Enhance video efficiency with the bandwidth reduction filter in AWS Elemental MediaConvert

In today’s digital landscape, content creators seek ways to optimize media workflows without compromising video quality. AWS Elemental MediaConvert, a cloud-based transcoding service, offers a bandwidth reduction filter (BRF) to streamline video delivery and maintain visual fidelity.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) delivered the bandwidth reduction filter to prioritize both bandwidth efficiency and high-quality video output. With this filter, you can deliver video that looks stunning while minimizing bandwidth consumption.

With BRF enabled, you can reduce encoded video bitrates by an average of 7%, depending on content, while maintaining quality and saving on storage and CDN costs. In this blog post, you will learn more about BRF, its benefits, and how to enable the feature in MediaConvert.

How does the bandwidth reduction filter work?

At its core, the BRF leverages human vision system models to reduce imperceptible signals and temporal noise from video input, which generally originates from camera sensors.

The BRF is a custom filter designed to run inside the video encoder loop (in-loop), allowing access to privileged data about each frame. This data includes the frame type (I, B, or P frame), detailed information about skip blocks and intra blocks, and the quantization parameter (QP) of the frame. For a detailed explanation about different types of video frames, please reference: Back to basics: GOPs explained on the AWS for M&E Blog.

The in-loop filter provides efficiencies as it processes frames based on specific complexities and requirements. This is different from a pre-filter, which processes all frames uniformly before they enter the encoder. The encoder has no visibility into which part of the frame is more complex or which frames to filter more or less in order to achieve the desired result.

How to enable the bandwidth reduction filter

To enable and start using the BRF:

1. In the MediaConvert console, select the type of video output

AWS Management Console create job.

2. Navigate to the Codec details within the encoding settings

AWS Management Console encoding settings.

3. Locate the Bandwidth reduction filter option
4. Set the filter strength to Auto

AWS Management Console bandwidth reduction filter configuration.

The BRF is a Professional tier feature. Enabling it causes encoding jobs to be charged in the Professional tier. Please reference MediaConvert pricing for more details.

For example:
60 minutes HD Basic tier one output cost: $0.90
60 minutes HD Professional one output cost: $1.44

This cost increase of using BRF when encoding can be offset by significant bandwidth savings, depending on your audience size.

The following image shows a side-by-side comparison of video encoded at 5 Mbps with no filter versus video encoded at 4 Mbps with the BRF enabled.

Side-by-side no filter vs BRF enabled.

Key benefits:

1. Enhanced streaming experience

• • Deliver high-quality video content to audiences with reduced buffering and faster load times.
  • Optimize video streams for a variety of devices and network conditions, ensuring smooth viewing across platforms.

2. Cost savings

• • Reduce bandwidth usage and associated costs, particularly for content delivery networks (CDNs). A 1 Mbps bandwidth reduction represents 45 TB saved for 60 minutes watched by 100,000 viewers over the lifetime of a video. This can result in substantial savings on Amazon CloudFront CDN data transfer costs.
  • Achieve greater efficiency in your video delivery pipeline, maximizing the value of infrastructure investments.

3. Simplified workflow

• • Integrate the BRF seamlessly into your existing MediaConvert workflow with just a few clicks.
  • Enjoy the convenience of automated transcoding and delivery processes, freeing time for creative endeavors.

Conclusion

Using MediaConvert with the bitrate reduction filter and Quality-Defined Variable Bitrate (QVBR), an enhanced version of variable bitrate (VBR) rate control that minimizes wasted bits and adjusts bitrate to maintain consistent video quality, processes video files more efficiently. BRF reduces overall video bandwidth usage without compromising video quality. In the long run, depending on your audience size, the incremental cost increase of Professional tier pricing to process video assets with MediaConvert can be offset by cost savings in CDN traffic.