[FFmpeg-user] Converting numerous files to h264

[neoculture23]

On 10 November 2012 17:13, Francois Visagie <francois.visagie at gmail.com>wrote:

> Hi,
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: ffmpeg-user-bounces at ffmpeg.org [mailto:ffmpeg-user-
> > bounces at ffmpeg.org] On Behalf Of neoculture23
> > Sent: 10 November 2012 06:24
> > To: ffmpeg-user at ffmpeg.org
> > Subject: [FFmpeg-user] Converting numerous files to h264
> >
>
...

> > The command line I am currently looking at using is:
> >
> > ffmpeg -i old_file.<ext> -c:a copy -c:s copy -c:d copy -c:t copy -c:v
> > libx264 -preset slower old_file.mkv
> >
>
>
> For two-pass encoding you need to run the command line twice. IIRC once
> with
> '-pass 1' and once more with '-pass 2'.
>
> Regarding quality, you can definitely look at video bitrate. See what is
> implied/specified by 'libx264 -preset slower', perhaps decide on a
> different
> bitrate and then specify that with '-b:v'.
>

Hi Francois, thanks for the reply.

I know nothing about video encoding except in the most generic sense. I
wouldn't know a decent bitrate if it danced into my room one evening,
playing the kazoo and singing "I am a decent bitrate".  ^_^

I am not looking for the perfect bitrate/compression, but rather for a set
of parameters which will work for most of my files with minimal loss of
quality.