High Quality On line video sharing/posting

[Mike Stivala]

Hi -
I'm building a web site to promote a film I made several years ago that
is just coming out on DVD. Basically, I'm looking to post a trailer and clips from the film on a 3rd party site (ie for free) and embed the clips in the site I'm building.
So...after doing a test with clips on YouTube, I was not happy because -
1 - You Tube promotes other stuff in the embedded window
2. quality kind of blows

Ok - so I'm hoping anyone out there has a better solution. Basically I'm looking for a place - like YouTube - where I can post a higher quality clip and embed the clip in my site without seeing links for other people's clips (I don't mind seeing ads - just don't want to promote other people's films on a web site I"m building for my film site).
or -
Is there a better, free to very cheap solution that I haven't thought of.
Id rather not pay for a streaming server myself at the moment, because I just started rolling on another project (an original series that will be offered via the internet) for which I will invest in a dedicated streaming server.

or -
are there tricks to posting on YouTube to get superior quality video (QT of Flash file??).

Thanks in advance for any help
Mike

[Perrone Ford]

www.vimeo.com

[Ervin Farkas]

Basically you have to either:

a/ host on a free site and be bound by their quality, ads, changing policies, running the risk of having your clips offline at any given time

b/ host on your own website and have full control over the look, quality, size, pretty much everything.

I really don't see why you wouldn't go with b/? Web hosting is dirt cheap nowadays!

I see you trying to use QT on your site. Not bad, just keep in mind that you're giving trouble to just about 95% of all computer users who are not on a Mac - the QT embedded player implementation in Internet Explorer has some known issues. It's up to you to decide what is more important for you: for me it's reaching as many potential viewers as possible, and you can do that with either flash or Windows Media.

I hope this helps,

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

Go for Flash. I've searched about the subject, and if you go for Quicktime, you'll exclude many windows-based viewers. If you choose for Windows Media, you'll exclude many Mac-users. But Flash is supported on both, standard in their browser (I think...?)

So go for Flash. The quality/data ratio is good too.

[Andy Wilkinson]

As already hinted above, if you want to have the videos for free Vimeo is the best option quality wise for HD (1280x720p) at the moment....but it's not perfect as I've posted about before.

There are some recent yet very well know tricks and advice to getting better quality on YouTube which I've used to good effect - "better" but in my opinion still not good enough!.... but it's free and YouTube is ubiquitous so I'll take better to get certain videos across to my chosen audiences.

Web delivery has been well covered on this forum (in the Web and DVD delivery section!) so just have a look round/search in that section and see if any of that that helps. Good luck.

[Mike Stivala]

for all of the input. I was thinking about it last night while driving home and
I think I'm starting to come around to Ervin's philosophy.

Hosting is fairly cheap and at the end of the day I'd rather control stuff
myself than be at the mercy of the YouTube-igans.

OK, next question - anybody recommend a reliable, inexpensive streaming
server??


Thanks again
Mike

[Perrone Ford]

Ervin is right in one regard. Hosting a website is cheap. But bandwidth is not. Make VERY sure you get an accurate handle on monthly bandwidth figures before you sign on the line.

[Ervin Farkas]

One more aspect: about half of the viewers (my estimation) will surf your site while at work; with more and more employers blocking video sharing sites, if you embed into your page video hosted on one of the blocked sites, all the viewer gets is an error... not a good projection on your video business.

[Perrone Ford]

Great point Ervin! If your business is going to be relying on these images, host it yourself. No doubt.

[Ervin Farkas]

Originally Posted by Mike Stivala

OK, next question - anybody recommend a reliable, inexpensive streaming server?

You can choose EITHER reliable OR cheap... not both. Take your pick.

[Mike Stivala]

Originally Posted by Ervin Farkas

You can choose EITHER reliable OR cheap... not both. Take your pick.

That settles it - I'm shopping for a streaming server.

So far though I've spoken to several different companies and the prices, for similar service, are all over teh map. I had one rep (from Vindego) quote me a price for their "starter" service - $500 set up fee and $250 per month which to me seemed outrageous. Then another company - again for similar space and bandwidth - quote me no set up fee and $60 per month.

I've done research on several of the companies and I've see good and bad about all of them.

Why the huge price difference? Are set ups really that different to warrant such a big difference? I mean - if I'm going to pay I want a reliable set up - but it's hard to justify paying tons more money just because company A has a cool website and slick talking salesmen. I think a little trial and error may be the thing to do. See if I can get a trial with some of these server companies and take them for a test spin for a few weeks.

mike

[Ervin Farkas]

Are you sure you need a streaming server? That's for live video transmissions.

For hosting your website that has either pages with embedded video or simply video that can be downloaded, you need a regular webserver. 10 GB of space and 300 GB data transfer per month is only $4.29 a month at GoDaddy and similar at other companies!

[Perrone Ford]

Agreed. All you need is a webhosting company that gives you a LOT of bandwidth and decent storage.

I looked at some last night after reading this thread and found some that offered 1500GB of storage and !5,000GB of transfer bandwidth for $10 a month. That's an INCREDIBLE price. I'm tempted to do a webpage for myself and showcase my stuff. Frankly, I just don't want to do the webwork.

[Ervin Farkas]

Just use common sense - when something is too good to be true, it probably is a scam. I read stories about these companies, they offer the Sun & the Moon almost for free - then they shut your site down because you eat up their bandwidth... so just be careful.

I am not advocating for any particular company, but I suggest use GoDaddy for a reference. If a price is close to theirs, you might get a better deal, you might not, but if it's much better, you're probably in for some big nasty surprise. I am with them for several years now and been happy - heard about customers complaining about high prices on add-ons but for basic hosting they have been good to me. Never had my sites down, got e-mail support in a few hours (maximum a day).

Lunarpages.com and NetworkSolutions.com have also good reviews.

[Mike Stivala]

Originally Posted by Ervin Farkas

Are you sure you need a streaming server? That's for live video transmissions.

For hosting your website that has either pages with embedded video or simply video that can be downloaded, you need a regular webserver. 10 GB of space and 300 GB data transfer per month is only $4.29 a month at GoDaddy and similar at other companies!

Well, for my first project - a site to promote my DVD, I'm sure I could get by with even the above mentioned deal from godaddy as it involves a few 1-2 min clips and the audience is relatively small

but...
for my next project I plan to put up 10-12 min episodes of an original series (one at a time). If all goes well, promotion wise, the goal is to have tens of thousands of people watching the episodes. I was told by a friend of mine who is a tech director at a large net/media company that I would need a streaming server for that. They are not just for live webcasting. Also, with a streaming server teh player in embedded in the code and adding the video to the site is as simple as copying the html and pasting it. That makes it so much easier for me and if I can find a resonably priced one - I'll brobably end up trying it out.

thanks again for all the input

mike