Make your Ppro Mp4's Progressively stream

[lobstaman]

I just found this really great gem of a free download that has just made my life so much simpler. It's called MP4 FastStart and "it adjusts the MP4's metadata to allow for Flash players to play them right away (Fast Start), while it progressively downloads."

http://www.datagoround.com/lab/

In PPro for example if you export a mp4 or mov file and try to embed it on a webpage either in quicktime or flash player the entire video will download before it starts to play. Which is no good for streaming media so previously I was using the following workflow to get around this.

-Export to an Uncompressed Avi (huge filesize)
-Open with Quicktme Pro(money wasted now that I found mp4 faststart)
-Export to h.264 with fast start enabled in export options.

Now I can just export directly from PPro to h.264 mp4 and fix it with MP4 Fast Start and it's ready to embed and stream on a website. Thought I'd share!

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

This is useful, thanks!

[lobstaman]

I made a mistake in my first post .. this only does mp4 files NOT mov.

But it's a good app .. only problem I need to work past now is when I embed quicktime the video is a lot brighter than the original video (too bright) and if I embed in flash (brightness is just right) but flash h.264 in Internet Explorer is choppy .. even on my 3ghz Core2Duo with 4 gig of ram. Seems like theres always something to be a pain in the butt.

Here's the comparison .. top is flash and bottom is quicktime.

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

It is normal to only support MP4, since Flash only supports MP4 between the two. However, what you see there is just a Quicktime different gamma, which is known and most people don't want it. Quicktime uses a different gamma than most other players, so it's not that "mp4 looks different", but rather "quicktime plays it differently than all the rest".

[lobstaman]

It is normal to only support MP4, since Flash only supports MP4 between the two. However, what you see there is just a Quicktime different gamma, which is known and most people don't want it. Quicktime uses a different gamma than most other players, so it's not that "mp4 looks different", but rather "quicktime plays it differently than all the rest".

Yeah I been reading up on it most of the day. Seems to be a pain for everyone. Right now I have to choose .. if i embed in quicktime it's too bright and if i embed in flash half of my viewers see a choppy mess but gamma is correct for everyone. So looks like i'll be embeding in quicktime and making the video darker when I edit it.

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

Why is it choppy? It shouldn't be choppy. Export in a lower-res/bitrate and see if this fixes the choppiness problem. If yes, then you just don't use a fast-enough PC to decode them.

[lobstaman]

Why is it choppy? It shouldn't be choppy. Export in a lower-res/bitrate and see if this fixes the choppiness problem. If yes, then you just don't use a fast-enough PC to decode them.

Core2duo at 3ghz with 4 gig of ram and a Nvidia 8800GT shouldn't have a problem decoding a 640x360 mp4. Not to mention it happens in Internet Explorer and is fine in Firefox. Some have the problem ..some don't. Seems to be 50/50 from what people have viewed it so far.

http://lobstaman.ca/?p=128

This is the video here .. or well one of them. Just a quick vacation video I had done nothing fancy.

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

No, it is not choppy for me.
Make sure:
1. Your viewers have the LATEST Flash installed.
2. Make sure you are running the latest JW player (you aren't).
3. Make sure your viewers are on a fast pipe. They might be thinking of the choppiness as a CPU problem rather than network-bound.
4. For a wide VGA clip, you don't need over 650 kbps of bitrate, use VBR if you can.

[lobstaman]

4. For a wide VGA clip, you don't need over 650 kbps of bitrate, use VBR if you can.

I tried 800kbps bitrate but found the quality really suffered. .. wasn't till about 1500 kbps when I found the quality to be acceptable.

[lobstaman]

OMG I had 2 versions of JW player and I thought I had used the latest one but I guess not. Used the new one and choppiness is gone. Can't believe I did that. Thanks Eugenia.

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

1500 kbps for a VGA clip is a lot to ask from your viewers' connection... Just make sure you use VBR. Vegas Pro can use VBR when using the MainConcept encoder.

[lobstaman]

1500 kbps for a VGA clip is a lot to ask from your viewers' connection... Just make sure you use VBR. Vegas Pro can use VBR when using the MainConcept encoder.

I don't see why .. if they can watch the same clip in HD on Facebook which weighs in at 40mb and on Youtube at 32mb then I can't see them having a problem watching it on my site at 24mb even if it's a couple hundred pixels short of youtube's highest HD width. Even if I embed at the same width (640) from youtube and in HD it still is 32mb so mine at 1500kbps (24mb) is still using less bandwidth.

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

Well, you are assuming that everyone can watch HD on Facebook, Youtube and Vimeo. Not everyone can.

[lobstaman]

Well, you are assuming that everyone can watch HD on Facebook, Youtube and Vimeo. Not everyone can.

Yea thats why my site has a low bandwidth version and a HD or high bandwidth version. You might not have noticed when you went to my site because the last 2 videos i put on i hadn't got the low bandwidth versions on yet. Sorry bout that.