# 720p Is So Low Quality when I Try Recording?



## LetsGoToi (Sep 1, 2020)

Hello, when i record with 1920x1080, quality is fine but, my computer works so slow, and then it's hard to edit.
1920x1080 is my monitor.

I want to try to record 1280x720, but then the quality is really so bad, I don't know what's the issue.
I tried playing with CBR but it didn't help

My Settings:
l


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## PWNhub (Sep 1, 2020)

4000 Bitrate isn't great for a recording, and you're monitor is 1080p so I'm betting you're watching a video player larger than your stream display which means even if you had a 10,000 bitrate 720p stretched out to 1080p will never look good! Record in 1080p


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## jennerate (Sep 1, 2020)

I am confused.  You're screenshots show you are recording in 1080p.  The only way you would get a 720p recording with the settings you have is if your "Stream"  settings are rescaling down to 720p and you start streaming first before you start recording.  

Start recording first before you stream, then your recording should be at 1080p.  BUT...  before you do that.  up the bitrate to something like 10,000 or 12,000 Kbps to give you a better quality recording.  4000 kbps is far too low for 1080p.


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## LetsGoToi (Sep 1, 2020)

I don't think you guys understood what I said.
my 1080p Quality is so fine, but I want to make it quality fine for 720p.
and I only Record, I DONT STREAM


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## jennerate (Sep 1, 2020)

LetsGoToi said:


> I don't think you guys understood what I said.
> my 1080p Quality is so fine, but I want to make it quality fine for 720p.
> and I only Record, I DONT STREAM


Yeah, I am confused.  You say you want to record in 720p, but your Record settings are for 1080p.  

The settings you have are fine for a good quality 720p recording, provided that you actually record in 720, which currently, based on the screenshot you provided, you are not.  If you only want to record in 720, then either change the "Output Scaled " resolution to 1280 x 720 in the Video Settings area, or in the Recording tab tick "Rescale Output" and select 1280 x 720.  Then record and you should see that your 720p recording looks better.  For good measure, I would also suggest changing the bit rate to be no less than 4500 kbps for a 720p recording.


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## LetsGoToi (Sep 1, 2020)

This is how a 720p Quality looks like (I took a screenshot cuz I can't upload the video)

The Screenshot


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## jennerate (Sep 1, 2020)

I don't understand your screenshot.  It doesn't look like a screenshot of a video you've recorded unless I am mistaken.  if I am mistaken, then this 1080p screenshot you've shared relates directly back to the reply from *PWNhub.   If you view a 720p video full screen on a 1080p monitor it won't look good.  *

Similarly, if you view a 1080p video recorded at 4000 Kbps on a 1080p monitor it won't look good either, because 4000 Kbps is too low for that resolution.


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## jennerate (Sep 1, 2020)

FYI: you could always upload the video to youtube and share the link with us so we can see what it looks like there.


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## koala (Sep 1, 2020)

You're using Quicksync as hardware encoder to lower CPU usage and want better video quality for recording. So switch rate control to ICQ and choose a CQ value of about 18-23 (lower values mean higher quality). Keep canvas and output resolution at 1920x1080.


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## LetsGoToi (Sep 1, 2020)

Here is the link of the video: 720p Resolution








						2020 09 01 16 14 32
					






					youtu.be
				



Even if i try to look it in my phone, the quality looks bad


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## jennerate (Sep 1, 2020)

LetsGoToi said:


> Here is the link of the video: 720p Resolution
> 
> 
> 
> ...



The trouble with watching something from youtube on a phone is that the YoutBue app will usually start streaming at a lower quality whilst it figures out how much bandwidth you have available to use.  When it determines that it ups the quality.  As this video is so short it probably doesn't;t have enough time to figure that out and you may always get a 480p or 360p stream on a mobile device.

Using my browser on my PC the video looks fine to me.  But, you are showing a very bland window, mostly blue and white.  Recording some gameplay or video to show the issue might be better.  

The video was a bit too short for me to analyse it properly (my software errored out before it had a chance to do anything).  But when viewing in VLC as original size (not fit to window), it looked fine, but the text is a little blocky.  The Bitrate never gets about 2500 Kbps.  Which is probably because the video is too short for it to ramp up to 4000 Kbps.  But either way, increase the bit rate as 4000 Kbps is too low.  

What is it about the video you think looks bad?  
If it's the slight blockiness around the text onscreen then you could try changing the downscaling algorithm from Bicubic (Sharpened scaling, 16 Samples) to Lanczos (sharpened Scaling, 36 Samples).  

Also doing what *koala suggests would produce a very good quality output, but be warned your file size will increase.  *


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## LetsGoToi (Sep 1, 2020)

Hello, Do you have discord or something so we can chat @jennerate
I changed the bitrate settings and to Lanczos, I still get the same result really, the texts are like so pixelated.

If you have discord, please add me afterlife#8610









						imgur.com
					

Imgur: The magic of the Internet




					imgur.com


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## jennerate (Sep 2, 2020)

ICQ Quality of 18 is a bit too much in the opposite direction compared to what you have before.  You'll end up with a file that has an average bitrate of 20 to 30 Mbps with that.  Which, for me, is a bit unnecessary.  For a 720p recording, you don't need the ICQ value to be that low (high quality).  For 720 you could have a value between 25 and 30 for a decent result and a smaller file size.   If you were to record in 1080p then a value between 20 and 25 would be appropriate.  

You've mentioned that you only want to record in 720p and do not stream.  You could easily record in 1080p at 30 fps and maintain a high-quality output.  

One thing I noticed with the example video you uploaded, is that it did not record the entire screen canvas and scale it down to 720p.  But rather it seems that you are zooming in on a part of the screen.  This could be a reason why things look blocky.  In the scene you have set up, what source are you using to capture?  
Is it a Browser source?  
If so what resolution did you set the browser source to?
Generally, any source you add to a scene should really make use of the size of the canvas (1080p in this instance according to your settings), which you should then record and scale to 720p.  If you were to put a 1280x720 browser source, for example, on a scene and then expand that so it took up the entire canvas size it will look blocky.

These are the settings I have which produce a very good output.  

Video Settings:




Record Settings:




Display Capture settings:




Test Videos:

Test 1: This Thread at 720p 30fps








						Test 1: This Thread at 720p 30fps
					






					youtu.be
				




Test 2: This Thread at 720p 60fps








						Test 2: This Thread at 720p 60fps
					






					youtu.be
				




Test 3: Youtube videos at 
https://youtu.be/M2U7rpv67TE720p 30fps

Test 4: Youtube videos at 720p 60fps








						Test 4: Youtube videos at 720p 60fps
					






					youtu.be
				





FYI: regards your comment in the first post.  I record at 1080p 60fps using Intel Quick Sync and I edit the videos in Dvanci resolve (free edition).  Davinci Resolve does not play well on my machine with videos at 60fps.  So I created a timeline with 24 fps, do all my editing.  Then create a new timeline with 60fps can copy and paste all everything from the 24fps timeline to the 60fps timeline.  This way Resolve seems to work as expected and doesn't kill itself each time I scrub a video.  

If the above hasn't helped message me in discord and we can go through a few things.


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