AV1 Is Now Live on SexLikeReal!

doublevr That's applied to all subscriptions, including the lifetime?

doublevr Alright, if the AV1 is really that high of a cost in terms of time and processing and that's the reason you're charging for it individually now, then, please, get back to HEVC and make it part of our subscription.

I don't think anyone is interested in a slightly higher quality original video if it cost them more, including high quality enthusiasts like me.

Please get back to the previous subscription plans. They were and still good for everyone, including SLR itself.

doublevr

eh what? I have to echo @VRXVR & @onyxone & @SchnuppiLilac sentiments and concern. You're gonna take away our access to the full quality 8k original downloads? From all studios or just SLRO? (If it's just SLRO then... ok... much less of a big deal . Because I do appreciate the visual quality SLRO manages to pack into the efficient files. But if it's site-wide from all creators, then alarm bells are ringing, so please take my concern all the more seriously!):

I've experimented with some ffmpeg myself and found that for video in the 120-200Mbps range, I could convert them to around 50-80Mbps depending on the video, using slow preset and crf 18. Then have my 3080 render them for my Q3 - this yields a definitely higher quality experience than watching the seemingly 30Mbps-capped vids, but obviously takes up much less space than the raw 120-200Mbps files. (fwiw if the studio's original file is less than 80Mbps or so, I may not bother doing a conversion at all)

Like, I genuinely admire how y'all have managed to push streaming quality as high as it can get within the 30Mbps range ️. But it's still good to have the ability to access higher bitrate than that with our subscription if we wanted sometimes! I'd like to be able to continue tinkering in the way I described above.

Getting surprised by downgrades periodically is certainly crummy - so if this is a full cutoff and not just SLRO, please reconsider. I'm not even one to argue against reasonable limits/compromises, such as the 30 files per 144 hours - that kind of thing makes sense. If I can conjure up an example of a new potential reasonable compromise: let's say we didn't have access to the full size original video anymore, but we did have the AV1 download option be at a higher cap than the 30Mbps used for streaming, that could certainly be agreeable. Say, if the downloadable file were 50-60Mbps AV1, which in my experience is very roughly comparable to 70Mbps h265 or 100Mbps h264, I could vibe with that! (no pun intended as I don't have a haptic device )

Furthermore, another thing I have tinkered with is AI interpolation to triple frame rate with really good quality results. Of course to do this, it's desirable to start with the highest bitrate original available, rather than a compressed file. I was contemplating doing some more of these transcodes, editing together top quality slow motion clips, and then seeing what it would take to become an uploader here. My fingers are crossed for confirmation that other studios' raw/full/original files will not be gated off . Because without those starting points for my editing tests, this potential side project will lose all steam and nothing will come of it.

nogarapamerT
Just a note. NVENC Encoder is trash and destroys quality. It's great for real time encoding but not for maintaining quality. The only way to maintain quality from the HBR files is to use the CPU encoder.

nogarapamerT They've indicated several times before that a high quality download option without the ludicrous bitrate isn't going to happen, so I don't think anything is going to change there.

Funnily enough they also promised that original downloads weren't going anywhere, but now they are taking them away from premium subscribers and slapping an additional fee on them. Must be making bank off scripts and figured they could charge extra for original quality downloads too? There's a repeating pattern of subscriber benefits being reduced or removed so you have to wonder what's next to go. No doubt downloads will disappear entirely at some stage, but it's probably too soon for that right now.

doublevr
This is a terrible precedent you guys are setting.

1. Moving Forward, if subscribers want Original High Bit Rate Files, they have to pay $7 for each of them individually? Is this correct?
2. Will other Studios be following suit? Will VRSpy/VRHush/RealJamVR also implement something like this in the near future?

Well the thing is that you're now lowering the baseline. Previously the original bitrates were included in the plan, now they are not anymore.

I fully understand that if costs are going up, you will need to increase revenue one way or another. But again, it's much more fair if you don't do that by lowering the product quality, but find other ways. Anyway just my 2 cents.

doublevr

So what's the plan now?

1. HBR only available for PPV?
2. Old SLR Originals will still have HBR?
3. Other Studios following suit?

Wow. So, I can't have access to the high-quality videos that brought me to SLR in the first place by being a member? There isn't even an option to upgrade my plan. And I don't understand why you think encoding a video file will do anything other than reduce the quality and size. AV1 might be great for your bandwidth costs, but any encoding is just removing pixels from the end product.

There's zero mention on individual pages of what resolution is underneath the "Buy" option. What a disaster. I hope you reconsider. Not sure why folks would choose to subscribe if the quality is dropping to that of inferior studios as a subscriber.

If bandwidth is killing you, then implement something like you did with scripts where subscribers can only download X number of original bitrate videos per month. I have zero interest in subscribing to a site that only offers inferior quality to their subscribers, our eyes notice the difference, and we're trying to recreate reality here.

Removing original bitrate and putting it behind a paywall is a slap in the face to paying members

Let people pay extra for AV1 encodes. If they are as good as you claim then they will sell!

Next on the chopping block is gonna be download limits for the hundredth time

petex67 Correct, I don't use real time encoding if I want to save space, I only mentioned GPU for crisp playback over link cable. When I mentioned creating my own ~65MBps files (imo a good middle ground spot for 8k) that were closer in quality to the 120-200Mbps files, that's on my 7950, which can luckily do that for a vid overnight instead of over half a week. Have some screenshots if people are interested, but holding off for now as I don't know if this is the best thread for it. I could revive a much older thread, or make a new one, but who knows if it really even matters.

Also, on a different note, still waiting for confirmation from any staff that this change will only happen for SLRO, or will it be site-wide?? To reiterate, from what I've seen with the image quality (which I have praised) of specifically SLRO greyscreen videos, I am the least concerned. Through the work at all stages y'all have done with both scene setup, and camera and editing settings/optimizations, you've made it so 30Mbps is pretty darn crisp, and the gap from raw quality is the smallest. But across the many other studios the range is much more broad, thus plenty of those videos are better viewed using the large download file, which often won't have as many artefacts or blocky splotches as the streaming file!

@2Jqt8XuAkwr To bounce off one idea you had, a tighter limit on original high bitrate videos, but still having them be accessible to subscribers, is also the kind of compromise I could get on board with. As in, from the 30 dl per 144 hr, maybe the yuge files count as 2-3 ticks off that counter. Anyone that runs out could always do ppv after that if they're impatient.

So now we have to pay for "original quality" downloads?

They were only reason i was subscriber, after 6 years i guess this is the end of my journey with SLR, after my yearly plan expires I'm out.