Seeking Opinions: friendliest video format for web surfers

Cheesehole wrote on 5/24/2002, 6:49 PM

looks like you are on the right track with DivX and QT. I would also consider Windows Media 8. check out sites like ifilm.com and atomfilms.com to see how they handle it. I think they usually have QT Real and WM.

WM is convenient for just about any windows user since v6.4 comes installed on Win2k and Win98 and will automatically download codecs even for WM8.

the next version of Windows Media (Corona) is right around the corner and should deliver just about the best video experience on the web (based on my experience with Windows Media Player 8 and the PR from MS about Corona)

I'm wondering when we'll get a decent WM player for non XP users. :/

Cheesehole wrote on 5/24/2002, 7:16 PM

>>>Real Media used to be OK, but they really can trick you into installing a bunch of unwanted crap if you are not very careful...plus they make it very difficult to find the free version.

heh heh... I was wondering if I was the only one.

seriously I avoid using RealPlayer tech in any of my interfaces for the sole reasons you just mentioned. every time I install it I feel like I'm fending off a date rape! :) I don't want to have your children I just want to hear a clip!

um anyway I think that would piss some people off even though it's a great player for low bitrate internet audio.

swarrine wrote on 5/24/2002, 10:29 PM

If I only use 1 format, I use QT for 2 reasons:

1: Compatibility - Works on Macs & PCs. WM does not cut it for Mac users.

2: Self Buffer - On slow Internet days, if you click pause on QT, the file will continue to download. This eliminates stop and start viewing and is invaluable. WM will not do this and it is annoying and distractive to me - not to be able to watch a video in one shot.

Furthermore, a 56k viewer can watch a broadband video in QT. They just have to wait longer for the download. About 6 to 1 depending on your settings.

If I have to use WM, I usually offer a zipped version which a user can download the complete file first, then watch without interruption.

Finally, I can't stand Real either. I wish the company would either change their philosophy or go away.

Cheesehole wrote on 5/25/2002, 10:31 PM

>>If I have to use WM, I usually offer a zipped version which a user can download the complete file first, then watch without interruption.

a very smart idea since *streaming* WM has such limited functionality. and since an unzipped straight non-streaming ASF or WMV file doesn't work over the web for a lot of people because of certain issues that I haven't quite worked out yet. have you seen the same thing? half the people can view it fine, and the other half get file not found errors and other misleading error messages.

I like the WM player tech though in that you can play video full screen perfectly smoothly if you have a decent video card. neither QT nor Real can do that and it seems essential to me for a TV-like experience. WM is really not there quite yet as a well rounded solution though... hopefully the next version of WM will bring everything together.

doctorfish wrote on 5/26/2002, 7:24 AM

I record mainly audio, but lately I've done some projects for my students
(I teach at an ESL school) in which we've made animation and slide show stories.
I tried rendering these from Vegas to WMV because I'm going to set up a website
for the students and parents to be able to stream and donwload these projects.
My problem is that in ANY WMV rendered video, the audio and the video get
out of sync, and any generated text media clips don't last as long as they should.
I've rendered avi's fine, but these would hardly do for the internet. I was planning
to give QT or Real a try, but I just had the thought to try rendering to WMV from
the avi file. It seems like it should work that way, and if so I'll stick with
WMV as it sounds good and the Mac market share here in Korea is so small that it
isn't even anything to worry about.

Dave

Chienworks wrote on 5/26/2002, 7:57 AM

doctorfish: i had terrible sync problems with WMV too, until i upgraded to Media Player 7. After i installed that all my .wmv files played in perfect sync, even those i had already encoded earlier.

swarrine wrote on 5/26/2002, 4:55 PM

Corona, the next version of WM is supposed to be incredible. At least that what the buzz is right now. Rumor is Beta in July, release at the end of the year. We'll see.

Spirit wrote on 5/26/2002, 9:25 PM

For something completely different, why not consider .swf format ? Flash format can be read by virtually everone, can be preloaded, streamed, or embedded in pages without going to a separate player...

I use the FLIX program to convert video. You can set a maximum bitrate for the stream when encoding which is very handy.... (I am not an employee!)

http://www.wildform.com/

chriselkins wrote on 5/28/2002, 9:24 AM

"For something completely different, why not consider .swf format ?"

I have actually experimented with that. I use "Illusion" to render my video in a stack of still frames, then import the media as a clip into Adobe Live Motion and save as a *.swf. I have only done it to the point of seeing if my idea worked...if it could be done...I need to go back and compare file sizes and what-not.

Thanks for the input all! Lot's of good info!

jeffy82 wrote on 6/3/2002, 5:30 PM

I am designing a website with large amounts of video streaming, and I believe I've found a possible solution.

By the Way, My Webhost, which I'm very happy with is www.hostik.com

900MB of disk space, Unlimited Data Transfer, Free domain name & IP address,Unlimited POP e-mail address for $29/month, $26/month, $23/month depending on whether paid Monthly, quarterly or yearly.

NOW, ON 2 video! Have you considered using ON2 codec. checkout wwww.on2.com. They make different versions of the codec. Their highest quality codec is being licenced by Real, for future release, but they have freely released a lower, but still great, version to the opensource community. FOR FREE, practically no restrictions. Both Encodes & Decodes, and NO watermark.

I am currently using it on my website and I am extremly happy with the quality. There is a version for Media player & Quicktime. I chose the quicktime because it serves both MAC & PC., the update (for the On2 codec) process is painless, and practically automatic, in detection, installation etc. When you click on the video it asks you 1 question. No error message, like WMP might.

I know I will regret this but checkout this link:

http://www.reelondvd.com

and click on Streaming Video on left. That should work.

It's an 8.5 minute video montage I put together for Universal Studios annual character meeting. I used the ON2 codec & Quicktime. You'd need DSL. I believe it's a 400-800kb/sec stream. I wanted Good Quality and 29.97 FPS. Ignore the rest of the site, it's still work-in-progress.

I'm curious to see how the video/streaming works from different systems. I can only test so many here. I would appreciate any comments on the streaming aspect. (ie. Didn't download codec, movie studdered, didn't display right, etc.) Either leave a note here or at my email address jeffy82@aol.com.

Cheesehole wrote on 6/3/2002, 7:20 PM

I tried with Opera 6.03 and it really freaked Opera out. my buttons were flashing, and the movie played in spurts, not because of download problems though, I could see the data all come down very quickly. eventually it couldn't keep up... I was getting 350kbps from your server, so the movie must be encoded quite a bit higher.

I tried with IE5.01 and an error came up saying the page uses potentially unsafe ActiveX controls which my security settings are set to ignore. the quicktime plugin loaded, but the movie did not start to download or play.

so no success here, but don't be discouraged.

Summersond wrote on 6/4/2002, 12:25 PM

worked like a champ on my w2k machine. Nice format, good sound, good pix. Install of codec was painless.

FuTz wrote on 6/4/2002, 3:28 PM

Win2k, Athlon 1000... worked A-1 !!! Just had to plug the MIME thing for QT setting ...

EW wrote on 6/4/2002, 6:22 PM

How do you use on2 to encode video?

theigloo wrote on 6/4/2002, 6:49 PM

The format everyone seems to have forgoten is MPG-1. Render it, zip it and toss it on the web. You get a bunch of excellent bonuses when you do it:
-You can track the downloads in your log file.
-Everyone can play it - even linux clowns. (mac users will be happy to watch it automatically unzip and start playing)
-It's guarantteed to be completely downloaded before it's opened.
-People will tend to download it and keep it local instead of streaming video where they keep comming back and using your bandwidth.
-when you put a link to a zip file on your site, it prompts for download when clicked. (the mpg alone will try to open a player).

Check out how I've done my site at www.theigloo.com simple and clean.

jeffy82 wrote on 6/6/2002, 2:39 PM

Thankyou all, for taking the time in to not only checkout my example, but for commenting also. The comments are really important. I would much rather refine the experience before I release the site, than to quickly try to fix a major catastrophe after its launch. The other benefit is that I can then share my experiences with the DV editors like yourselves. I figure that if I can generate more interest in GOOD quality video streaming, everyone benefits.

Ok, Cheesehole,
Thank you for your comments, I now understand the problems you are having. I tried launching with IE & Opera, and they both worked fine. But, the problem, resides with Microsoft, you gota love them.

Background: Quicktime was considered by IE a "Netscape style" plugin, and functioned that way. However, when MS release IE 5.5SP2 (not even waiting for the next major version change) they decided to pull the rug out from under quicktime, disabling ALL netscape style plugins. Quicktime was unaware and unprepared for this sudden change, and had to scramble to redesign Quicktime to follow MS's strict Active X controls for operation. It took nearly 2 weeks before the update was ready.
ActiveX in simple terms were MS's way to restrict special actions that go beyond the scope of a typical browser. This effects all Web browsers including Opera. So for instance, if you go to MS Windows Update, you must accept the ActiveX (gray box) permission (only the first time you visit.) or else MS cannot look to see what software you need, and therefore doesn't know what to send you or update.

Now, in reality, what has happened is that Active X has been the target and the source of most of the vunerablilities for viruses, so I understand cheesehole's hesitation to allow ActiveX to perform any functions. Unfortunately there is no solution, or way around this. I guess I have to face the fact that in my case, Quicktime needs to look to see if you have ON2 installed. If it can't....Roadblock.

theigloo
Please don't take this in a negative way, I'm not trying to say one method is better than another, I'm just voicing my thoughts.
I havn't forgotton about Mpeg-1. I actually use MPEG-1 for Demo Reel VCDs, that I create. It IS very good. I even looked at your site and downloaded a movie and watched it. Quality was excellent however these are the limitations I encountered:

Compression ratio isn't great, as compared with current technology.
-Your 2:35 snowboarding video was zipped 27megs, unzipped 29megs.
I reencoded the same video with ON2 and put it on my site with nearly the same quality and the size was 12megs. I posted it to my site at the same place (I hope you don't mind, for this example) www.reelondvd.com Then choose: Streaming Video

Because of the poor ratio, progressive streaming (ability to start playing before download is complete) is not possible. So if someone wants to see a clip of the video, they have to download the entire file, and unzip it before they can see any of it. Some people might not mind this hastle for a 10 & 15 second videos, but if it's longer than 30 seconds it can be frustrating.

Webspace storage is expensive. WHY? cause that's where they get you financially. Unless you are hosting your own website and have a T1 line ($400/month), webspace storage is expensive. www.Hostik.com is a steal. I'm almost wary that it's too good to be true. Most sites might give you 250megs for $19.95/month, and additional space can run as much as $10-100 per 100megs/month. and then they put transfer limitations.

Longer times to upload to the site. Most People who have Cable or ADSL are limited to 128-400 kilobits/sec Upload speed. Thats 12-40 KiloBytes/sec. So with MPEG1, your 2min35sec video would take up to 34 minutes to upload. My suggestion would be to keep the high quality video and reduce the size, Divx 5.02 may be more ideal.

Compatibitility with slower computers. According to ON2, the codec is less CPU demanding than Divx or MPeg1. I havn't verifed this.

HOW to use the ON2 Codec.

Easy as pie, well, almost.
1. Goto On2 Opensource site at: www.vp3.com
You need to register, (they just need an email address) and download either the version depending on whether you plan on streaming with WMP or Quicktime. For simplicity lets use Quicktime. The windows version works with Virtual dub, but I havn't tried streaming with WMP.

2. Install Quicktime 5.02. Now, in order to publish to a website, you either need to use Cleaner 5, which comes with Premiere 6.0, or just use Quicktime 5.02 pro.
The difference between Regular & Pro is it's export abilities. The download is the same from apple, but paying the $29.95 unlocks the export/publish feature. If you don't own pro. I recommend buying it. It's cheap enough to buy, and my personal opinion that if a company is willing to do offer a program that cheap, then I don't mind paying.

3. Install the On2 codec/encoder for Quicktime that you downloaded (for Free).

4. Open Quicktime choose: File, Import, specify your video file, Open.

5. Choose: File, Export, Options, for the video (top) choose ON2VP3, and the default settings will work, You may want to up the FPS to 29.97, default is 15.

6. I then choose Best, Keyframe every 120, Limit Data Rate to 70kB/sec. then OK.

7. For Audio Choose QDesign Music2 44khz, 16bit, mono, and in Options, the 48kbits. Then OK.

8. Finally Choose Prepare for Internet Streaming - FastStart Compressed Headers. OK

9. Give it a name, and Wala. Done.

Depending on which software you use to publish your website, the HTML can differ slightly.

Jeffy82.
I can be reached at jeffy82@aol.com, for a quicker response to encoding questions or HTML format.