TMPGEnc Tips & Tricks

TMPGEnc is one of the most versatile programs to encode AVI's to MPEG's. It has a wide array of settings that can be changed to influence the final result. Best of all it is Freeware. Downside of the program is that it does not include a manual. For basic operation this is not much of a problem because it is pretty straightforward. However, when you start checking out all the menu's and settings, it is not always clear what they do and what they are used for. This article is not meant to be a complete manual for TMPGEnc but it gives you some tips and tricks on what you can do with the program and how you can do it.

1. Encoding Quality
2. Using templates
3. Batch encoding
4. Cutting and pasting MPEG's
5. Multiplexing and de-multiplexing
6. Problems reading AVI's
7. MPEG-2 encoding limit

1. Encoding Quality

Many people have asked me questions about quality of MPEG encoded video. Of course there is the normal quality dependency on whether MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 is being used and the applied bitrate. But there even can be a quality difference between two MPEG's with the same bitrate encoded from the same source material. The issue is that encoding can be done using all kinds of different algorithms. Certain algorithms are better for low static video with a low level of detail and others are better for video with a lot of movement and lots of detail. The best encoder is the one that analyzes every frame (and actually a series of frames) in detail and then adapts its way of encoding it to that analysis. Unfortunately the encoding process takes an enormous amount of processing, so compromises have to be made between quality and the time it takes to do the encoding. One of the nicest things of TMPGEnc is that you can influence the quality by changing all kinds of settings. Below I have listed a number of settings that you can use to improve your quality.

Motion Precision Search

The most obvious setting to influence quality can be found on the first tab of the Setting menu: Motion search precision. It suggests that you can make your own compromise between quality and encoding speed and that is what it does.

However, I have received reports from users who claim that they do not see quality differences between the different settings or they even have better results with some of the lower quality settings than with higher quality settings. My personal choice here is always High Quality (Slow).

Block noise and other artifacts

One of the most disturbing artifacts in MPEG video is what people generally refer to as blockiness. It is the phenomenon that the image seems to be built up out of small squares. Specially if you use MPEG-1 for VCD this can be very noticeable. A very well known example when this occurs is on scenes with flowing water or a water surface with small ripples. One of the tools that can be used to decrease that effect can be found on the Quantize Matrix tab called Reduce block noise. It definitely works but it will also result in loss of some detail. You can refine it by changing settings for Intra block noise and Non-intra block noise at the bottom of the tab.

Another usefull setting on this tab is Use floating point DCT. For the mathematicians among our readers: DCT is the Discrete Cosine Transformation, a matrix calculation used while calculating the MPEG. If this option is enabled the calculation will be done with larger precision yielding a general improvement in picture quality. Downside is that it takes more time so it will increase the encoding time.

The last one that I want to mention from this tab is No motion search for still picture.... This option will reduce blur around non moving objects with sharp edges. This is very usefull for scenes with a title superimposed on the video. However, if such object makes small movements, the result will be worse than when this option is not used at all.

Filters to improve quality