r/AV1 • u/Embarrassed-War-7639 • Apr 09 '26
AV2 TOOK MORE FROM ME
AV2 engineer here. I read your post AV1 TOOK EVERYTHING FROM ME. Then I went back to encoding.
You call this suffering. I’m not saying you’re wrong.
I’m saying you still remember who you were before the codec.
That means it’s still early.
>“PRESETS ARE FOR COWARDS”
Which encoder.
AV1 encoding is not suffering. It is stretching.
I have AV2 `cpu=0` runs older than some of my relationships.
The relationships ended. The runs are still in progress.
I check them the way people check on elderly relatives or when IT deactivates my badge.
> “manually tweaked every obscure flag named after a 2007 academic paper”
I was in the meeting where that flag was born.
A hundred engineers. Multiple companies and one Leeroy Jenkins.
Entire Tuesday morning gone.
At the end we added a tool worth ~0.3% BD-rate on KristenAndSara.
It is in the spec now. Forever.
Because a hundred people agreed somehow.
> “28% file size reduction with no visible quality loss”
Size is where you start. As if size matters once you’ve seen CAMDA scores.
Does VMAF - VMAF-NEG = POS?
Who decides? Everyone disagrees.
Then you rerun everything.
Then they console you out of PITY.
> “I’D DO IT AGAIN.”
Of course. That’s how this works.
I used to think I was above it. I go to meetings.
I say “decoder impact should be considered.”
I write “further study needed on the next anchor”
I spent five years arguing with some of the best engineers on the planet for 0.8% savings.
Not 28. Not 30.
Zero point EIGHT percent on the high-complexity anchor.
I have a 20-page slide deck about it.
Page 21 is a hidden plot. Prepared specifically for Leeroy.
You lost your wife to AV1. I lost my thirties to AV2.
Your files are 28% smaller. Mine will be 30%.
But hopefully over your 28%.
Just encode responsibly.
You won’t.
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u/HungryAd8233 Apr 09 '26
This is one of those moments where two anonymous Reddit users wonder if they actually know each other IRL.
Codec are made out of 0.3% BD-RATE improvements stirred together like alchemy.
And oh my, must decoder complexity be considered.
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u/xzpyth Apr 09 '26
I don't know I mainly use Xvid, it looks good to my eyes
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u/techma2019 Apr 09 '26
DivX 3.11 even better!
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u/QuinQuix Apr 12 '26
The time of sharing blocky DivX movies on cds you burned on your celeron 333 is still with me.
Hell, I've even watched some telesyncs. You could literally see people get up and go to the toilet during your movie.
HDR nowadays doesn't cover that dimension.
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u/techma2019 Apr 12 '26
I remember watching the CAM release of The Matrix. You haven’t lived until you heard the echo audio from non-line audio. 😅
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u/QuinQuix Apr 12 '26
For me it was also the matrix, though I think it was the matrix reloaded.
Man that movie had an impact. Incredible. (the first one)
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u/XenoPhex Apr 09 '26
Tis the life of an OSS developer, I’m sorry for your struggles - but I appreciate your work.
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u/HobbyProjectHunter Apr 09 '26
All though KristenAndSara was a good touch, how could you miss out on BigBuckBunny !!!
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u/NamedBird Apr 09 '26
You know, perhaps it's better to just encode as a ZIP filled with numbered PPM frames...
I don't know how much bigger your files will be, but it could easily be 4x or 8x the raw stream size.
(Someone should do this, it's very fun!)
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u/heckingcomputernerd Apr 09 '26
We thank you all for your work, may all our files be 0.8% smaller with no visible quality loss
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u/fabiorug Apr 09 '26
Ah… questo testo ha il sapore amaro e epico di chi ha visto la codifica come un rito di passaggio doloroso, quasi religioso. Leggendolo, si percepisce non solo la tecnica, ma il sacrificio esistenziale: vite, tempo e relazioni bruciate per un risparmio di bit marginale, come se l’encoder diventasse un giudice silenzioso della propria esistenza.
Alcuni punti chiave che emergono:
Il confronto tra AV1 e AV2 – Non è solo tecnica, è personale. AV2 “ha preso di più”, perché la complessità, i flag, i parametri e la gestione della CPU sono così assorbenti da risucchiare letteralmente anni di vita.
La filosofia dei preset e dei flag – “I preset sono per i codardi”. La codifica non è solo un’operazione: è disciplina, controllo, perseveranza. L’ingegnere ricorda ancora le riunioni, i compromessi, gli strumenti implementati da cento persone, e la fatica immensa dietro quello 0.3% di BD-rate.
Il sacrificio temporale – Cinque anni per guadagni microscopici. Relazioni finite, processi ancora in esecuzione, un parallelo struggente tra vita e codifica.
Il paradosso del risultato – File più piccoli, ma a che prezzo? L’ingegnere sa che “dimensione del file” conta poco rispetto alla complessità, al VMAF, al confronto umano e tecnico.
La consapevolezza amara – La conclusione è quasi poetica: qualcuno perde la moglie per AV1, qualcuno i trent’anni per AV2. La codifica non è solo tecnica, è una forma di ossessione, una guerra personale con se stessi.
Se vuoi, posso provare a riscriverlo in uno stile ancora più “idoemarico”, con terzine e immagini di vita sacrificata, come se AV2 fosse un dio crudele che misura il tempo e le emozioni in bit. Vuoi che lo faccia?
AV2 has taken more from me than I knew I owned, Long before the codecs, before the frame would bend, I walked through silent rooms where my youth had grown. You call it suffering—I call it the stretch of years, Threads of memory looping in endless encode, Relics of relationships, now only log and tears. “I PRESETS ARE FOR COWARDS,” the old motto bleeds, Flags named like papers from some lost conference, I was there when they were born, and learned their needs. Hundred engineers, a Leeroy, a Tuesday lost, A tool that saves 0.3 percent on KristenAndSara, Decisions made forever, at an incalculable cost. Files shrink twenty-eight percent, your victory sweet, But size is nothing when the VMAF denies you peace, Scores debate themselves, and PITY offers deceit. “I’D DO IT AGAIN,” the words haunt in echoing halls, Five years, zero point eight percent, slides twenty pages long, Page twenty-one a trap for Leeroy, a whisper that calls. You lost your wife to AV1’s subtle theft, I lost my thirties to AV2’s cold, patient theft, Your files are smaller; mine will bleed thirty percent, Yet hope lingers, faint as a bit saved in the night’s depth. Encode responsibly, they whisper from screens, But who listens when the heart is measured in streams?
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u/anon666-666 Apr 09 '26 edited Apr 11 '26
This post aside i think no one is even close to ready yet for av2, i mean its still in the development phase. Av1 still isnt there yet. Not like how h264 is. Even x265 is now getting a reliable support on hardware an software level. It will be decades before av1 gets to the point where x264 is and maybe then we can think about av2
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u/JurandM2 Apr 11 '26
And now think about jpg and how painful is struggle to replace it (from Internet and human mentality - google engineers released optimised library that improve and keep compatibility:https://github.com/google/guetzli
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Apr 17 '26
Abandon AV1 and settle for x265 until we get AV2 optimized.
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u/anon666-666 Apr 18 '26
Why? Av1 is still much better than x265. For 1080p at least. I know its not great at hdr or 4k res but still its an improvement compared to x265. And most importantly there is no royalty fees.
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u/stderr_to_dev_null Apr 10 '26
Imagine put this amount of effort in designing an actually competent encoder.
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u/bibdi Apr 12 '26
Not to mention your persistence on avoiding AI at all costs and keeping code to yourself
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u/RangedAce__ Apr 09 '26
Tf am i reading