best way to post short video sequences online?

[Dom Stevenson]

What's the best way to post short video sequences online? I have been thinking of opening a .mac account and wonder if this is a good option for showing stuff on the web. Has anyone got one of these accounts with video posted that i could have look at? Also what is the best file type to export out of final cut 5 for optimal quality?
thanks
Dom

[Austin Meyers]

i have .mac, although i don't really use it for video hosting. i use just the webserver that hosts my website. i use 1and1.com, they have really good prices/bandwidth.

i have a special folder on my server that that public has direct access to i.e. they can see all the individual files in it.

http://file.meyersproduction.com/

as you can see i have alot of varied things in there. from photos to html to videos of all shapes and sizes, and it requires no coding (after an initial setup, which is mostly copy/pasting) you can also password protect certain things etc if you only want x client seeing x things.

if you have any kind of familiarity with html i would recommend doing it that way over the .mac.

don't get me wrong .mac is great...great for keeping back ups of my address book bookmarks etc... but for the web stuff it don't give you much flexibility.

here is a sample of my .mac stuff.

http://homepage.mac.com/aatawm/iMovieTheater25.html



as far as exporting i personally like to use the h.264 codec at a bit rate of 600-700 bit rate for a 640x480 movie and 400-600 for a 320x240 movie

and example is here:

http://www.tapwaterentertainment.com...drenaline.html

and if you're using compressor you can set it as a custom export setting (the web download 800k setting is pretty close except its set for 320x240)


the biggest problem with h.264 is that a fair amount of pc's have issues playing them back if they don't have the latest version of quicktime, although since it's been bundled with itunes that problem is quickly resolving.

another option you might look at is exporting a movie as described above and uploading it to a youtube channel.

and example of that workflow:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=XfI-ugQL2EY

and with youtube you will have very very few who can't look at it.

hope this helps

austin

[Andzei Matsukevits]

im also paying for server room. I pay $3/month and get 2gb of space. I just upload all the files there and everyone can download them

[Ervin Farkas]

Web hosting is getting so inexpensive, it's not worth anymore to fool around with free hosting that has, in most cases, strings attached.

Deciding on the file type is not an easy task. You have to consider such things as your target audience (their computer equipment, willingness to install specific players, their connection speed), your content (video, "film look", etc). I have done extensive experimenting and for me Windows Media is the best fit - may or may not work for you. Bottom line is, unfortunately there is no "one style fits all" solution... you have to do your own homework.

[Rune Austefjord]

Inexpensive web hosting often has limitations on the size of files you can upload, and limitations on how many gigabytes you can download from an account.
My box.net account allows me to upload large files, gives me 2GB storage, and up to 20GB download per month, all for just $49.
The limitation of 20GB is used up in just days if you upload a large popular clip, such as my sample video from my new Canon HV10.
So I uploaded my files to sharebigfile.com which lets you store an unlimited number of files of any size up to 500MB per file (for the free account), and gives you unlimited download bandwidth. Their only limitation is that they delete the file you upload after it has not been downloaded by anyone for a month.
I also host my own webpages at http://xrun.mine.nu but I have just 2.5mbit upload bandwidth, so max download speed for a single user is about 250KBytes/sec, which isn't all that fast, and large files take many minutes, with gigabyte files taking a loooong time.

I just host my largest files on sharebigfile.com, and the smaller files on my own server here at home.
Sharebigfile.com gives you a decent download speed, just takes a while to upload, and if you wanna keep the file available, make sure its downloaded at least once a month.

[Bob Thieda]

Rune, that is $49 a year, correct?

1and1.com gives me 120GB of space, 1200GB traffic, two domains and 1200 email address for $4.99 a month.

Bob T.

[Rune Austefjord]

Yes, that's $49 per year.

[Matthew Craggs]

I typically use Quicktime files encoded in Sorenson 3, 320x240, and sort of do a "to taste" thing with the bitrate. I adjust it depending on the size of the file I want.

I admit that it isn't the best codec out there, but I am always looking for better options, and for the time being there seems to be a reasonable balance between file size and quality.

[Dom Stevenson]

Many thanks everyone for the useful tips. I'm hoping to get some stuff up from my A1 ASAP.