An example method includes receiving a video bitstream with a high fidelity input format and side information related to the video bitstream. The side information includes a video bitstream representing the original video source with a low fidelity input format, coding parameters optimized based on knowledge of the original video source, transform coefficients, indicative of a residual between the original video source and a decoded version of the high fidelity format. The method further includes decoding the side information to generate transcoding guiding information, estimating a representation of video bitstream with a low fidelity output format, based on the received bit stream and the generated transcoding guiding information, improving the estimated low-fidelity representation by adding the transform coefficients of the side information to transform coefficients generated from the estimated low-fidelity representation, and encoding the improved estimated representation of the low-fidelity bitstream.