Video for Website

S

Sumfun

Veteran
I'm starting to put video on my website, and I'm looking for advice on the best way to get a reasonably good video output at a reasonable bit rate (~384kbps). So far I've just been using the WMV9 codec included in Premiere Pro, but it looks like there are better compressors out there. Just how much better are they, and are they worth the extra cost? It's important to me that the video is compatible with most (if not all) users.

Also, can anybody recommend a good way for people to be able to view the video, but not be able to save it (i.e. with "save target as")?
 
Sumfun said:
Just how much better are they, and are they worth the extra cost? It's important to me that the video is compatible with most (if not all) users.
Also, can anybody recommend a good way for people to be able to view the video, but not be able to save it (i.e. with "save target as")?
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1. Compressors - Sorenson Squeeze
2. Quicktime - Its cross platform
3. Quicktime again - Use the Quicktime Plug-in helper to set your movie to disallow saving.

Try and use at least a hinted http streamed movie. This forum seems to be ripe with movies that you have to download before you can start to see them. Also when you've hinted the movie, don't forget to enable the hinting tracks. Go to "Enable Tracks.." in Quicktime edit menu.

The pro version of Quicktime player lets you have full control of your Quicktime environment.
 
Yes its great, but QT7 is not widely in use just yet. It just came out for PC Yesterday.

He said he wants the widest compatibility for most users and unfortunately for now, that rules it out.
 
Hey guys, thanks for the advice. Looks like Squeeze can do a pretty good job of compressing. Now I have to weigh the costs and benefits of that $450 price tag.

But I have a question about your Quicktime recommendation. Since 90% of computers are PC's, and they already have Windows media player, wouldn't it be better to output video in the wmv format? Are Mac users not able to play this format? (Sorry, I use a PC, so I don't know).
 
Not natively.

Don't use general computer statistics when dealing with computer graphics and multimedia markets. Its more like 60/40. Mac is very popular in TV/FILM/Print circles. PC is strong in traditional business markets which is where is gets a lot of its numbers from.
 
I tried compressing video in many ways. I used Windows Media Encoder, Squeeze with Sorenson 3, Quicktime h.264 from a Quicktime Pro player. Then I played all three videos side by side. Same bitrate and resolution. H.264 was much better. don't put money on Squeeze. They seem to be as good as dead. If you need to distribute something immediately, than that could be your only way to go, but a revised version of Quicktime 7 for PC should be coming out anyday. Yes Windows Media is more used, but more or less everybody has Quicktime. Windows Media has too many problems. If you really want a universal video distribution format that absolutely everybody can see, go with Macromedia Flash and their video extesions. It's not H.264 but it's good and plays everywhere. No players needed.
 
Macromedia has already announced that new FLV codec for Maelstrom, current code name for Flash 8 is ON2 Technology's VP6 . ON2 claims that VP6 gives better compression and quality than H.264.

I'll hold judgement on that claim until I see it.
 
craigbowman said:
Macromedia has already announced that new FLV codec for Maelstrom, current code name for Flash 8 is ON2 Technology's VP6 . ON2 claims that VP6 gives better compression and quality than H.264.

I'll hold judgement on that claim until I see it.
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That would be great, and a solution to cross platform trouble. I went to see Sorenson's site but they don't mention anything about 264 or their future developments. I only see that they have split the company in 2 parts, one for compression and one for something else. Are they giving up web video?
 
I said so in the post -- both Vegas and QT Pro. The QT Pro-encoded H.264 files end up being larger than the H.264 files encoded by Vegas.

I'm putting them through a series of tests and will post my results later on.

Though I'd still like to see your results.
 
Jubal28 said:
Actually, I'm testing that for web-type use right now, and I'm finding that QT7/H.264 doesn't come close to WM9 for filesize/quality ratio. I'm still testing, but early results can be found here:

http://www.dvxuser.com/V3/showpost.php?p=229691&postcount=41
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I'm getting the same results wm9 is blowing h264 out of the water! I'm disapointed so far in qt7 pro and h264...I could have stayed home and rendered wmv's to sorrenson for qt conversion and done better!

And what's the deal with the render times for h264 i qt7, 15 minutes for a two minute clip?
 
They are some serious render times! I have finally managed to get a fairly good quality render using qt medium broadband settings, 2 minute clip @ 4.54mb 15 fps 320X240. I find that I'm miising the depth of info in the get movie info section of qt7 pro as opposed to qt6...not near as much info. Sorenson squeeze now shows h264 as a qt render option, but crashes if I attempt to use it.
 
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