Welcome to this article, where we will explore how to optimize the management of your video resources and the major role that transcoding plays in this digital magic.

Have you ever wondered why media on Nudgis takes up more space than its original size?

The answer is simple: when you upload media to Nudgis, it is transcoded.

Summary

1/ TRANSCODING, FORMAT, AND BITRATE

2/ ​INFLUENCE OF NUDGIS PARAMETERS ON MEDIA SIZE

Transcoding, format, and bitrate

Transcoding involves converting an original media file into several versions with different formats and qualities, allowing the content to be adapted for various uses (streaming, downloading, offline viewing, etc.). That's why when you upload a video to Nudgis, you won't just have one video resource for your media, but several.

The main formats to remember:

• M3U8/HLS: ideal for streaming playback via the Nudgis player.
• MP4: preferred for downloading or offline use (video editors).
• MP3: audio formats available for users who don't have a lot of bandwidth or for podcast playback.

The size of a video depends mainly on its length, resolution, and the codec used. But the key factor is the bitrate, which combines with these other parameters to produce the final file size.

It is important to choose a bitrate that matches the resolution of your media. 

For example, if you are using a Miris recorder, here are our recommendations for the encoding bitrate in relation to the rendering resolution of your recording.

By default, the encoding rate is set to 5 Mbits/s on the Miris station. 

On Nudgis, if you are using the WebStudio, we use by default a bitrate of 4 Mbits/s for 720p.

Thus, in this configuration, 1 hour of video would represent approximately 2.25 GB of storage on Miris with a rendering resolution of 1080p, and for WebStudio in 720p, you would get approximately 1.8 GB of storage.

However, the higher the resolution, the higher the bitrate required to ensure good quality, so the file will be larger for a given duration. A 4K video typically consumes 2 to 4 times more data than a FullHD video.

The maximum transcoding quality depends on the quality of the source file. For example, it is impossible to transcode to 1440p or 2160p if the original video is in 1080p.

Influence of Nudgis settings on media size

Nudgis offers fine-grained video transcoding management, allowing you to optimize storage and adapt formats and quality to your needs. The transcoding rules on Nudgis have a direct impact on the size of media files stored and distributed on the platform.

If multiple formats and qualities are active (MP4, M3U8, WEBM, MP3, OGA, with resolutions such as 2160p, 1440p, 1080p, 720p, 480p, etc.), each version takes up additional space on the server.

It will therefore be necessary to reduce the active resolutions for transcoding as well as the formats to reduce the total weight of a media resources. Nudgis offers unique features that allow you to optimize your storage.

In the transcoding rules, you have the single MP4 mode, which allows you to limit storage space by creating only one MP4 file of the best possible quality, thereby reducing the cumulative size of the media.

In addition, the original resources (source files sent to Nudgis) can be programmed to expire automatically, freeing up space by default after 14 days.

You can therefore optimize the management of your media size by adjusting these rules according to your actual distribution or archiving needs.

If, despite these settings (as disk space is not infinite), you still need to recover space, you will need to use our video lifecycle scripts.

In summary, the more rules generate versions and formats, the more space the media takes up on Nudgis. Fine settings allow you to control this weight, between flexibility of distribution and storage optimization. These settings are accessible in the Nudgis administration and changing them can affect all new media, even retroactively if the option to restart transcoding is used.

To continue : "How do you configure transcoding  in Nudgis ?"