What Project Options & Render Setting should I use

PIERCGG5230 wrote on 1/13/2009, 8:03 AM

I have created a video for someone to distribute via a web filestream (not YouTube but one that we pay for). The filestreaming company we use does not adjust the video size so we get to see exactly what we've created.

Now, the problem. She keeps trying the video out on various computers with varying screen sizes and resolutions and is DRIVING ME NUTS of "this one is fine" but "on my laptop it is too small" but on one of her older slower machines "it is too slow" or it looks "blurry".

WHAT are the BEST settings for the Project Options and for the Make Movie - Render Settings screen for a .wmv file (Windows Media Player) that will give me the LARGEST (screen size, not file size) viewable video with the MOST clarity while still not being a horribly large megabyte size.

I have been trying out different setting for almost 2 months now so please don't tell me I just have to "play around with the settings", cause that "playing around" method just ain't working here.

Comments

Eugenia wrote on 1/13/2009, 8:30 AM

If the source footage is HD, export like this:
http://eugenia.gnomefiles.org/2007/11/09/exporting-with-vegas-for-vimeo-hd/
If your footage is not HD, again export as above, but change the resolution to 640x360 for widescreen, or 640x480 for 4:3 video, at 2,000 kbps.

Now, regarding looking "small" on some screens, it's because some screens have larger resolutions for the same diagonial size, and so they will naturally look smaller. This is not your fault. As for the blurry remark, I don't know, but the same kind of footage should look the same on any computer that used the same media player. As for the slowness, well, different computers have different speeds, and you can't expect modern video sizes to play smoothly on very old PCs.

PIERCGG5230 wrote on 1/13/2009, 8:49 AM

What would I put in the Template field of the make Movie - Render Settings box? There is not 640x480 at 2,000 as you describe.

I using Platinum 8.0

Eugenia wrote on 1/13/2009, 9:09 AM

As I write in the tutorial I linked, you don't do "make movie", you click RENDER AS, and then you follow the screenshots in the tutorial. And if there are no such numbers available there by default, you type them.

Eugenia wrote on 1/13/2009, 9:10 AM

The 2,000 kbps we talked about might need to be written as 2 M or 2,000,000 depending on the dialog and what it expects as bitrates.

PIERCGG5230 wrote on 1/13/2009, 11:22 AM

Thanks Eugenia. I will work this further tonight to see if it helps.

Sonata wrote on 1/13/2009, 11:39 AM

Also, and I don't know *why* this is for me, but I need to use pan & crop to select 16:9 ratio on the widescreen footage (in addition to using a widescreen template) or else I get 4 pixels of black bars on the top and bottom of the YouTube widescreen window, even with 640x360 resolution.

I also use "3M" bit rate and I get a "view in high quality" option on my videos.

SD, not HD.

Chienworks wrote on 1/13/2009, 2:54 PM

Widescreen SD is not 16:9. It's close, but not exact.