I recently wrote about My Digital Content Workflow, and in step 7 I describe how I had been using Xilisoft Video Converter to resize videos from 1080p ("full HD") to smaller sizes like 720p ("HD"). Given that a new version of HandBrake (0.10.0) was released just 2 days ago, I thought I'd give it another look. HandBrake is traditionally known for being used as a DVD ripping application, so I had never seriously considered it for video conversion, although it has had those capabilities for quite some time. With release 0.10.0 comes several new encoding schemes which I'll probably never use, but it's nice to know that the developers are staying current with newer codecs like H.265 (even if it is still in early development at this stage).
For a vast majority of my needs, I will generally start with a preset and make further adjustments from there. For example, the iPad present defaults to a 720p resolution, and I might just modify the bitrate to achieve a level of quality that is suitable for the contents of the video that I am converting. I find that a bitrate of 5000 kbps results in pretty good quality, especially for viewing on mobile devices and YouTube, although it is possible to get away with 3000 kbps or less if the video does not contain a lot of fast-moving images.
Overall I'm pleased with HandBrake as a video conversion tool, and given that it is free, it is hard to beat HandBrake in terms of value. Furthermore, HandBrake is available for both Mac and Windows (and Ubuntu, if you're into that). If you have any other recommendations for video conversion, I'd like to know!
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