Compression Help: Getting that file to 50mb

[Meryem Ersoz]

Does anyone need help with this?

If you render out of the timeline in FCP, the default settings will make your file too large.

Things you can do....

1) When you complete your film, click

"Export">

"Using Quicktime Conversion">

"Options">

"Settings">

"Compression Type"> pulldown Sorenson Video 3

Now you can change the data rate...if you drop this down to even 2400 or 1800, you can maintain quality at the required size.

Another thing you can reduce to compress your file is the audio quality.

Return to the menu where you pushed the "Settings" (entitled "Movie Settings") and click on the "Settings" the Sound heading....you can reduce to 32khz without much loss in audio quality, and this will shrink your file.

The UWOL Challenge is also a great opportunity to make friends with Compressor. You can do all these same things and more, and it tends to render your file faster than FCP.

Maybe someone else who works in other NLEs can offer some additional advice. I tried to make this a step-by-step quickie tutorial, because I know some of you have never output for the web before. For some of you, this may even be a first film, in which case, you have my complete respect and admiration, for taking the plunge.

I hope this helps new users. Maybe we can hear basics from some other platform users.

[Bruce Foreman]

Originally Posted by Meryem Ersoz

Maybe someone else who works in other NLEs can offer some additional advice. I tried to make this a step-by-step quickie tutorial, because I know some of you have never output for the web before. For some of you, this may even be a first film, in which case, you have my complete respect and admiration, for taking the plunge.

I hope this helps new users. Maybe we can hear basics from some other platform users.

I'll make a stab at this. A few of us in DVC7 who don't have NLE's that output to a .mov format tried to use QuickTime 7 Pro and messages indicated somewhat miserable results. QT7 Pro seemed to lighten tones overall and softened detail significantly.

So I wound up submitting mine in .mp4 and at least one other indicated theirs would be .wmv

For this one I had time to "mess" with the beast and here's what I came up with:

In Pinnacle Studio 10.7 plus I output to full DV in an .avi file.
Opened that in QT7 Pro and selected Export.
Under SETTINGS selected Sorenson Video 3, KEY Frames and DATA Rate both AUTOMATIC and COMPRESSOR Quality Medium.
Size: 428x240 for 16:9 as specified
Filter: Set Brightness at -7 and Sharpening at +2

After saving, that gave me a result that I was not ashamed to look at. The "window" is a bit on the small side (I like to see the screen filled but the image still sharp) but the color and clarity of a 3CCD camera was there.

So I hope this helps a few of you folks.

[Meryem Ersoz]

thanks so much for chiming in, bruce. i wish this whole cross-platform biz would go away. as i said in the beginning, there will be some learning curves, and i am wide open to other formats which are cross-platform. it's ridiculous that an equally accessible, true cross-platform codec still eludes us.

any other PC users care to share their experience with conforming their video to sorenson or mp4? i'd love to hear about it. (i don't have a context for it, but i'd love to hear about it!)

p.s. there is currently no uploaded .wmv file. i don't even think the uploader will accept it, since it is programmed to receive .mov file extensions. if you want to upload a .wmv file, you can do so on your own website and post a link to it in your feedback thread, for viewers who might want to view the better quality...

[Ruth Happel]

I posted my video yesterday, and compressed it using my trial download of Vegas 7. I don't know if it appears optimal- this is the first video I have uploaded to the web, so my learning curve for this contest has been very steep, between learning video editing software, and how to upload to the web. I did the editing in DV and then I used the Render option in Vegas 7 and selected Quicktime as the format. I selected the 3 MB template, since the other templates displayed a lot of compression artifacts - blurring and loss of color. I created a custom frame size of 428x240 since I shot the video at 16:9 instead of 4:3 (my camera is the Panasonic PV-GS500, and I've been playing with its widescreen abilities). I reduced the bit rate to about 240 Kbps to get the size under 50 MB for my video. I didn't do any sharpening or colors. I did set the audio to be 48 KHz and high quality. I was happy to be able to cut it to just under 3 minutes (without the credits), and down to 50 MB. Hopefully as the contests progress I will learn better how to tweak video. But I feel I've already won, having learned so much by doing this contest. The last time I did anything with video other than just shooting it was over 15 years ago, and tools and capabilities certainly have changed a lot since then. Thanks!

[Meryem Ersoz]

thanks for sharing your experience, ruth. i uploaded my first-ever web video for a DV Challenge (DVC #2, i think....), so i know how nerve-wracking it is to learn on the fly with a deadline looming. all part of the fun n games! it sounds as if you did a lot better than i did, my first time around.

one tip to get the smaller file size is to lower the audio...at web size, you can pretty much drop it to 32 khz without much loss. most of us are setting our entries to music--there's not as much critical dialogue as in a DVC entry, so reducing audio quality is one of the best ways to reduce file size.

[Ruth Happel]

Thanks for the encouragement, Meryem. It was a challenge in more than one sense of the word, but it was a great experience. I found it perfect for getting me to finally start doing something with my camera, which I've had since late last year but not really done much with. So far I've mainly just been shooting nature videos in the back yard, but not doing anything with what I shot. So with this contest inspiring me to start learning Vegas, I feel like I've now at least made a start at editing and working creatively with my videos.

I thought about lowering the audio quality, but actually this video is very dependent on audio, so I didn't want to take a chance of making it unintelligible. But I'll keep that in mind for future contests!

Thanks for the contest, it has really motivated me.

Ruth

[Greg Boston]

Originally Posted by Meryem Ersoz

it's ridiculous that an equally accessible, true cross-platform codec still eludes us.

I believe you'll find that MPEG1 is cross platform.

-gb-

[Geir Inge]

I tried uploading my video as a wmv-file, but it was rejected after 20 min.
So I baught Sorenseon, and it worked out fine, uploading.
For this matter i found a link to this little joke, in a Norwegian forum.
It's about explorer, netscape and firefox, what browser is the best one?
I hope it makes you laugh, too :-)

http://www.firefoxflicks.com/flick/i...=19542&c=false

[Per Johan Naesje]

LOL - Geir Inge, that was nice :-)

As a PC guy, I will give you my experience with this matter. Seriously it's a jungle out there! Tons of Non Linear Editors (NLE) and much more to choose from than in the Mac-world where you have Imovie and FCP.

I'm using Avid Liquid 7.1 myself as a NLE and this is perfect for my use. I'm sure that others which are using Vegas, Premier, Canopus etc. are saying the same. For everyday use where you don't have to concern about web-delivery your NLE is your friend most of the time.

What I have found is that you have to use a special software to get a decent result. Bruce's advice above is very good. What I found with QT-Pro is that it generate a rather large file compared with e.g Sorensen Squeeze Suite. As an example I generated an avi-file from my source in Avid Liquid. The avi-file was approx. 550MB in size. The QT-Pro compressed this file to more than 60MB in 428x240 using Sorenson 3 codec, while the Sorenson Squeeze Suite did the same at a size of just 28MB!
Playing bofh files side by side I couldn't tell which was compressed in QT or the other. What I'm trying to say is that you should be aware that it can be smart to take a look at different solutions. I know that Sorenson Squeeze Suite is expensive but it have a veeery nice and effective compression codec compared with e.g. QT-Pro.

I also found that when you use such a small size as 428x240 you have to be aware that small object in your film maybe doesn't show up so good as you think it will. My tip is to have this in your mind when your are planning and shooting your film. Go nearer to get this tiny objects larger with good lightning will help.

Well, I'm still out doing some more shooting for the challenge. I'm going up in the mountains for a couple of days now. Hopefully the weather will be fine to get some nice shot of the sky.
Sunday will be my D-day or editing-day, where I will put together and send in my contribution. This have been very fun so far and I have spend many hours out in the wild, pushing some limits to get decent footage in not so good weather conditions

Good luck to you all I think we are all winners!

[Meryem Ersoz]

i don't want people to have to buy new software to participate. the whole point was to avoid unnecessary downloads, which don't even require any additional money, just space on our hard drives. adding additional costs to participating was certainly not our intent!

greg, i have never used mpeg1 for anything. you've mentioned it before. does it conform to a .mov extension (that's why flash it not on our cross-platform codec list, the uploader only accepts .mov extensions....i don't know enough about it to discuss why that is, but it's one parameter.)

so, if MPEG1 conforms to .mov, we will add it to the list of acceptable codecs. so we can have sorenson 3, mp4, and mpeg1.

this is the single stickiest issue, and the one that will take the most effort to work out. thank you for the feedback and for staying with us as we work out the process.....

by the next Challenge, we should be able tol make it frictionless, from all of the information we have received from the first one....

p.s. geir -- that short video was a hoot!

[Brendan Marnell]

Well that's uploaded that, then ... it had to be .mov, which is fair enough, if .mov can be played on mac as clearly as .wmv plays back on my pc. Will pc users get feedback on that?

It may not be possible to "optimize playback quality" under Preferences for Quicktime Player on a pc. I could not improve it. Qt played back with frequent smudging and pixellation for me, while Windows Media Player showed me an unblemished .wmv version of the same file squeezed to the same rates. Both files came to 20MB using 1Mbps_Stream in Sorenson 3.

[Paul Wags]

I think FLASH (FLV) would be best at it plays on all computers.

I used EDIUS 4 to cut it up and then encoding was very easy straight out of the timeline with procoder express that comes with EDIUS.

QT looks better on a MAC and WMV looks beter on a PC when watching the exact same clips...go figure....

22 megs for 3 mins mine came in at...

[Steve Siegel]

Having spent two days trying to get my file from 60 mB to the required 50 without making it unwatchable, may I suggest that in the future you set the size limit at 70mB? These submissions are not talking heads, they are all outdoor moving images, and difficult to compress without degradation. A few extra megabytes would really help, and not increase download times that much.

[Bob Safay]

Ruth, I was going nuts trying to render my 16x9 video. I read your post about your settings, tried them and was able to upload with no problems. Thank you so much. Bob

[Ruth Happel]

Bob,

Glad I could help. This is the first video I've ever uploaded to the web, so I am happily pleased my post about how I did it could help someone. This contest taught me a lot, learning how to edit video with an NLE, how to compress, etc. It has been a steep but fun learning curve.

Ruth