Hello, I have a much more powerful computer (Mac) now, because it uses a whole new technology that makes them powerful and efficient at the same time. So I downloaded a few clips to play with Final Cut and learn... But I have some questions that I know you'll gladly answer, I know this is a supportive community:
1st, the thing that worries me the most: Building tolerance towards arousing material. Since I watching (and enjoying) CHs, 6 years ago, I've slowly built some tolerance, and for the past few years my sex drive has plummeted to the point where, to actually enjoy CH, I have to quit all activity for a week. Yeah, this could be related to depression and other issues, but anyways, I'm just having one or two releases per week, and it is going worse. That's why I'm a bit worried about the process involving CH production: using and watching all that content -my favourite visual content- several times while working on a project, will actually worsen this, and make me "immune" to sexual arousal through visuals.
2nd: I'm playing with h.264 and h.265 codecs with Final Cut and Handbrake, and h.264, while more compatible and retaining better visual quality, it leaves me with files of 8GB of size (for a 50 minute footage). The h.265 (HEVC) file is 3,7GB which is acceptable. I've had the idea of rendering an h.264 video and then re-encoding/compressing it with handbrake, an awesome software that is already available for this ARM machines with a native binary, and the final size is smaller: 2,5GB for the file with the "superHQ" preset in HandBrake, with a good quality (it looks almost like the original 4K file), and an even smaller file of 1,5GB with the "fast" preset" but with a much worse visual quality (some people might notice it, some people might not).
I'm a bit obsessive when it comes to visual quality. I think we're dealing with 4K (compressed) material and it is a pity to compress it to the point where it loses a lot of quality. Well, maybe not a lot for many but it is for me. I can leave you with a sample of 3 pictures, one is the original 4K, the other one is the h.264 compressed with superHQ preset, and the other one is the one with "fast preset":
Probably you can't see the quality drop, but click on it and open it in a separate tab full size, and you'll see there's one of them that looks more compressed and with less quality.
I think the Final Cut -> render at 1080p with h.264 -> then compress it via Handbrake with superHQ preset is the best path to achieve a relatively small file (2,5GB) with good video quality (low compression).
With my previous computer, a low power dual core CPU from 2012 with integrated graphics, it was almost impossible to compress with HandBrake using anything aside the "very fast" preset. Now I can compress it in superHQ within one hour, and I'm still doing a rectification in h.265, although the gains I see with HEVC are not huge to be honest...
For now, I'm just learning to paste several videos into one single video, rendering, compressing, basic stuff. Next step is deepen my video editing knowledge, and learn to make transitions. Then, replacing the file audio with my own music, and finally add captions and text. Beatmeter don't worries me, because I am not a fan of it personally, I rather watch green light red light videos, or those with simple speed intructions, and I plan to do the same... If some day I do a CH, that's it.
Oh, and by the way, I started to roughly editing this videos without nothing in mind, just to learn the basics and test the capabilities of this new machine. But I know the first thing before starting the edit process, is to make a script and plan the whole video beforehand, then look for the scenes that fit into the idea, and then, start editing, right?