Optimizing your MPEG videos
Starting with the basic knowledge of video editing, you combine different elements such as videos, audio, titles, overlays and effects to create a movie project. Before burning this movie on a disc or saving it to file, every element included in your timeline needs to be rendered into a continuous stream of data. There are many factors to consider in making the rendering process of your project successful. For one, a project with exactly same attributes as your captured videos' should render very quickly and at the best quality.
Using the MPEG Optimizer minimizes several rendering problems since it intelligently analyzes all your project's video attributes and suggests the optimal video and audio profile you can use to create high-quality movies.
This tutorial explores how MPEG Optimizer can help you produce better quality for your MPEG videos and at the same time maximize your rendering speed.
To better understand the concept of MPEG Optimizer, we need to compare the properties of our videos. For example, there are three videos that we have decided to add to our Timeline.
Let's begin by comparing the video and audio properties of the three video clips by right-clicking a video clip and selecting Properties.
Part 1: Analyzing the video and audio properties of your clips
As illustrated below, our video clips have different file formats, video types and attributes. It is important, however, to have at least one MPEG-2 file in order to use MPEG Optimizer.
Among the three video clips, Video B has the highest video and audio properties.
Even if Video A is in MPEG-4 File format, its attributes are lower than Video B, which is 368x208 as compared to 720x480.
Part 2: Understanding the Optimal project settings profile
Now that we have identified the video clip with better attributes and since there are no more elements we intend to add to our project, we can now proceed to the Share Step and start creating a video file.
Click Create Video File and select MPEG Optimizer to open the MPEG Optimizer dialog box.
One of the tasks of the MPEG Optimizer is to suggest the Optimal project settings profile that is compatible to the video clip with the most recommended attributes, which in our case is Video B.
The Optimal project settings profile specifies the video and audio attributes that we will have once the project is saved as a movie. To view a breakdown of Optimal project settings profile, click Show detail.
As we have mentioned earlier, the Optimal project settings profile is the highest possible MPEG settings for the movie we will create, taking all the video clips' properties and limitations into consideration.
Since MPEG Optimizer recommends using the video and audio settings of Video B, you can see that it is represented as Original in the MPEG Optimizer dialog box. This means that this particular segment need not be rendered.
Segments that need to be re-encoded, on the other hand, are represented as the red areas in the Timeline segment layout. This means that these segments, such as Video A and Video C, do not carry the attributes specified in the Optimal project settings profile.
By looking at the Timeline segment layout, you can estimate how much time rendering your movie will need. The idea, therefore, is to use video clips with the same MPEG attributes when possible to reduce rendering time of your movie.
Part 3: Rendering and creating your project
Now that you know how to read the MPEG Optimizer information box, you can click Accept to start rendering and creating your project. Clicking Accept means that you allow MPEG Optimizer to render and save your movie, carrying the attributes of the Optimal project settings profile.
If you have decided to add or edit your project after rendering, the MPEG Optimizer automatically detects changes in your project and renders out only the edited portions, making render time much shorter and faster.