Recording for youtube workflow

[Stefan_12]

I'm trying to get the best possible quality on final YouTube video while maintaining relatively small file sizes.

At the the moment for recording I'm using UtVideo YUV420 codec. Quality of recording is great but file size is just huge. 10min video is like 40gb ... My settings for Dxtory are attached.

1. What codec will give me similar quality at at least half file size?

I render using adobe premiere H.264. YouTube after receiving uploaded video at 1080 resolution, render it again using h.264 codec which results in terrible quality (before upload video looks good). If video is uploaded at 2k size (after scalin up in AdobePremiere) than YouTube will render it using VP9 codec. VP9 looks way better. Even resolution 1080 with VP9 is way better. Anyway here I'm still not getting maximum results after uploading 2k. My test video here at 1080 resolution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guEhNZYuWL0&feature=youtu.be still doesn't look as good as video here at 1080 resolution https://youtu.be/blp6_fEfqQc?t=267

2. How other YouTuber gets better quality than I? Is it because of the codec other than H.264 that he uses to render video before uploading to YouTube? What are other options available on windows other than H.264 that works with YouTube and gives better quality than H.264? I can imagine that converting by YouTube my H.264 to VP9 still downgrades quality to something worse than original H.264 that's why I'm thinking about using other codec which gives better quality than H.264. Am I understanding this right or there is other way to get better quality?

I'm also attaching my export settings from Adobe Premiere. I think I have them right, just that H.264 codec looks suspicious to me.
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[ClassifyLP]

1. What codec will give me similar quality at at least half file size?

None at this time. Lossless codecs will always turn out quite big.
You can encode with a lossy codec like H.264, which will lower the file size a lot, but at the same time decrease quality. It will also not be a lossless recording, meaning quality will get worse every time you re-encode it.

I render using adobe premiere H.264. YouTube after receiving uploaded video at 1080 resolution, render it again using h.264 codec which results in terrible quality (before upload video looks good). If video is uploaded at 2k size (after scalin up in AdobePremiere) than YouTube will render it using VP9 codec. VP9 looks way better. Even resolution 1080 with VP9 is way better. Anyway here I'm still not getting maximum results after uploading 2k. My test video here at 1080 resolution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guEhNZYuWL0&feature=youtu.be still doesn't look as good as video here at 1080 resolution https://youtu.be/blp6_fEfqQc?t=267

2. How other YouTuber gets better quality than I? Is it because of the codec other than H.264 that he uses to render video before uploading to YouTube? What are other options available on windows other than H.264 that works with YouTube and gives better quality than H.264? I can imagine that converting by YouTube my H.264 to VP9 still downgrades quality to something worse than original H.264 that's why I'm thinking about using other codec which gives better quality than H.264. Am I understanding this right or there is other way to get better quality?

YouTube has suggestions for optimal settings: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/1722171?hl=en
YouTube will always re-encode your video, so the only things that matter are resolution, framerate and quality of the uploaded video.
Since H.264 is recommended, other codecs will turn out worse or will not work at all (H.265 didn't work, last time I checked).
You will never get an equal quality, if you re-encode into a lossy codec.

I'm also attaching my export settings from Adobe Premiere. I think I have them right, just that H.264 codec looks suspicious to me.

Your audio settings should use a higher bitrate and sample rate, consider using 384kbit/s and 48kHz.

Your video bitrate is above the recommended, however, normal VBR mode is not the best. CRF is a better way of distributing space where it is needed. It tries to make every frame look similar in quality no matter the 2D scene complexity.

The biggest problem is, that there is a factor, one cannot change: 2D scene complexity
If the complexity of your video is high, it will look worse.
Scaling also causes artifacting (more or less, depending on which algorithm is used), which is generally an increase in complexity.

From my experience though, in most cases, the viewers do not care much about video quality.

[Stefan_12]

Si it looks like I will need to work with losses codec. Which one would you recommend?

I know about YT specification. I have been doing lots of testing with various bitrates. Increasing bitrate doesn't help really but having it slightly higher can't hurt. I prefer to have on YouTube server higher quality orginal video as maybe in the future they will change theirs specs and render video again using higher bitrate ...

I still can't understand why other youtuber has better quality. You can see difference in quality in the left top corner where red numbers are. If he uploads the same as me with H.264 than the only difference is in scaling. He probably uploads 1080 and 100% scale as he is big youtuber and people like he get VP9 automatically, I need to scale to get VP9 but it can affect quality so much? My 2k vid looks very ok but 1080 is quite bad.

I don't have an option to use CRF, only CBR and VBR. Audio is as recommended by YT ACC and it can go as high as 320 kbps.

[ClassifyLP]

Si it looks like I will need to work with losses codec. Which one would you recommend?

UtVideo or MagicYUV, both are very good overall.

I still can't understand why other youtuber has better quality. You can see difference in quality in the left top corner where red numbers are. If he uploads the same as me with H.264 than the only difference is in scaling. He probably uploads 1080 and 100% scale as he is big youtuber and people like he get VP9 automatically, I need to scale to get VP9 but it can affect quality so much? My 2k vid looks very ok but 1080 is quite bad.

YouTube has to scale your 1440p video down to 1080p, causing more artifacting. That results in an even more complex scene, meaning the quality will go down.

If you have another look at M.C. I.K's video at around 7:32 (where the green energy effect triggers), you can see the quality drop since scene complexity is high.
You can test this by uploading a video where you stand still for a few seconds then move (the camera) around a lot and use skills that trigger effects with many particles.