h.265 Better Than h.264?

[swoermck]

uuh, kind of shocking ?

What kind of "other processing occuring" could prevent lens correction? 4K 60fps recording? Is this somewhere mentioned in the manual that H.265 could prevent lens correction?

 

[GadgetGuy]

The primary reason for using H.265 on the MA2 is to support 4K @ 60fps. It is required. If you only shoot 4K@ 30fps, you can still get away with H.264.

 

[JohnLietzke]

Compression and memory space is the big advantage to H.265 over H.264. It takes up about about 40% of the space with no quality difference.

H based codec compression is a standard that is adapted rapidly across software platforms with the appropriate hardware capabilities.

The only reason I have to H.264 is because the hardware is not capable of processing the new H.265 codec. I have never see any quality difference at 4K@60 frames on an 85 inch 4K TV.

 

[GadgetGuy]

Compression and memory space is the big advantage to H.265 over H.264. It takes up about about 40% of the space with no quality difference.

H based codec compression is a standard that is adapted rapidly across software platforms with the appropriate hardware capabilities.

The only reason I have to H.264 is because the hardware is not capable of processing the new H.265 codec. I have never see any quality difference at 4K@60 frames on an 85 inch 4K TV.

Unfortunately, Mavic Air 2 is not capable of H.264 at 4K@60fps.
You either have to use H.265, or give up the 4K@60fps and settle for H.264 while shooting 4K@30fps, as 30fps is the highest H.264 frame rate supported in 4K on the MA2.

 

[WithTheBirds]

If you can’t see the difference or have the hardware to support it fair enough. Doesn’t mean it isn’t better.

Get ready for H266- a further 30-50% efficiency improvement and supports 16K.

 

[chris-bin]

Anyone who has issues when editing H.265 or H.264 videos from Mavic, you may try transcoding. A software like DumboFab will helo you out.

 

[Perceivedshift]

If you can’t see the difference or have the hardware to support it fair enough. Doesn’t mean it isn’t better.

Get ready for H266- a further 30-50% efficiency improvement and supports 16K.

If 266 has the same quality as 265 but uses that much less resources....nice.

 

[Rick B.]

Not a big difference in quality between h.264 and h.265...265 has a bit more efficient encoder...meaning less file size for the same media vice h.264...it's purported to have file sizes 50% smaller of the same media shot in h.264 -- not my experience, but there is a decrease in file size. There is a cost in "shrinking" file sizes...it does take more resources to decode h.265...about a 10 to 1 increase in calculations.

All that aside, the average joe/jane sittin' in front of his/her computer won't see a difference...there's no "ahh, that was shot in h.265" moment.

A pretty good web source explaining the difference can be found at: What is the Difference Between H264 and H265? - Castr's Blog.

 

[SethB]

…A pretty good web source explaining the difference can be found at: What is the Difference Between H264 and H265? - Castr's Blog.

Thanks for that link - a pretty good read that tells part of the story. I think what’s missing is a focus on particular applications for creators. Apparently Castr is a streaming services provider, much of the post reflects that context.

For everyone:
As noted above, h.265 becomes required at certain framerates and resolutions. Will it be at 4k-60p, at 5.7k-30p? It depends on the manufacturer, because…

For drone video capture:
Nobody wants to buy expensive high-speed high-capacity storage in a consumer/prosumer drone. Drone/camera manufacturers recognize that this is a market issue, and respond with image processing and encoding that can be stored using the data write speeds of U3 SD/uSD cards.

For example, the Mavic 3 Cine package will lay down high bitrate ProRes Raw capture like 4K-120p or 5.1k-50p… on a card that has a write speed of 471 MB/s (compare to 90 Mb/s on the uSD cards I use)… but the media costs $800 USD for 1TB of storage. There’s a similar story to tell with the Inspire 2.

What h.265 gets you is inexpensive storage, because it supports either a) better quality at a lower bitrate, and/or, b) higher resolution/framerate at the same bitrate as the card you already own can handle. b is what DJI seems to have chosen.

For editing:
For decoding h.265, hardware is required.
A couple years ago you needed a gaming GPU to get the h.265 hardware decoder. Now that chip capability is going in (almost) everything. If your computer doesn’t have hardware decoding h.265 is out of reach unless you create proxy files in another codec that can be decoded. That could be h.264, ProRes 422, DNxHD, etc.

I’m currently working with 360 cameras at up to 11k-30p, which has required an upscale recent GPU. Those are facts of life at about 6k and above. 4k to 6k is a vast gray area of h.264/h.265 overlap, where you may or may not have choices in settings, you may or may not be able to record on a conventional SD/uSD U3 card, you may or may not be able to edit on the computer you have.

My post here reflects my own experience. This isn’t what I’ve read on the internet and recycled to others. Some of these lessons have been expensive of my time and my or my employer’s money.

Your mileage *will* vary. It will change from drone to drone, from setting to setting, from card to card, from computer to computer. Most importantly, it will change with *your own* priorities and sense of quality, aesthetics, and your patience with cumbersome workflows (hello transcoding to proxies!)

Test a few things. If it looks good, it is good.

 

[Rick B.]

Thanks for that link - a pretty good read that tells part of the story. I think what’s missing is a focus on particular applications for creators. Apparently Castr is a streaming services provider, much of the post reflects that context.

For everyone:
As noted above, h.265 becomes required at certain framerates and resolutions. Will it be at 4k-60p, at 5.7k-30p? It depends on the manufacturer, because…

For drone video capture:
Nobody wants to buy expensive high-speed high-capacity storage in a consumer/prosumer drone. Drone/camera manufacturers recognize that this is a market issue, and respond with image processing and encoding that can be stored using the data write speeds of U3 SD/uSD cards.

For example, the Mavic 3 Cine package will lay down high bitrate ProRes Raw capture like 4K-120p or 5.1k-50p… on a card that has a write speed of 471 MB/s (compare to 90 Mb/s on the uSD cards I use)… but the media costs $800 USD for 1TB of storage. There’s a similar story to tell with the Inspire 2.

What h.265 gets you is inexpensive storage, because it supports either a) better quality at a lower bitrate, and/or, b) higher resolution/framerate at the same bitrate as the card you already own can handle. b is what DJI seems to have chosen.

For editing:
For decoding h.265, hardware is required.
A couple years ago you needed a gaming GPU to get the h.265 hardware decoder. Now that chip capability is going in (almost) everything. If your computer doesn’t have hardware decoding h.265 is out of reach unless you create proxy files in another codec that can be decoded. That could be h.264, ProRes 422, DNxHD, etc.

I’m currently working with 360 cameras at up to 11k-30p, which has required an upscale recent GPU. Those are facts of life at about 6k and above. 4k to 6k is a vast gray area of h.264/h.265 overlap, where you may or may not have choices in settings, you may or may not be able to record on a conventional SD/uSD U3 card, you may or may not be able to edit on the computer you have.

My post here reflects my own experience. This isn’t what I’ve read on the internet and recycled to others. Some of these lessons have been expensive of my time and my or my employer’s money.

Your mileage *will* vary. It will change from drone to drone, from setting to setting, from card to card, from computer to computer. Most importantly, it will change with *your own* priorities and sense of quality, aesthetics, and your patience with cumbersome workflows (hello transcoding to proxies!)

Test a few things. If it looks good, it is good.

Encoding/decoding, like most things in life, is the calculus of what do I need, what do I want, what can I get, and what can I afford...lol