H.264 or H.265?

[Donnie Frank]

I know most computers struggle with H.265 but is it a better format to shoot in for “future proofing”? Is there any benefit to shooting H.265? This is for shooting 4k on the Mini 3 Pro

I'm going to side with brett8883 on this one. If you want to future-proof your footage, shoot H.265. There are a couple points worth mentioning.

1) Naturally, due to more efficient compression, H.265 files are a good deal smaller than H.264. This isn't a big deal if you're only shooting a couple of gigabytes of footage. But if you're shooting roughly 10TB/year like I am, those savings ARE a HUGE deal.

2) You can always transcode to H.264 if you wish. I do this all the time. I record H.265 4K but deliver H.264 1080p (or as low as 480p in some instances). H.264 is still ubiquitous and I know it will play on even the most marginal machine, so that's the delivery container I choose.

3) Yes, machines struggled with H.265 a few years ago, but that has changed. And I believe this is due to codec changes in the H.265 space. The reason I say this is because even my TV can play H.265 files now. The same TV could NOT play H.265 videos just 2 years ago. So something has changed with the codec, I believe. And even my 10-year-old HP envy plays H.265 files with no problem using K-Lite player. So now all I do is H.265.

In a nutshell, even if you're not recording 10-bit, H.265 is a better codec that will play on pretty much any machine (see my examples above). I made the jump (full commitment to H.265) about 6 months ago.

D

 

[retiredNH]

H.265 and DaVinci work just fine for me. What I was alluding to is that DaVinci is a resource hog compared to Adobe, Lightworks, Filmora etc. DaVinci 18 is a big improvement over v17 and v16 but still falls behind the rest in terms of speed. It was so bad I quit using it for a while, but am back to editing with v18.


Cheers!

Are you using the free or paid version? Once I upgraded to the paid version, I found the speed increased dramatically, because only paid (at least when I upgraded about 20 months ago...) uses gpu acceleration.

 

[baddog]

I know most computers struggle with H.265 but is it a better format to shoot in for “future proofing”? Is there any benefit to shooting H.265? This is for shooting 4k on the Mini 3 Pro

H.265 give you a lot more latitude in post production. Then you can export out for YouTube and FB in H.264. If your output requires more, then export to H.265 and adjust as needed. I work with proxy video when editing, so i don't have to deal with scrubbing adn preview issues.

 

[Yanlisman]

My Air 2S defaults to H265 in D-log yet the Mini3 allows either H264 or H265 for D-cinelike.

I cannot open the Mini3 H264 D-cinelike to edit (can view in VLC though) on Win 10.

Why no choice in Air 2S but options (and hence posible wrong choice) in mini 3?

 

[brett8883]

My Air 2S defaults to H265 in D-log yet the Mini3 allows either H264 or H265 for D-cinelike.

I cannot open the Mini3 H264 D-cinelike to edit (can view in VLC though) on Win 10.

Why no choice in Air 2S but options (and hence posible wrong choice) in mini 3?

My guess is it comes back to the fact that h264 doesn’t usually support 10 bit video. H264 can support 10 bit but it’s unusual and so some programs may not support it.

D-log is a log profile and log profiles increases the dynamic range by exploiting the 10 bit code values and thus log is more or less reliant on 10 bit to do what it’s designed to do. 8 bit log essentially defeats the purpose of using log and always looks like . Since h265 supports 10 bit easily but h264 doesn’t this could be an explanation as to why DJI only allows d-log in h265.

D-cinelike on the other hand is not a log profile and so can be 8 or 10 bit without defeating the purpose. I don’t have a mini 3 so can’t tell you forsure but my guess is D-cinelike h265 is 10 bit and D-cinelike h264 is 8 bit. Or both are 10 bit and since 10 bit h264 is so unusual could explain why you can’t play h264 D-Cinelike in some players. I can’t be sure which way is correct without having an original file

 

[Lister]

This might be common knowledge, but I thought I’d mention anyway:

If you’re having trouble with choppiness in h.265 (really any) high-res footage in Davinci Resolve, double-check that you are using proxies. You’ll need to first generate proxies for your clips, then set the timeline to use the 1/2 or 1/4 size proxies during editing. Makes a huge difference. There are some other optimizations, too, involving fusion (generally titles, in my case), color grading, etc. where the footage can be pre-processed and made more smooth during editing. I’m not at my real computer at the moment, and I can’t remember the exact menu items, sorry.

(I know this trick, obviously, and I still forget from time to time and eventually start wondering why my editing experience is so choppy on my 2018 MacBook Pro — then it hits me ).

Once you’ve exported your project to final, you can delete the proxies and other optimized/cached stuff, because they do take up space. Again, can’t remember the exact menu item, but it’s there. You can also just delete the related directory later.

“generate optimized media”

also select “use optimized media if available”

The resolve reference manual covers this.

 

[moldorf]

Are you using the free or paid version? Once I upgraded to the paid version, I found the speed increased dramatically, because only paid (at least when I upgraded about 20 months ago...) uses gpu acceleration.

that's what I thought and I have Resolve 17

if I render to h264 it renders with CPU and memory. However, if I render to h265, Resolve uses 20-30% CPU and 25-35% GPU. It seems to balance resource use

 

[Lister]

If you choose h.265 on the Mini 3, is it automatically ten bit?'
I just shot some h.265 and MediaInfo says it's only eight bit.

 

[brett8883]

If you choose h.265 on the Mini 3, is it automatically ten bit?'
I just shot some h.265 and MediaInfo says it's only eight bit.

My understanding is it has to be D-cinelike

 

[Lister]

Thanks, Brett. I thought I WAS shooting D-Cinelike. I'll check.