Handbrake producing TERRIIBLE quality

[sawunsch32]

I'm trying to put my DVD's onto my ipod touch and when handbrake finally finishes the quality of the movie is terrible and i can hardly view any of the movie that I ripped. I put the setting to ipod touch and the average bitrate to 960. Even when I finally put it on i Tunes, it still looks terrible. If anyone has any suggestions it would be greatly appreciated.

[Taezar]

it is because you are saving it for the quality on a touch - not on your screen in itunes.
I do mine at 400 for my touch and they rock ON my touch.
If you want to watch on itunes, you are going to have to rip at a MUCH MUCH higher abr - 1750ish I would imagine.

[bennettnz]

I use handbrake all the time and I think that it consistently produces very dark movies and I also suspect the iphone setting is crap.

[Japester]

Firstly, never assume that it's going to be easy. You can develop a good working routine but some movies are going to piss you off because you're working within strict limitations to make it compatible. I push the envelope to get the best quality possible and I only have trouble about 20% of the time.

Firstly, rip the DVD to hard drive using a ripper like MacTheRipper or the Windows app DVDFab Decrypter. This will remove the copy protection and your DVD will not have to spin for hours.

In Handbrake, I start with the built-in iPod setting, then I adjust as follows:

Bitrate: 1500 kbps
2-pass encoding, Turbo first pass
Video Resolution: 640 x 480 (4:3)/720 x 400 (16:9)/720 x 304 (2.35:1)
Audio: Two tracks if the movie has them, both 160kbps, Stereo, Dolby Surround or Dolby ProLogic, depending on the source.

Once you've ripped it and before doing extensive tagging using Lostify, test to see that iTunes will copy it to the iPod or iPhone. Sometimes it won't because it sees something it doesn't consider compatible. In this case, tweak the settings such as bitrate or audio selections, then rip one chapter for speed and test the sync again. Once you've got a successful sync, use those settings for the whole movie.

Unfortunately, due to the relatively low bitrate, you're going to see blockies, moiring and other ills. I would recommend not viewing these at home on computer or Apple TV, but only on iPod/iPhone. I run a mixed shop where I rip the DVD as a DVD to hard drive for watching at home and I have iPod copies for the road.

[nightelves]

Why don't you use a program called Isquint or Visualhub that seems to work extremely well but very rare to find it these days since the developer has abandoned the project last time I heard.

[derekaw]

Originally Posted by nightelves

Why don't you use a program for Isquint or Visualhub that seems to work extremely well but very rare to find it these days since the developer has abandoned the project last time I heard.

I use Handbreak to grab the .vob files and save to my hard drive then I use VisualHub to encode. I use the 'iTunes All Devices' setting and I get perfect results every time. That way I can use on my ATV or iPhone.

It is such a shame that the guy stopped developing VisualHub.

I found VisualHub on the net somewhere last week for a friend, spend some time and you will find it.