Content-based client side video transcoding

1. A system comprising:

a processor;

a user interface coupled to the processor, the user interface comprising an image capture device; and

memory coupled to the processor and storing instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the system to perform operations comprising:

determining a complexity within a field of view of an image capture device that captured video data; and

generating, based on the determined complexity and the video data, transcoded video data by selecting a transcoding configuration that applies a bitrate to the video data, the transcoding configuration selected from a plurality of transcoding configurations of varying bitrates, wherein the bitrate applied to the transcoded video is selected to correspond to a video quality metric, based on predefined mappings between at least one video quality metric and the transcoding configuration.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes detecting motion within the field of view.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes determining that the detected motion exceeds a predetermined threshold.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes detecting a texture within the field of view.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes determining an average difference between a plurality of frames in the captured video data and a plurality of frames in the video data.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes determining a square error between a plurality of frames in the captured video data and a plurality of frames in the video data.

7. The system of claim 1 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes determining a peak signal-to-noise ratio between a first frame in the video data and a second frame in the video data.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein the bitrate applied to the transcoded video is one of: a fixed bitrate, or a variable bitrate.

9. The system of claim 1 , wherein the bitrate applied to the transcoded video is capped.

10. The system of claim 1 , wherein generating the transcoded video includes transcoding the video according to a predetermined transcoding profile to generate the transcoded video at a predetermined bitrate.

11. The system of claim 1 , wherein the user interface includes a display screen, and capturing the video data includes presenting the video data on the display screen.

12. The system of claim 11 , wherein the user interface further includes an input device, and wherein the memory further stores instructions for receiving, from a user of the system via the input device, a user interaction for initiating a recording of the video data.

13. The system of claim 1 , wherein the operations further comprise encoding the captured video data to generate encoded video data, wherein the complexity is determined based on the encoded video data.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the complexity is determined based on a comparison between at least a portion of the captured video data and at least a portion of the encoded video data.

15. The system of claim 13 , wherein encoding the captured video data is performed using one or more of: a frame by frame encoding, and an encoding of a collection of frames.

16. The system of claim 13 , wherein the captured video data is compressed, wherein the difference between the captured video data and the encoded video data results in a larger difference for compression artifacts between frames than non-compression artifacts.

17. The system of claim 1 , wherein determining the complexity within the field of view of the image capture device includes encoding a video frame to a pixel frame and performing one or more subtraction operations with a corresponding frame of the captured video data.

18. The system of claim 1 , wherein the predefined mappings are stored within a database and are accessible via the database, to provide consistent video transcoding with respect to messaging clients of the messaging system.

19. A computer-implemented method comprising:

determining a complexity within a field of view of an image capture device that captured video data; and

generating, based on the determined complexity and the video data, transcoded video data by selecting a transcoding configuration that applies a bitrate to the video data, the transcoding configuration selected from a plurality of transcoding configurations of varying bitrates, wherein the bitrate applied to the transcoded video is selected to correspond to a video quality metric, based on predefined mappings between at least one video quality metric and the transcoding configuration.

20. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a computer system, cause the computer system to perform operations comprising:

determining a complexity within a field of view of an image capture device that captured video data; and

generating, based on the determined complexity and the video data, transcoded video data by selecting a transcoding configuration that applies a bitrate to the video data, the transcoding configuration selected from a plurality of transcoding configurations of varying bitrates, wherein the bitrate applied to the transcoded video is selected to correspond to a video quality metric, based on predefined mappings between at least one video quality metric and the transcoding configuration.