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Best way to share video?


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Naderfan
Queen of Confrontation
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Ohio
 
2009-05-24, 13:24

I need help - I'm pretty hopeless when it comes to this stuff, so please be nice.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to upload and share videos I've been taking with my digital camera. I normally don't bother with that, but since my parents live far away, I've been taking videos fairly often of my son so I can share with them. I had been using a website, Dropshots, which was easy enough, but apparently I maxed out the limit, so I would have to pay to keep using it.

I do have a Flickr account, but there's a 2 video a month limit, and also none of my videos seem to meet the required size limits (same with Photobucket) and I have no idea how to resize.

So I'm wondering if there are any other sites out there you would recommend for video sharing. If my only (or best) option is to buy a subscription somewhere, I'll do that, but then I'd like to know what's the best. Should I just buy iLife 09, since I'm sharing so much?

Anyway, thanks for any help/advice/suggestions you might have.
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chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: near Bremen, Germany
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2009-05-24, 13:27

I like Vimeo, myself. There's also, of course, YouTube.
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Dorian Gray
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
 
2009-05-24, 13:30

I think you should learn how to resize. It's not hard with QuickTime Pro if you've got that, or probably iMovie also (though less flexibility). It basically boils down to frame size (horizontal x vertical pixels), frame rate (frames per second), data-rate (bits per second, influenced by the degree of compression) and video duration.

You could use YouTube perhaps - it's dead easy to use and free.

Alternatively you could just share the video file itself, rather than uploading it to a video-sharing website. Depending on the file size you could email it, send it via SaveFile or similar, or burn it to an optical disc and send it by mail.
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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2009-05-24, 14:04

Quote:
Originally Posted by Naderfan View Post
I do have a Flickr account, but there's a 2 video a month limit, and also none of my videos seem to meet the required size limits (same with Photobucket) and I have no idea how to resize.
Like Dorian said, resizing and recompressing is easy if you buy QuickTime Pro. Apple has been pretty good about allowing QTP licenses to carry over for a version or two without making users pay again when they upgrade. I can't recall when the last switch was and if that would indicate that they'll charge existing users again with the upcoming QuickTime X in Snow Leopard…

Anyhow, QuickTime Player's export feature offers built-in suggested settings for each of its formats but also allows you to further customize the settings to a high degree. For example, if I chose to export to the QuickTime ".mov" format:



I get this helpful selection of defaults:



that I can further customize to my heart's content:




Of course, the vast number of options may be daunting at first, but it's all pretty logical and straightforward once you walk through it bit-by-bit. Generally, higher quality results in larger files, more frames per second result in larger files, and larger width*height dimensions result in larger files. Tweak these to get something smaller for sharing online.

Another option you could use for resizing and recompressing is HandBrake. HandBrake was originally built to convert DVDs into video files to play on the computer, but it recently gained the ability to convert from any arbitrary video file it can read. HandBrake is specially geared for MPEG-4 output; so, the options reflect that.



HandBrake also comes with a bunch of presets for exporting options.



Quote:
Originally Posted by Naderfan View Post
So I'm wondering if there are any other sites out there you would recommend for video sharing. If my only (or best) option is to buy a subscription somewhere, I'll do that, but then I'd like to know what's the best. Should I just buy iLife 09, since I'm sharing so much?
Getting iLife wouldn't help you with your videos. Perhaps you mean a "Mobile Me" subscription? I wouldn't suggest MM for something like this because you'd be locked into paying up again every year to keep your content online. There are much better services dedicated to hosting online video, such as…

Quote:
Originally Posted by chucker View Post
I like Vimeo, myself. There's also, of course, YouTube.
Seconded! Vimeo picture and audio quality and user experience kick the snot out of YouTube. The only drawback to Vimeo is that it has a slow video conversion queue for non-paid users. So, during peak hours, videos can take an hour or so to convert instead of a few minutes. If you're going to pay up for a video hosting service, my vote would be with Vimeo.

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Naderfan
Queen of Confrontation
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Ohio
 
2009-05-24, 14:20

cool, thanks you guys. And Brad, thanks for the images, that helps a lot!
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