WebM, H264: Encoder Speed Benchmark
Linked by Brooss on Tue 15th Mar 2011 23:32 UTC
Benchmarks A comment on the recent article about the Bali release of Googles WebM tools (libvpx) claimed that one of the biggest problems facing the adoption of WebM video was the slow speed of the encoder as compared to x264. This article sets out to benchmark the encoder against x264 to see if this is indeed true and if so, how significant the speed difference really is.
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RE[3]: WebM vs H.264 benchmark
by lemur2 on Wed 16th Mar 2011 12:53 UTC in reply to "RE[2]: WebM vs H.264 benchmark"
lemur2
Member since:
2007-02-17

"The most recent release of the libvpx reference code for WebM is 12.8% better quality than the version shown in the graphs plotted in June 2010 at compression.ru.

Hope this helps.


No, it doesn't. Percentages do not say anything about how it actually looks like to the eye and thus referring to them as some sort of a holy bible doesn't really tell me much. "

This observation is perfectly correct. In "blind testing", a group of people are shown different versions of a video, without being told anything else about them, and they are asked which version they prefer.

Blind testing of WebM launch release showed that people were simply unable to pick the difference between h264 and WebM. Some preferred one, other preferred the other, and still others said they couldn't pick between them.

"The eye" effectively can't pick these small differences in measured video quality.

PS: It was you who asked for video quality benchmark results, not I.

Edited 2011-03-16 12:59 UTC

Reply Parent Score: 2

WereCatf Member since:
2006-02-15

PS: It was you who asked for video quality benchmark results, not I.


But as I said, comparisons over how many more percents one version has gotten over the previous one in one metric simply doesn't suffice for a benchmark. And I asked for the actual output files so people could make their comparisons and opinions themselves, not just one or another metric.

I personally have no tools to shoot such a source video as I described nor do I have the necessary knowledge to know what encoder parameters I should use and thus I don't qualify as for making the benchmarks myself.

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE[5]: WebM vs H.264 benchmark
by lemur2 on Wed 16th Mar 2011 13:09 in reply to "RE[4]: WebM vs H.264 benchmark"
lemur2 Member since:
2007-02-17

"PS: It was you who asked for video quality benchmark results, not I.


But as I said, comparisons over how many more percents one version has gotten over the previous one in one metric simply doesn't suffice for a benchmark. And I asked for the actual output files so people could make their comparisons and opinions themselves, not just one or another metric.

I personally have no tools to shoot such a source video as I described nor do I have the necessary knowledge to know what encoder parameters I should use and thus I don't qualify as for making the benchmarks myself. "

The YouTube HTML5 trial lets you join and un-join the trial.

http://www.youtube.com/html5

If you have Firefox 4 RC or Chrome I think you can use this trial to view the same video at the same resolution in both WebM and h264 versions. Some video clips are available at 720p resolution.

Recently I haven't been able to spot any difference. Hope this helps.

Reply Parent Score: 2

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