h265/HEVC v AV1 masters fight

doublevr What's the point of this? The bitrate is high enough that both masters are going to look good regardless of the codec choice. Are you wanting us to compare the masters or the transcoded versions?

Yeah I don't get it either. The av1 max has a larger file size (so bitrate) then h265. Since AV1 has better compression it should look better unless something got screwed up.

Then there is the h265 original but I thought you recorded in av1 now right, so shouldn't there be a AV1 original?

fenderwq Then there is the h265 original but I thought you recorded in av1 now right, so shouldn't there be a AV1 original?

The camera doesn't output AV1. The master/original files are the output from post production.

doublevr You will continue to publish HEVC for all your homemade SLR videos and for all your user's subscriptions ?

I don't see Master AV1 Videos. Are we comparing Master HEVC to Low Bit Rate AV1?

Hello,
If you make both versions from now on, would it be possible to create only one video card?
For those who download (like me), and don't pay attention to the first version that came out a week earlier, it's a lost download slot.
Back when downloads were unlimited, no problem, but now, sometimes, it can be a little tense to lose a slot on such a silly thing.

fenderwq Pretty sure he wants us to compare HEVC master vs AV1 streaming, since SLR's whole argument is that AV1 is such an efficient codec that you don't need higher bitrates and it's all placebo anyways. Any other comparison is pointless and doesn't address people's arguments (AV1 master vs HEVC master because both will look good apart from color grading issues, maybe not even possible since people recently complained that AV1 masters aren't even live yet even when buying scenes; AV1 streaming vs HEVC streaming because even if AV1 was more efficient and looked better at 30mbit/s, it doesn't address complaints that regardless of codec the bitrate is too low).

When the bitrates are similar the quality is similar. AV1 vs x265 does not matter much quality wise.

When it comes to VR video encoding, it does not matter which Codec you choose out of the two (HEVC or AV1) in terms of video quality. At same bitrate, both provide IDINTICAL visual quality. Period.

The ONLY advantage of AV1 is SLIGHTLY smaller file size when encoding 8K+ resolutions which is what should be used for VR Videos in this day and age.

So, even that advantage is not worth it IMHO with all the time AV1 encoding it takes vs HEVC.

And no, better Color grading for AV1 Videos doesn't mean they are better in visual quality. You can adjust the same color grade for the HEVC video, and they we'll look identical.

When I compare, I don't look for the better color, I look for the better pixel. And at same bitrate, both are identical as I said.

Sorry, this whole HEVC vs AV1 is meaningless. And if you guys want to be sure about this, just encode your own VR videos at 8K resolutions in both HEVC and AV1 at same bitrate and same color grade and you'll see NOTHING difference between the two either you look at them and zooming on a 4K PC monitor or on a high resolution VR headset.

That's what I did multiple times, and these were the end results every time.

phiber Even HEVC master vs AV1 streaming is a pointless comparison. AV1 is around 20% more efficient than HEVC at best. The HEVC master here has something like 9x the bitrate of the AV1 streaming version, so obviously it's going to be much higher quality.

VRXVR When it comes to VR video encoding, it does not matter which Codec you choose out of the two (HEVC or AV1) in terms of video quality. At same bitrate, both provide IDINTICAL visual quality. Period.

That's straight up wrong. AV1, when encoded with appropriate parameters, has better compression efficiency than HEVC and can therefore achieve higher visual quality at the same bitrate. Whether that additional quality is perceptible or not depends on a multitude of other factors.

Clearly not a question of HEVC or AV1... it's the bitrate that you provided in these last slr videos... I dont care if its AV1 or HEVC or H265... having 30 mb bitrates makes the video less smooth... if your testing people dont see that, then they dont watch videos when they test. Or they dont wanna see because you want to profit from selling high bitrate videos... If you dont make an acceptable choice of bitrate (at least 60mb) to run the video smoothly, then your videos will lack image quality and smooth thats so important in VR. If you follow this way of having only 30 mb bitrate of your videos company, I will GTFO (term and suggestion kindly used on other post) when my subscription is over as I see no point of being here if you dont provide the best quality has you always did in the past.

Playing AV1 files maxes out the thermals on my (mobile) 3080 and CPU, while the HEVC files play like a cold breeze.

Hairsational Yes, that's right and we all know that "theoretically", This is why I started my statement with "When it comes to VR video encoding" then specifically expanded on the 8K+ resolution videos.

What I meant is, in real life implementations (encoding and observing) you MOSTLY can't see the difference between the two at same 8K+ resolution at same bitrate, with your perfect vision and high resolution headset.

At least, that was my case. And this is why I encouraged everyone to do the same tests using 8K+ resolutions at same bitrate at same color grade and see for themselves.

People still treat the AV1 specs as the judging factor for their 8K+ VR Videos arguments which is not always accurate.

I know it's confusing as many of us tend to rely on spec numbers and so on when compare. But VR Video format is a totally different beast, especially when observing with a VR headset, which is the way to go of course and thus can throw any specs and numbers out of the window.

In other words, as you said, what's the point of a higher quality if you can't see it with your perfect vision using high resolution headset? Yes, it's there, but it's out of our human eyes distinguish capabilities.

There is a "threshold" for our human eyes when it comes to visual quality, even with perfect vision.

If we don't have this vision limitation, All of us should rage about demanding the VR Camera RAW files themselves which would be hilarious.

And that's my whole point and I hope I cleared it out this time.

Best Regards.

LickLock That's correct. even on my PC (RTX 4080) Because AV1 is more taxing on hardware compared to HEVC.

VRXVR Hey Why 4080 can't run av1 soothly they said av1 is more efficient，what exactly the positive effect does the av1 bring?

The AVP can't even play those HBR AV1 files since it doesn't have a AV1 decoder onboard.

nimendie It's a bit more encoding efficient, so resulting in 10-20% smaller files. Or at the same file size, in slightly better quality. It's way more processing intensive though. And I was surprised to find that I actually thought that the HVEC examples at low bitrate that were posted, were better than the AV1 samples. At least I could distguish a bit more detail.