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Size of videos on iPad?

D

Doju

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Jun 16, 2008
1,510
1
I'm wondering whether or not I should go with the 32GB or 64GB iPad.

For videos, if I wanted to display them at the native resolution (re-encoding the resolution) slightly lower than 720p, what would an average movie be? An average, 30 min TV show?

What about at 720p?
 
Well, an iTunes movie at say ~800x350 that goes for one and a half hours, would be roughly 1.5GB, so I'd guess 3GB? Maybe 4GB? I'm not really sure.
 
I'm guessing 3-4GB for a 90-120 minute video/movie.

Right now movies off iTunes are 1.2 GB for HD and 600Mb for SD. iPhone res of 300 some pixels, multiply by three to make the 1024x768 pixels of iPad and you get about 3GB for an HD video.

Like others said above, get the biggest you can if videos are a factor. That is why I got 32GB, which should be enough for a handful of movies plus allowing space for other stuff (music, photos, apps, etc).

16GB you may start with, but real space is prob going to be 13GB, and give it the 2% extra space, and you are left with a bit over 10GB for data. In my opinion, you will have to be very meticulous on what you keep on the iPad and very good at syncing stuff. For traveling, 16GB is not enough for me.
 
Where are you going to source slightly under 720p 4:3 content to encode from?

Basically, a near-DVD quality (852*368 or 852*480 anamorphic encode) h.264 file with the 5.1 surround intact is maybe 600mb per hour. These filles look great on my 100" projector (which is an older, but very high quality 852*480 native resolution DLP unit). (This is based off the HandBrake "universal" setting, which does a great job).

If you do 720p, but keep the aspect ratio (cropping sucks), you'll end up with a 1024*576 file, or there abouts fot 16:9 content (TV) and 1024*432 for 2.35:1 (movies), which is likely in the 900mb per hour range.

Frankly, downscaling a 1080p BD file to 1024*432 isn't going to be worth the hassle. You won't be able to tell the difference between that and a DVD rip on a 10" screen. Upscaling the DVD during encode isn't going to do any good - the iPad will do that automatically and look just as good doing as if you encoded at that res (there's no source pixels to work from over the DVD resolution, so it's all just making pixels up) and if you do that they will just be larger files for no gain, and they won't work on other iPods, which is nice to have for future compatibility and not reencoding all your media for a new device.
 
mrgreen4242 said:
If you do 720p, but keep the aspect ratio (cropping sucks), you'll end up with a 1024*576 file, or there abouts fot 16:9 content (TV) and 1024*432 for 2.35:1 (movies), which is likely in the 900mb per hour range.
Click to expand...

But you could keep 720p at 1280x720, which should look pretty nice when scaled up full screen by the iPad (i.e., cropped at the sides). Granted you loose the sides (I hate pan & scan, too) but all it takes is a double tap to zoom in and out, just like the iPhone/iPod touch.

But I agree that unless you're sourcing off Blu-Ray, there's no point in upscaling a standard NTSC DVD encode beyond 480p. And 480p looks pretty good on my 105" 720p projector, too.
 
GeekLawyer said:
mrgreen4242, that was very helpful. Thank you!
Click to expand...
No problem, glad I could help. I have a pretty huge digital video library at this point, with about 450 movies (maybe 75-100 are short films, the rest feature length) and just under 1000 TV show episodes, mostly DVD rips we've been amassing over the last couple years so I've put quite a bit of time into this.

I used to use a custom HandBrake setting, with all the advanced strings set and stuff, but the jerks over at the HandBrake site have done a great job with the newer presets, and I just use the universal setting now.

xraydoc said:
But you could keep 720p at 1280x720, which should look pretty nice when scaled up full screen by the iPad (i.e., cropped at the sides). Granted you loose the sides (I hate pan & scan, too) but all it takes is a double tap to zoom in and out, just like the iPhone/iPod touch.

But I agree that unless you're sourcing off Blu-Ray, there's no point in upscaling a standard NTSC DVD encode beyond 480p. And 480p looks pretty good on my 105" 720p projector, too.
Click to expand...

You could, and for the 3:2 aspect ratio, 3.5" screen on the iPod touch/iPhone I often do zoom in and crop... but a centered 4:3 crop of a 2.35:1 source is just... wrong. :/ Letterboxing on a 10" isn't as big a deal as on a 3.5".

If you are targeting an iPad and an AppleTV (or similar set top box) only, and ripping from BD, a 720p24 rip is an OK choice (the ATV can have some trouble with 720p30 content, which you run into somewhat often and for that I might go "half-HD", or 540p30).

If you want to share the content around pretty much any modern Apple media player, and/or are ripping from DVD, 480p is fine. Personally, I have ZERO interest in going to BD/720p rips at this point because:
1) won't ever go back to disc media
2) device compatibility
3) storage space
4) rip/encode time
5) 480p is "good enough", especially upscaled (I know it's not HD, but honestly, I just don't care... a bad movie will still be bad at 4k, and a good movie would still be good on a 2.5" iPod classic screen)
 
First, I strongly suggest using the Universal Preset. I don't suggest using the Apple TV preset for DVD-sourced material: Upconverting, to me, is a waste of space. If you encode from an HD source, such as a mkv file or blu-ray rip, then I would suggest using the Universal Preset at 1280x720, or use the Apple TV preset. Universal is what I always use though.

My Blu-Ray rips range in size from 2.25 to 3.75 gigs (encoded with the universal setting @ 1280x720). An hour and a half movie with a 2.35:1 ratio can yield a small file size, thanks to Handbrake cropping off the black bars (most 2.35:1 video is really a 1.78:1 video with black bars encoded on the top and bottom. Handbrake crops these off since they are totally unnecessary). Longer movies, especially 16:9 movies, take up more space. Action films and concerts will need a higher bitrate than a drama (in most cases) and will yield bigger file sizes.

My SD encodes encoded from the Blu-Ray rips are the same size as videos encoded from DVD, but look slightly better, since higher-quality going in = higher quality going out.

My DVD's look great encoded at 720x480 and displayed at 853x480 (for 16:9 content). 2.35:1 content is stored at 720x352 (Since again, the black bars are cropped). For full-screen content (4:3), I drop things down to 640x480.

I too never crop my videos, the only thing I ever do is crop off unnecessary black bars that are encoded as part of the video.

I don't believe I'll be putting much, if any, HD content on my iPad. Maybe one or two of my favorite episodes of Lost or something, but thats about it. The rest of the time I'll use SD content.
 
Those small blue boxes seem to be pretty small to me! :)



But frankly, if you can afford, get the bigger one and have a decent media collection on your iPad! It is so frustrating not to be able to enjoy most of what you have. Having said that, my 8GB iPhone 3G might not be the best basis to illustrate that point. So, if you listen to me, you get the best one that you can simply afford.
 
GermanSuplex said:
F Action films and concerts will need a higher bitrate than a drama (in most cases) and will yield bigger file sizes.
Click to expand...
This is the only non-100% correct thing in your post. It's actually really hard to predict bitrate that the quality based algorithm will use bases on the "type" of movie. For example, a very detailed scene that is mostly static talking heads (think something like a scene from The Darjeerling Limited) will be a higher bitrate than a fight scene from something like the Matrix because the constant quality algorithm uses some form of psychovisual encoding to give higher bitrates to scenes where your eye will search out detail (there's very little movement and a lot of small things going on) and less to places where your eyes will be so bombarded with motion and things happening that you won't see the detail.

It's really counter-intuitive. You can go over to the Handbrake forums and be abused by the people there if you'd like to look into it more. ;)

Also, movies that are really dark are usually smaller regardless of motion. My 2.5 hour Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince rip, with the 5.1, is like 1.25gb or something crazy small like that.
 
Yep. Apple Universal for DVD-sourced material is what I always use on HandBrake. Looks good, preserves the 5.1 digital surround tracks and has manageable file sizes (about 900MB per hour or so). Off DVD it takes about 20 minutes per hour with my 2.66Ghz quad core 2006 Mac Pro.
 
mrgreen4242 said:
This is the only non-100% correct thing in your post. It's actually really hard to predict bitrate that the quality based algorithm will use bases on the "type" of movie. For example, a very detailed scene that is mostly static talking heads (think something like a scene from The Darjeerling Limited) will be a higher bitrate than a fight scene from something like the Matrix because the constant quality algorithm uses some form of psychovisual encoding to give higher bitrates to scenes where your eye will search out detail (there's very little movement and a lot of small things going on) and less to places where your eyes will be so bombarded with motion and things happening that you won't see the detail.

It's really counter-intuitive. You can go over to the Handbrake forums and be abused by the people there if you'd like to look into it more. ;)

Also, movies that are really dark are usually smaller regardless of motion. My 2.5 hour Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince rip, with the 5.1, is like 1.25gb or something crazy small like that.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I know all about the Handbrake forums. I guess a great free encoder is not without consequences.

Thanks for the info. Personally, I've noticed that anytime I encode a concert or movies high in action, I've always gotten a larger overall file size, but I don't necessarily know if the high action scenes or the parts in a concert where there's tons of lights flashing and stuff need a higher bitrate, that's just what I assumed. If that's not the case, then perhaps there are more static scenes which, as you put it, Handbrake thinks people will look for detail for and it jacks up the bitrate.
 
GermanSuplex said:
Yeah, I know all about the Handbrake forums. I guess a great free encoder is not without consequences.

Thanks for the info. Personally, I've noticed that anytime I encode a concert or movies high in action, I've always gotten a larger overall file size, but I don't necessarily know if the high action scenes or the parts in a concert where there's tons of lights flashing and stuff need a higher bitrate, that's just what I assumed. If that's not the case, then perhaps there are more static scenes which, as you put it, Handbrake thinks people will look for detail for and it jacks up the bitrate.
Click to expand...

Ya, it's hard to say what causes different movie to end up larger smaller. One thing is that older films have a lot of grain/noise that makes the encoder THINK there's lot of detail in the frame and it bumps up the bitrate. This is also possible an issue with concerts, depending on the lighting - not just the flashes as you mention which can mess up keyframing, but if the venue is dark and they are shooting with a higher ISO sensitivity there will be more noise.

I mention that because there's 'fix'! In the picture settings, turn on a mild denoise setting for older film transfers or noisy concerts and Handbrake will run a denoise pass over the frame before encoding which smooths out some of the grain and results in a lower bitrate file.

I should export out my movie library details from iTunes and do some analysis on bitrates and genres and stuff, just out of curiosity. :)
 
to mrgreen4242
Thought i wanted to ask the pro ;D

Atm i've ripped (backuped) all my movies, but don't really known how i should compress them.
I'm primary gong to play it on an iPad (64GB) and an Apple TV (160GB, 50" TV) but also on iPhone and iPod Nano 5th gen.
Atm i'm using Universal preset at 60,78% CC - would you recomment an other preset?
I would also like a higher audio quality than the 160kbps AAC(faac), is there any way to get higher audio quality which still would play on the iPad, ATV, iPhone and iPod?
 
Semdk said:
to mrgreen4242
Thought i wanted to ask the pro ;D

Atm i've ripped (backuped) all my movies, but don't really known how i should compress them.
I'm primary gong to play it on an iPad (64GB) and an Apple TV (160GB, 50" TV) but also on iPhone and iPod Nano 5th gen.
Atm i'm using Universal preset at 60,78% CC - would you recomment an other preset?
I would also like a higher audio quality than the 160kbps AAC(faac), is there any way to get higher audio quality which still would play on the iPad, ATV, iPhone and iPod?
Click to expand...

Is 60.78 the default for Universal now (sounds right, but can't recall offhand)? If so, stick with that. Going higher will look better, but it's a case of diminishing returns - you'll get a bigger file for very little improvement. In other words, stick with the most up to date universal setting.

For sound, the Universal will keep the original, un(re)compressed AC3 track and use that for your ATV (your iPod/iPad will use the 160kbit/s AAC DPL track). This is going to be perfectly acceptable. On an iPad/iPod you will be using the crappy built in speaker (making 160kbs overkill) or headphones (making 160 adequate for 99.99% of cases). I think, maybe, you can go higher using a non-Quicktime encoder, but the quality per bit and encode time tends to go down a little, so it just not worth it. For the record, on some movies I have had only a 160kbps DPL2 track and played it back through my surround sound system (entry level Onkyo receiver and speakers) and no one noticed it wasn't 5.1 DVD sound.

Other than that, be sure to check to see if the source is interlaced (way more common than I would have guessed) and use the default decomb filter, NOT the deinterlace filter, on those. Also, look at the preview stills for the movie and if it looks grainy/noisy, remember to try the denoise filter (on the mild/lowest setting - more and it removes to much detail, imo). Lastly, if you are converting already compressed files (downloaded .avi's etc), try out the deblock filter, I think it improves the quality of the end result.

Hope that helps! The new Handbrake builds/presets are very good and make it really easy.
 
The iPhone 3GS with the latest firmware can play Handbrake's Apple TV preset. No doubt the iPad will be able to do the same. I'd forget about the iPad Nano and if it's an older iPhone, you'll upgrade them eventually.

Universal preset on my 42" doesn't look anywhere as good as the Apple TV option.
 
xraydoc said:
Yep. Apple Universal for DVD-sourced material is what I always use on HandBrake. Looks good, preserves the 5.1 digital surround tracks and has manageable file sizes (about 900MB per hour or so). Off DVD it takes about 20 minutes per hour with my 2.66Ghz quad core 2006 Mac Pro.
Click to expand...

Universal is using Baseline and the Apple TV preset is using Main Profile, which not only look a little better, they are more efficient on Bitrate so they are slightly smaller. And the Main Profile is now supported on the Touch, Ipad and the Apple TV. I use that setting for mostly everything.
 
Most of the Encodes Blu Ray or DVD that I have done for my Apple TV Should work on my Ipad, here's the only one's I'm unsure about and that's 4:3 material, there's not much 4:3 stuff we have to worry about but I want to Encode my Star Trek TOS Blu Rays to be able to play them on the Ipad. Now the Ipad supports up to 720p. With 4:3 material 1280 Wide is going to put the Hieght at 960p no good. Going to 1024 actually matches the Ipad's screen Rez but put's the Height at 768, once again too high. Going to 960 seems to be the best I can accomplish as it puts the Height at 720p. Now I want to also use these files on my Apple TV and that should be no issue if I stay with 960x720p. Even if Ipad is forgiving and I can use native Rez 1024x768 not sure those files would play on my ATV. Guess we'll have to play with it, but I'll stay 960x720p on the few eps I encode to get ready fo rthe Ipad's release...
 
Any DVD I feel worth ripping I rip in two ways:

1) Native resolution

2) Device specific which has thus far meant iPhone. These are much smaller file sizes obviously.

When BR ripping gets a little easier I'll do the same.

Ultimately, even if we can't view a 1080p file on a 10" screen, I do believe that we'll be able to output the file as 1080p. So I want to have native rez rips on hand...
 
ciaran00 - I would highly recommend Handbrake regardless of your platform. It's free, easy to use, quality is high and it's pretty much bulletproof.

Best of luck,
Pat
 
anthonymoody said:
Ultimately, even if we can't view a 1080p file on a 10" screen, I do believe that we'll be able to output the file as 1080p. So I want to have native rez rips on hand...
Click to expand...

I think the max video out is something like 576p. I agree though... if it did output 1080p it'd be nice to have the full rez.
 
to mrgreen4242

I tried the AC3 Parsthruu, but it didn't even work on the ATV (it's fully updated), got any idear? I could also just compress on my Mac even though the 1.6 C2D which is much more slower than the 2.66 C2D in my XP, because the mac has a audioformat the windows handbrake dosen't have...

An other thing is the filers..
I tried it but couldn't really see any difference on my UP(2009), the only thing i noticed is that the denoice (medium) made som strange constrast noices in black clolors.
So i think ill stick with the standart preset (ATV)
 
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