Can Media Encoder automatically choose the 'Level'?

[lflegg]

Am I the only one who has no idea how to use levels when transcoding media?

I get that higher levels are generally for higher quality / bigger files, but for me it's by far the least intuitive and most frustrating part of AME's user journey.

Example: I'm often looking to do (very) low quality previews for clients (note that there's no very low quality / small file size preset) so I have to adapt something like the Twitter one and further reduce the bit rate etc. Changing even the frame rate from 30 to 25 throws out an error saying it's incompatible with the level I've chosen.

I don't get why there isn't a 'automatic' setting for level as I never care what level it is, and most of the options aren't compatible anyway, so I just end up randomly selecting different levels hoping one of them won't cause an error. At the very least it automatically change to fit when I change other settings or grey out the levels that are incompatible with the other settings I've chosen.

Thanks for any ideas!

[excited_Genie16B8]

Frame rate won't affect file size, so you can probably leave that alone.

Just lower the bitrate, and leave all else as is.  It should work.

[lflegg]

Jim Simon​ unfortunately no, it throws an error if the bit rate / other settings don't fall into the suitable range for that Level.

I just don't get why there's no 'auto level' option. It'd surely make all of this a hell of a lot easier.

[excited_Genie16B8]

OK.

You'll have to do the research.  Find the Profile and Level that suite your needs and switch to it manually.

You can create your own encoding Presets for easy selection later.