ffmpeg - Downloading Media

NOTE: This will return all kinds of information about the media file, such as bitrate, fps, encoded type, subtitles info, audio info, channels and more.

NOTE: Downloads the videolink.mp4 file and saves (copies) it as downloadedfile.mp4

NOTE: Downloads the videolink.mp4 file and uses a fast encoding to compression speed, so the file will be quiet large but it will encode quickly.

• The -preset values are:
  • ultrafast, superfast, veryfast, faster, fast, medium, slow, slower, veryslow.
• A slow -preset will take longer but compress the file better.

• The -crf is constant rate factor or quality control on the video.
  • 0 is lossless meaning it wont encode it or change its quality, FFmpeg say an output that is roughly visually lossless but not technically lossless is -crf 17 or -crf 18.
  • The range of the CRF scale is 0–51, 0 is lossless, 23 is the default, and 51 is the worst quality possible.
  • A -crf of around 18-21 is the sweet spot.

• A good solid combination is to make the file slightly smaller, keep quality and do it quickly is the values used here:

  ffmpeg -i "https://videofile.mp4" -c:v libx264 -preset fast -crf 19 downloadedfile.mp4