Converting Anime to 170-180MB

[Renzoken]

Hi, Most anime i download now are around 170MB, for example like Bleach. And Shakugan no Shana are all around the 170-180MB a episodes.

Now i still got some anime files from other serie like School Rumble first episode which to my suprise is 270MB MKV file. And no.. these don't even have dual audio. So i really don't understand why its 270MB or even a MKV file, and not just avi.

And yet the quality is the same as other school rumble which are 180MB. Got 2 episodes which are 280mb MKV. And i would like to convert them to the same type as the rest of my school rumble anime. Which are all below 180MB. And a AVI.

Now the question is. What settings are they using to convert it to that size? And what software do they use for it? After searching around a bit on this side i found a tool named Super. It seems as a good converter. Now you just gets tons of options to convert. And i truly have no idea which settings i have to use. The only info i could find from my bleach anime is that there 128kbs... And thats all.. No idea what audio compression they used or what video compression and setting they used.

First experiment with converting school rumble mkv episode 1 using super turnd out quite bad.... The result were... plain ugly... bad quality.. and ugh.. for some reason my sound didn't sync with the video either. THOUGH!!! it was only 80mb from original 270 lol...

So anyone that can help me out with this ?

Thanks in advance.
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[Jsy3k]

If you are using super, you need to play around with the figures to see which one suited your eyes. It takes a lot of trial and error in order to get the ones that you want, but you may not want to expect to high.

You need to remember that MKV files are container and most of the time, the video file is already compressed, so if you convert it again, the quality may deteriorate further.

As for your off-sync sound, it may be due to your computer specification. May I know your PC's specification?
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Innocent Tranquility

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[Renzoken]

Mmm it's a notebook.

Core 2 Duo, T7200
2GB ram 667mhz
160 GB, 5400RPM
ATI mobility X1600.

And yes i tried a few settings. None of them turned out well actually. But i was wondering what the anime series subbers use to compress there series. Since there all nicely 175MB. And good quality.

Guess it will takes a lot of time since compressing a anime from 25min takes some time.

And the off sync sound, i think the reason is because its MKV. And with some of extra audio stream. Though i couldn't find one with any of my player. No option of english or japanese sound. Thought it would explain why it is 275 mb if there is a second audio.
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[thugangel]

You should really check into codecs. That's what matters the most in having good quality videos yet being compact. I don't know which fansub or version your Shakugan no Shana was done, but the ones I got were in x264 codec. They're much more compressed than DivX or XviD in terms of quality.

I've never heard of Super. Though, I haven't been around in video editing for a while. Most fansubbers use VirtualDub or VirtualDubMod (recommends the latter). What I used to do is edit out the un-needed scenes in animes so they would fit in a CD. I did that with VirtualDub/Mod successfully. Just try to re-encode the edited video with the same codec as the original (you can look at the properties from your usual media player or some other source). Then, just mess around with the encoding settings, trial and error, until the stat is almost the same as the original video file. You don't need to mess with the audio as they are already compressed, unless you don't mind losing the audio quality. Dattebayo or DB uses Windows Movie Maker (2.1) for encoding their videos (which are XvID as of late)...

What's neat about VirtualDubMod is that if you just want a certain track like the English audio track taken out to make the file smaller (if the original is dual-audio), you can set the video processing as Direct Stream Copy, and under audio streams, disable the unwanted track. Then, just go to File > Save video as ... and it's easy as that. No need to mess with encoding settings. Welp, that's how much I remember...

[Renzoken]

^^ wasnt shakugan no shana, was my School rumble episode 1 and 2 which are 279MB or so. And they are same quality as a 175mb episode which the rest of my school rumble is.

I was hoping to get it down to 175mb to. Since i really don't see why the files are 279mb. And bloody MKV without dual audio. Friend gave me Megui. To compress anime to H264. But dear lord... That programm is even more complicated than virtual dub. Which is quite easy to use except for the huge amount of settings...

I googled around and hoping to find the settings people used. Atleast to use as a basic and learn from that. But there don't appear to be many guides about it. Unless its so obvious people don't bother making guides of it. But reading here i think trial and error really is the only way.

And you say DB use Windows Movie maker 2.1 Damn... i thought they had some neat tool. But just Windows Movie maker... I used a bit to rip some parts of a anime. But bleh... doesnt seem like a good program.
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[Jsy3k]

[thugangel]

Ah, nvm about what I said about Dattebayo's release. When I think about it, they could either be using a raw that was captured through Windows Movie Maker and left Windows Movie Maker 2.1 as comments/info or... they purposely put it in there to make themselves look gayer. I think it's the former. Their final releases are in XviD codec. Windows Movie Maker can only save videos as WMVs as far as I know.


Hmm.. the first two eps I got of the 1st season were done by dashfansubs which were 182MB on the first and 179MB on the second. But looking at WF's encodes, their filesize were pretty consistent at around 179MB which goes for around 906Kbps. The biggest filesize of theirs was ep 22 which is around 205MB and the bitrate goes as 1056Kbps; videos that are in AVI, anyway.

I don't have the .mkv episodes as you do. But I will show you how I would twiddle around with their highest bitrate/filesize and make them smaller through VirtualDubMod.

Open up your VirtualDubMob > File > Open video file...

Assuming your .mkv video files are in resolution of 640x480, then all we need to do is go to Video > Fast recompress. It's faster to reincode this way since you're not resizing the resolution of the video; otherwise, full processing mode. Go to Video > Compression and select XviD MPEG-4 Codec (assuming you have a separate XviD install like Koepi's XviD). Hit the Configure button. For Profile @ Level, choose Advanced Simple @ L5. You can either choose Single Pass or Two Pass (better). we're going for Two passes.

First, choose Twopass - 1st pass and click the "more" button. Select where you want the first pass file to be saved. This file will contain most of the information that will be gathered during the first pass. Check "Full quality first pass" and uncheck the "discard first pass" box (since we need that .pass file). Click OK. Click OK in the XviD configuration window and OK again in Select video compression window. File > Save as... and choose a path and a filename to save your video as. This is your first pass file so call it something like 1stpass. Since you want .avi, make sure you save in that file type. Then, wait for VirtualDubMod to do its job. I usually have the "Show input/output video" disabled so that I would be able to save more processing power for the encoding.

Now, for the 2nd pass, choose Twopass - 2nd pass from the XviD configuration window and make sure the .pass we want is what we're using by clicking at the "more..." button. You can either play with the "Target bitrate" or make an absolute filesize by hitting the "calc..." button. I prefer the former. I tried putting in 906kbps and ended up being 5MB bigger than the original size, lol. When I looked at the bitrate by looking at the properties from MPC (Media Player Classic), it gave me 1090Kbps. So yeah... I was off. I would try 850kbps as target next time. Sorry, I don't wanna spend more time on doing any more trial-and-error as I don't have an up-to-date CPU.

Next, click OK. Under "More" Quality preset: I chose (User defined) and hit "more..." In the new window pop-up, go to the Quantization tab and enter 2 instead of 1 for the minimum frame quantizers. Hit OK. OK and then Ok. File > Save as... then save as 2ndpass. If you get the desired result, rename it to your desired filename, which should be from the original video.

I'm sorry I don't have the .mkv files and I'm sorry as well that I didn't spend enough time getting to a desired result. My computer is one of the becoming obsolete and it just takes too much time. I've also haven't done this kind of stuff for a couple of years now, so I can't tell you what's what. This one is a reliable site. ALSO, what I've told you is just lowering the quality of the video. I'm not sure whether you wanted to cut/edit out some stuff to sustain as much quality. Shaving off a few seconds can save you a few megabytes.

[Renzoken]

Thanks for the guide thugangel. I tried it on my School rumble file. It got smaller to 233mb. Just a bit odd with the file is that the subs and sound are gone.

Subs i could guess i have to mux it or something. The sound is odd since it give me a error of lacking codec or something even though it was working perfectly fine in the orignal file.

But guess this file is just a bloody pain in the ass. Il just check around a bit on the link you gave me and try to learn a bit more of encoding/recoding.
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[thugangel]

Ah, I forgot about the fact you're working with MKV and didn't think about the subtitles part. Since the MKV may be using a different subtitle file type that AVI couldn't handle, you may have to demux it and convert it to something that AVI can handle and then add it in the stream list. As for the audio issue, I thought the setting for that stream would be on "Direct Copy" instead of "Full processing mode" by default. Coz I don't think VirtualDubMod should have a problem copying directly. Or unless you're getting the error as soon as you open the original file from VirtualDubMod?

And yeah... It looks like you need to lower down the bitrate more if it's in 640x480. If the resolution is higher than that, you're better off resizing the resolution into a smaller one.

[Renzoken]

Original file doesn't give any error and plays fine. So no idea why it happens after... But eitherway i gave up on it already Thanks for your help though.

If you got interested somehow. Here is a link to exact the same file i found. You can check what kind f wicked malice coding has been used on it

BTW you have to use IE to download the files... Doesn't work in FireFox btw... yea you get crappy adds in IE...

Edit:
link removed than ^^

Though i don't see why such link is illegal oO since there is a anime request topic so i thought this wouldn't be a prob either.
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[thugangel]

I believe you're not allowed to post links for such kind of content. You're better off editing your comment and removing the link. Besides, I couldn't find the download link even if it was in IE. Also, I'm not really interested in playing around with it ^_^;