How to compress the video without compromising it too much

codeccompressionvideo

Alright, i'm down to crunch time. I have a video that I have rendered out for something I have to turn in. The submission requires that it be At Most: 200 MB and be one of the following formats:

  • .avi
  • .dv
  • .mov
  • .qt
  • .mp4
  • .mpeg
  • .3pg
  • .asf
  • .wmv
  • .mpg

It's my goal (as is many peoples goal) to preserve as much quality as possible. The problem is, my video is currently 721.99707 MB! Out of the formats, which are the best for me to try? What other methods can I apply to shrink the file size while still trying to keep as much as possible of the original quality.

I'm sure I'll have to use something lossy (as much as I would prefer not). I'm just looking for a best solution, not a God solution if you know what I mean.

Thanks so much!

EDIT

Sorry, a commenter pointed out some good questions.

  • Current Format: .mov
  • Current Bit Rate: 1135kbps
  • Current Framerate: 30fps
  • Current Resolution: 720 x 480
  • Length: 3 Minutes, 22 Seconds

I would prefer that the resolution not go down any more. It will be viewed in a box about the size of its current resolution, however, if it is necessary, then I will shrink it…

Best Answer

The formats listed there are simply containers, they have nothing to do with the size of the encoded video.

A container needs to contain video that has been encoded with some kind of codec (and it can then be muxed with audio as well, and maybe some subtitles for good measure depending on the container).

In your case however I would suggest looking at using H264 as your codec inside the mp4 container. H264 (and to some extent MPEG 4 Visual as well) has a very good reputation for retaining video quality even at low bitrates.

The most famous encoder for H264 is x264, which is included in many video encoding applications such as Handbrake, SUPER or even FFmpeg. When you set the quality, don't go for "average bitrate" (since x264 performs poorly there), but rather change the "constant rate factor" setting to get the desired file size.

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