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How best to compress HD video

Hi Gary,

Thanks for replying to the previous posts.

I have an ad I shot in HD 1080 format and I have to upload it to a competition, whose specifications are that it should ideally be an mov container with 300 MB file size limit, but suggesting I should aim for 30 MB per 60 seconds. My ad is 90 seconds long. I used Final Cut Express to output something using H264, and it said the target file would be 30 mb, but ended up being 8.5 MB with terrible pixellation. Should I try to use a converter? I want to ideally preserve the 1080 resolution but can come down to 720 if need be. Handbrake isn;t even reading the mov source edit file, just freezing.

Thanks so much for your time.

— Dhruv

Comments: One Response to “How best to compress HD video”

    14 years ago

    You can use programs like MPEGStreamclip and FFMpegX to re-compress video into any h264 bitrate you want. I'd export the video from Final Cut at a high bitrate first, though.
    But you can also export from FC at any number of settings. Just export and change the QuickTime options and choose a different bitrate. For instance, h264 at 500kpbs probably looks like crap, but it is a small file. 10000kpbs looks greate, but will be twice the size of 5000kpbs and about the same result. Experiment.

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