Handbrake Tech terms & How-To

Handbrake

Tech Terms

Video Tab, Quality
Constant Quality (RF) vs Average Bitrate (kbps) – These have the largest impact on quality & file size. Move the Constant Quality RF slider far enough to the right (or use a high enough Average Bitrate) and the video will be large, and look indistinguishable from your source. Moving the slider to the extreme left (or using a low enough Average Bitrate), and you can get really small file sizes, but something looking pretty ugly. Most people aim for something in between.

Constant Quality – Usually this is the preferred method. This targets a certain level of quality throughout your video(s). The advantage to Constant Quality is that your videos all tend to look consistent. The downside is that you don’t know how large each video will be until the end.

RF – Sliding to the right (lower numbers) lead to better quality. Sliding to the left (higher numbers) result in lower quality, but lower file sizes too. If you’ve never used Constant Quality before, normally RF:20 is considered as a starting point for DVD encodes (and RF:22 for BluRay). Most people experiment to find an RF value that looks good enough to them at a file size they can handle, and use that RF value most of the time, deviating slightly when need be.

Average Bitrate – Using this and a calculator, you can aim for a specific file size given a certain video length. Helpful if you wanted each of your movies to be exactly 700MB for example. Advantage to Average Bitrate is that you can effectively pre-determine your file size. The downside is that after you finish encoding, you might find out that the file size you chose wasn’t high enough, and your video looks like junk. Or maybe the file size was higher than it needed to be. 2 pass encoding when using this option used to be strongly recommended, but it’s generally not thought to be as important anymore unless you need a precise file size (“turbo” first pass is okay if you don’t mind losing a little precision in size).

Average bitrate isn't “bad”, it’s just not consistent when it comes to visual quality – it’s only consistent when it comes to file size.

kbps – The higher this is, the larger the file will be (and thus, the higher the quality). Online bitrate calculators are the easiest way to do this.

Video Tab, Video
Video Codec (x264 Preset) – As mentioned above, this has a different effect depending on whether you went with Constant Quality, or Average Bitrate.

If you went with Constant Quality, your quality has already been “decided”. Changing this won’t substantially affect the quality any further (if you wanted higher quality, move the RF slider more to the right). Using the 7 slowest settings will find ways to fit that quality into a lower file size. Using the 2 fastest settings will result in a larger file size. Either way, it should look about the same. Note that the 3rd setting (very fast) behaves very oddly with Constant Quality and I suggest you avoid using it. If you want more detail about the RF value and CQ, I’ve got a separate writeup to help clarify all of that (with charts) at Handbrake RF + slower speeds = craziness.

If you went with Average Bitrate, your file size has already been “decided”. Changing this won’t affect the file size any further. Going with slower settings here will try to pack more quality into that file size you’ve chosen. Going with faster settings here will result in less quality.

Video Codec – H.264 (x264) vs MPEG-4 vs MPEG-2 (vs H.265/x265 vs VP8 in v0.10) – H.264 is probably the reason you’re using Handbrake to begin with. It’s the newest codec offered, results in high quality at low file sizes, and is supported by virtually every recent device out there.

Frame Rate (FPS) – 1080p/24 is a resolution and frame rate indicative of Hollywood movies on Blu-ray discs. 1080p is the resolution, implying a full HD resolution of 1,920 by 1,080 pixels. The "P" stands for "Progressive." which means each frame has all the pixels listed. This is the opposite of "i" or "interlaced" which shows half the horizontal lines each frame. The 24 is the number of frames per second in the video. The most common framerate for video is 60, or 60 Hz, which is 60 frames per second. 24 is how many frames nearly all Hollywood movies are shot at.

Video Tab, Optimize Video
This is where the time trade-off comes into play. The Veryslow preset is about the most hard-core anyone should typically get, and it can take a long time even on a quick machine. This is one of those areas where you’ll have to experiment on your machine and find something reasonable.

Keep in mind that there are diminishing returns as you get slower. Compared to “Veryslow”, the “Placebo” setting takes forever and a day. At the very least, it’ll usually add a few hours, if not days, depending on your source and computer. Even worse, you might not even notice the visual difference (it’s called “Placebo” for a reason). On the other hand, the difference between “Ultrafast” and “Medium” (skipping Superfast, Veryfast, Faster, and Fast) might only be a few minutes and will often give a quite noticeable difference.

Encoder Tune – In general, these focus on shifting “bits” between detailed & flat areas, depending on the setting. To be honest, you don’t have to really understand what they do – other people have done the grunt work figuring them out, so they’re whittled down to pretty simple “one size fits all” settings.

None – This is like the “old” Handbrake presets. Nothing inherently wrong with it. It’s something of a middle-road setting.

Film – For TV/Movies/Film and 3D animation (Pixar movies for example)

Animation – For 2D animation (Mikey Mouse, Simpsons, etc)

Grain – For very grainy movies/shows. For example, movies like 300 or Saving Private Ryan (the beach scene). Note that this tries to KEEP the grain, which uses a boatload of bitrate, and tends to result in higher file sizes when using Constant Quality (if you’re using Avg Bitrate, make sure you’re using a high bitrate, or overall quality will suffer).

Still Image – For still images (slide show/pictures).

PSNR/SSIM –  Generally for testing/comparative purposes. These stand for “peak signal to noise ratio” and “structural similarity”. x264 has some enhancements that improve the image as you would see it (robbing “detail” from places you wouldn’t notice it anyway, and putting that detail where you would notice it). These settings disable those, so that the image is more “technically” correct so that a computer can compare the video with the source to see how accurate/identical it is.

Zero Latency – Meant for fast encoding with quick streaming.

Short version: Film, Animation, and Grain are what you probably want to use most of the time (perhaps “None” as well). The others are for pretty edge cases that most people don’t have to worry about.

Fast Decode (checkbox) – Usually you do *not* want this checked. A few exceptions:
- Check it if you’re trying to play your videos on an older computer that struggles to decode H264.
- Check it if playing videos on an older device that struggles to decode H264.
- You could optionally check it if uploading to YouTube or other video-sharing sites. It may make it quicker for the site to decode it and put your video up. It’s usually not necessary.

Fast Decode disables a few H264/x264 optimizations, making it easier to play but at the expense of a larger file (or lower quality if using an average bit rate). Since most recent computers/devices have built-in hardware support for these optimizations, you usually don’t need to bother with it. If you find that playback on your favorite device is choppy, try checking this, though.

H.264 Profile & H.264 Level – This is where things can get a little tricky. Higher profiles & levels tend to get you better compression (so better quality in a given file size). However, you’re going to be limited by the profile support of the hardware devices you’re planning to play your videos on. Here’s the order of things:

Encoder Level – Baseline -> Main -> High >> 1.0 -> 1b -> 1.1 -> 1.2 -> ……. -> 5.1 -> 5.2 (this one’s easy enough to figure out). Currently, High Profile, Level 4.1 is the most popular profile on recent/cutting edge devices. Such a device will also play Baseline/Main, and any level between 1.0-4.0. The industry’s stagnated at Level 4.1 for a couple years, probably because it’s at the point where it’s “good enough” until H265 starts taking over.

BluRay devices (those which will read from a USB hard drive for example) should normally support High/Level 4.1, but are often somewhat picky and have a tendency to complain about being “too complex”. I haven’t actually bothered to try determining the exact cause, but if you run into this issue, you can try entering bluray-compat=1 in the “Extra Options” window (note that your file size may increase somewhat). If that doesn’t work, try Main profile or a lower level.

Picture Tab, Size
Anamorphic – Unless you’re doing some manual resizing, you’re usually best to use “None”. I can’t think of a lot of reasons to use “Loose” unless you’re resizing the video resolution (loose makes it fairly easy). “Custom” is beyond the scope of this write-up, but allows you to do a bit of manipulation, including changing the aspect ratio if you have a desire to smush/stretch things. Don’t use “None” unless you know what you’re doing.

Cropping – Use Automatic. That way, it won’t waste space trying to save any black bars (your device will add black bars if necessary). On the other hand, if you want black bars manually saved as part of the video stream, feel free to set it to “none” and change the values to all 0s.
Hitting the “Preview” button is usually a good idea if you’re trying to tweak here.

Filters Tab, Filters
Detelecine – Setting to “Off” is a good idea. If your source is telecined, it’ll detelecine automatically. If it’s not, it won’t. Set-and-forget.

Decomb – Setting to “Off” is a good idea here, too. If your source is interlaced, it’ll automatically deinterlace it. If not, it won't. Just like the above. Set-and-forget. You normally don’t want to use “Deinterlace” unless Decomb is giving you problems or you have one of those oddball situations where you want to manually set it for some other reason.

Denoise – Usually, keep this Off. A couple exceptions:
- Turn it on if you have noise/grain in your source you want to get rid of.
- Turn it on if you want to reduce your file size slightly (or improve overall quality) at the expense of softening your image some.
- Turn it on and use a CUSTOM value if you’re trying to get rid of “dancing dots”.

Deblock – Off. It’s supposed to get rid of blockiness but in my experience it ends up blurring everything a crazy amount that makes the video hard to watch. On the plus side, it pretty much destroys noise/grain in the process.

For Audio Settings, Subtitles, and Advanced Settings, nothing’s really changed so rather than re-write it all, I suggest reading the old writeup for version 0.9.6 if you need further details on those options.


Video Compression - Step-by-Step Handbrake Tutorial
This tutorial assumes you have an HD video file that is 1920x1080 pixels.
Encoding Blu-Rays: after about 25% progress your file will be about 1/4 its final size.

Video Tab
1)   Open Handbrake from your Applications or Programs folder.
2)   Source – Load your video file. A browse window should have automatically opened for you to select your source video file, if not click Open Source button.
3)   Select the file you want to compress and click Open.
4)   Destination – Select where you want the transcoded video file to be saved by clicking Browse...
5)   Give the file an appropriate name such as “(Original-Filename)-H264.mp4” so you know which version is the one you have compressed. Choose where you want to save it, and click Save.
6)   Output Settings – Choose Container MKV.
7)   Video Codec – Choose H.264 (x264).
8)   Presets – Choose High Profile from the Presets Drawer on the right (if this isn't open, you can open it from Window > Presets Drawer in the top menu bar).
9)   Frame Rate (FPS) – Choose the frame rate depending on your source video. For Blu-Rays it is 24fps. Tick the Constant Framerate radio button to ensure better compatibility.
10) Quality – Select Constant Quality. This targets a certain level of quality throughout your video(s). The advantage to Constant Quality is that your videos all tend to look consistent. The downside is that you don’t know how large each video will be until the end.
11) RF – If you went with Constant Quality, your quality has already been “decided”. For Blu-Rays select 22 or 23 (If using 23 the video size is too large, go back to 22). Details: This is where the time trade-off comes into play. Speed wise you are using the 'Very slow' encoder preset, if you want a faster encode, you’ll need to adjust this to a faster setting, but this will come at a trade off of quality and/or size.
12) Encoder Tune –  Select None.
13) Encoder Profile – Select Auto. Short version: The other settings are for pretty edge cases that most people don’t have to worry about. … Speed, Quality, Size pick 2 of them (?!)
14) Fast Decode (checkbox) – Don’t select Fast Decode.
15) Encoder Level – Select 4 or 4.1. If 4.1 seems to create a problem, try entering bluray-compat=1 in the “Extra Options” window (note that your file size may increase somewhat). If that doesn’t work, try Main profile or a lower level.

Picture Tab
Click the Picture settings tab, which opens a new dialog box where we can change the video frame size or resolution.
16) Stepper Width & Height – Keep at 1920x 1072.
17) Tick Keep Aspect Ratio.
18) Anamorphic – Select None.
19) Modulus – Select 16.

Audio Tab
20) Codec – Select AAC (avcodec), Bitrate, 256kbps.
21) Mixdown –  Choose Stereo.

FiltersTab
22) Detelecine, Deinterlace and Denoise – Set all to Off.  If the picture isn’t "noisy", leaving Denoise "Off" is faster, but some sources will be a lot smaller if you use a Denoise filter... at the cost of speed (sometimes a LOT on low-capability CPUs.
23) Deblock – Leave in Off position.
24) Hit the Start Encode button and wait until your video has finished encoding. Handbrake will let you know when it has finished.
25) Open your video file in MPC or another video player and check it looks good. Check periods of intense motion more carefully to make sure you don’t have too many compression artefacts. If the file doesn't look good enough, try doing it again with a higher bitrate.
26) Presets – If you like the settings you are using, save them as a preset by clicking the + sign in the bottom right of the Presets Drawer.