD, but basically they use a lower bit rate.

But it may be the case that we want to record a movie with our GH5. In that case I do recommend going to more “professional” profiles so to speak. Keep in mind that each camera is a world, but as a general rule, when we are recording something with a more cinematic aspiration, I recommend going to the highest quality option that the camera gives. There are cameras that allow you to record in RAW, so we will need tons of storage. For example, in the GH5 the highest quality preset is 4K at 400 megabits per second with a color depth of 10 bits. Take chestnut. That is, 50 megabytes per second at 10 bit color, absolutely crazy.

In fact, it is so crazy that any SD card is not worth it, because if we use one that has a low writing speed, we will run out of buffers and stop recording. So it is essential to use special cards that allow this recording speed, for example I have the 128GB Sony M Series, which allow a writing speed of 150 Megabytes per second. Be careful, here we are mixing megabytes and megabits. In the camera preset we will see 400 megabits, that is, the mbps in lowercase, while the card shows it in Megabytes, with the MB in uppercase.