Reduce size of Google Pixel (Android phone) videos (from Google Photos) while preserving metadata

reduce_google_photos_video_size.md

1. Plug your phone with usb
2. copy large videos
3. use the given batch script (requires ffmpeg.exe and exiftool.exe). Can simply drag drop a video on the .bat file to start conversion.
4. copy the out file back to phone
5. delete original large file from phone using Google photos

NOTE: the ffmpeg command uses Intel GPU acceleration using -c:v hevc_qsv. Change it if you want/need. for Nvidia GPU, use -c:v hevc_nvenc

video_converter.bat

@echo on
SET input=%~1
SET filename=%~n1
SET ext=%~x1
SET output=%filename%_conv%ext%


ffmpeg -i %input% -c:v hevc_qsv -crf 23 -preset fast -c:a copy -movflags use_metadata_tags -map_metadata 0 %output%
echo Conversion done

echo copying metadata
exiftool -v0 -overwrite_original -ee -sep * -a -TagsFromFile %input% -All:All -FileCreateDate -FileModifyDate %output%

echo Done. Will close in 5 seconds
timeout /t 5 /nobreak >nul