Recording Outputs are Slightly Blurry

[harbormarketing]

Hey everyone, I'm running into trouble with my recordings for OBS. I'm doing local recordings (not streaming) with the intent of just using OBS to make talking head videos. I have a Canon EOS Rebel SL3 wired up to my Macbook Pro, which is what I'm using to record. I also have a Shure SM7db microphone wired up to the Macbook Pro.

I'm trying to record videos, but they're coming out just slightly blurrier than what I know the camera is capable of. I haven't had this issue with the camera before using OBS (which makes me fairly certain it's an OBS settings issue). From what I can tell from other forum threads and YouTube videos, I have my settings correct, but I'm not 100% sure. I've attached screenshots of my recording settings below. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

 

[AaronD]

1920x1080p30 at 2500kbps is going to be blurry. You just don't have enough bits to define all those pixels. How much data can you afford?

 

[harbormarketing]

1920x1080p30 at 2500kbps is going to be blurry. You just don't have enough bits to define all those pixels. How much data can you afford?

Sorry... I'm a noob at this. How do I tell how much data I can afford? Should I just raise the kbps?

 

[AaronD]

How do I tell how much data I can afford?

That's mostly trial and error, unfortunately.

If you're streaming, then your internet connection gives you a hard cap that you'll never reach anyway. Typically, you'd go for maybe 1/4 or less of the advertised upload speed, and play with it from there. See what you can reliably get away with.

If you're only recording, then it's more about the file size that you end up with.

• Constant Bitrate makes it easy to calculate, but gives you variable quality throughout the video. Some shots take fewer bits to describe than others, so those will look better than others at a constant bitrate.
• Constant Quality makes everything look the same, by using more bits to describe the more complex shots. The number tells it how much detail to throw away - lower number keeps more - and then it uses as many bits as it needs to describe what's left. So the file size is less predictable, but still affected by that setting.

So what options do you have besides ABR?

Should I just raise the kbps?

Try it and find out. At some point, either something won't keep up, or you'll get a file that's bigger than you want. Then look at the quality that you end up with and see if you can live with that. If you can, then you can turn it down to see when the quality drops to something you don't like, then up just enough to get it back.

If you switch to constant quality, then the adjustment direction is backwards, but it's the same idea.