Today I would like to search how to encode video using x264/x265 command line on Linux. And here my research about it.

x264 (for the video)

I do not use ffmpeg because of encoding in 8bit or 10bit.

It seems that the easiest way is to download the official binaries from VLC: x264 binaries. I choose the most up to date version on this list of the x264 and x264-10b binaire.

After that, you must to chmod +x theses binaires.

Encode Video

There are three ways to encode:

• 1 pass = you select a bitrate for your video
• 2 pass = you do a 1 pass to check and organize the bitrate and then you encode
• crf = define a global quality of the video. The visual lossless is --crf 18
  • if you set a higher number, the quality will be worst, but the size will be lower.
  • if you set a lower number, the quality will be better, but the size will be higher.

Example:
x264 --preset veryslow --crf 18 --bframes 10 -o 'output.mkv' 'input.mkv'
x264-10b --preset veryslow --crf 18 --bframes 10 -o 'output.mkv' 'input.mkv'

x265 (for the video)

For this one, I’ve used a tarball version, and compiled it:

1. Download the last version here: x265 tarball
2. Extract it: tar -xvzf x265.tar.gz and go to build/linux
3. Run sh multilib.sh
4. Your binarie is on build/linux/8bit and is compiled to use --output-depth with the number 8/10 or even 12.
5. Because x265 only run with input files in the YUV or Y4M format, you should to use ffmpeg (install it on your system)
6. Now you can encode!

Encode video

Same than x264, 3 ways to encode the video. CRF 20.0 is the same to CRF 18.0 for X264. x265 want the --input-res with the resolution of the input video.

Example:
ffmpeg -i 'input.mkv' -an -f yuv4mpegpipe - | x265 --y4m --input - --input-res 1280x720 --output-depth 10 --preset slower --crf 20.0 --output 'output.hevc'
And after that, you can mux to have a .mkv :)