Export for net downloading

Age old question.... I'm on FCP 6.0.2 I have a series of (roughly) 7 minute video segments (mini DV source) on time lines that I wish to export for downloading (sales) purposes to a web-site. My web gal says I should get each segement down to roughly 35MG. Anyone know the best way to do this....?

Thanks,
Michael

Yeah... Drop it to Compressor. Feel free to play around with it. Just remember that you really need to pay attention to your audio settings in order to keep the file size compact. 32Khz, mono is suitable for almost everything...

Thanks for that...I got lost in Compressor, but I'll try again...and I'm told that using QT conversion produces inferior product

michael rouse Wrote:
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> Thanks for that...I got lost in Compressor, but
> I'll try again...and I'm told that using QT
> conversion produces inferior product


No it does not. QT conversion is the golden standard and it is the only way to export anything out of FCP in digital format (at least without additional hardware).

You don't even need Compressor to do your web squeeze... You can do the same in Quicktime Pro. It even has some handy presets for web delivery. You really don't need to buy any additional software to create a web deliverable quicktime.

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QT conversion is the golden standard and it is the only way to export anything out of FCP in digital format (at least without additional hardware).

What?

There is no way to get anything out of Final Cut not in digital format without additional hardware. Macs lack analog video I/O spigots. If you come out of Final Cut as a Quicktime or via Firewire, you're coming out digital.

Now, contrary to conventional wisdom, "digital" is not synonymous with "perfect." Converting from one digital format to another can definitely degrade your footage. So "Quicktime Conversion" is fine only as long as it's fine. It's not a guarantee of perfection.

Err...

1. There's no "golden standard", and definitely not QT conversion.

2. Everything FCP does is digital. Every output starts or ends with digital. Everything stored in your capture scratch is digital. Firewire outputs, SDI, HD-SDI, HDMI, DVI, AES/EBU, these are all digital signals.

3. In Compressor, you have access to more tools (esp. Frame Controls), these help in retiming, resizing, de-interlacing, motion compensation, etc.. All of which QT conversion does, but not very well.



www.strypesinpost.com

Jeff and Strypes; PLS read my post again. I said "IS the ONLY way" so you must have misunderstood what I wrote. (ok, not completely true since you can also Save as QT or Export to Compressor but the idea is the same.. without additional HW like deck, I/O board etc , you need to save your edit as digital file...using quicktime. This process will not de-grade your project and is essential even if you use other programs to do the actual web-compression).

About the golden standard; yes, exporting a quicktime is the standard way. The other way would be to print to tape. If you need web-compression, this is probably something you don't do.

Okay, there are 4 different ways of exporting a Quicktime from Final Cut Pro (not including going out to tape).

1. Exporting a Quicktime movie. This extract frames directly from your source footage or render files. Footage that has not been rendered do not lose a generation, if "recompress all frames" is unchecked.

2. Exporting via Quicktime Conversion. This allows you access to codecs available in Quicktime Player. You'll lose a generation doing so, superwhites and sub blacks (blacks below black point, whatever it is called) will be clipped. I am inclined to believe that QT conversion works off render files where available. Personally, find exporting through the other modes to be 'cleaner'. I only use this for offlines/audio reference videos where quality isn't an issue.

3. Batch Exports. Same as Exporting a Quicktime Movie, except that you cannot export include compression markers/ DVD SP markers, etc...

4. Exporting via Compressor. Compressor will ignore all render files and render directly from your source footage. It also allows you to encode to mpeg2 (which is the reason why many of us use it), but more than that, it gives you access to tools and settings that can improve the quality of your encodes, as i mentioned earlier. But the learning curve is definitely steeper than Quicktime Conversion for the uninitiated.



www.strypesinpost.com

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QT conversion is the golden standard and it is the only way to export anything out of FCP in digital format

Yeah...that's wrong. I hardly EVER do a "QT Conversion". When I am not laying off directly from the timeline (which is 90% of the time), I export a Quicktime Movie...not "QT Conversion".

"Gold Standard" or even "Standard" is definitely the wrong term here.

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

> QT conversion is the golden standard and it is the only way to export anything out of FCP in
> digital format

I think nicknasty was creating some confusion there -- he was using the term "QT conversion" too loosely to mean "a conversion using QuickTime". "QuickTime Conversion" is a specific process in FCP -- Michael Rouse used that term specifically. And "Export - Using QuickTime Conversion" almost always results in some degrading of the picture quality, as strypes states above.

And exports of digital formats out of FCP aren't limited to QuickTime formats, either. A TIFF or DPX image sequence, for example, wouldn't be a QuickTime format.


www.derekmok.com

>A TIFF or DPX image sequence, for example, wouldn't be a QuickTime format.

Not exactly. Quicktime is a media architecture, something like open source mxf, or the older avi. Then there are codecs, which specify the compression scheme and certain audio/video information, and all Quicktime needs to do is to support the codecs.

A tga image sequence can be wrapped in a QT container (something you can do in QT pro, under import image sequence), can't remember if you can do that to tiff, but I think you can. With GlueTools, DPX is supported by Quicktime. With additional 3rd party support, you can have access to a wider variety of codecs which do not natively originate from Apple (eg. Avid's DNxHD, 1:1, etc). Also, 3rd party apps like Mxf4QT adds additional functions to the QT media architecture.

Also, there's the export to avi function (which is completely not "Quicktime" in the QT conversion tool which I haven't yet to use.



www.strypesinpost.com

thank you all.. some of the tech flies over me, but overall it's great to take in the dialogue.

Final question (for me) in this string: If you were to convert the 7 minute timeline to a 35mg file (for best A/V results) what specific process/software would you use?

Michael

If you are going out to web, it depends on what format your web guy wants it in and what frame size. It's important that you avoid double compression. The defacto standards today, are Flash 9 and QT/H.264 which they will then embed into the webpage. And yea, do yourself a big favour ditch wmv.

For Flash, I'll look at Sorensen or Telestream, and you export a SCQT (export> Quicktime Movie) to encode. For QT, it's Compressor, and you turn on Frame Controls and set deinterlace (if your source is an interlaced format) and resizing to "best" and you crop/resize in the geometry room (and this will take you quite some time, if your machine isn't so powerful).

On the other hand, there's DVkitchen, which is quite simple to use and very effective, which you can find by clicking around on the wall on the left of this page, has pretty cool features in it which you will find very useful for web encoding, some of the features in it allows you to find the "sweet spot" for the encode, and tells you whether your video is effectively streamable to your target audience based on what kind of web connection they are likely to have. Very cool, comes with a free trial. Also, Josh has video tutorials up on dvcreators.net to guide you along.



www.strypesinpost.com

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If you were to convert the 7 minute timeline to a 35mg file (for best A/V results)

Yeah, that's not really going to happen. Seven minutes of footage at a total of 35 MB only adds up to about 650 kilobits per second. That's not sufficient to get "the best" results using any compressor. If you assign about 512 kilobits per second to picture and about 128 kilobits to sound, you might be able to get marginally acceptable results using H.264 and AAC. Maybe. Where "maybe" in this case means "probably not."

Why the arbitrary "35 megabytes" constraint?

When in doubt, visit Apple.com.

[www.apple.com]



www.strypesinpost.com

Thanks again... alll Wow many options...the 35mg restraint was put to me by my web designer, I think based on the size of the page, (500mgs?- I have to get back to her)...but I would rather pay a little more and have a site that contained quality product..but then I think there is also the question/concern of how large a file, as customer can download.

Overall file size is irrelevant when it comes to Quicktime. For years now, Quicktime has been able to start playing a movie before it has been completely downloaded to the viewer's computer. As long as it's being downloaded faster than the data rate of the movie, it'll play in real time with only a short buffering period at the start. That's how Apple TV works, for example.

(This is technically stuff your Web designer should know back-to-front.)

>but then I think there is also the question/concern of how large a file, as customer can download.

Just download a copy of DVkitchen. That should guide you along.



www.strypesinpost.com

in my experience, overall end file size has zero to do with playability. that only comes into play when you start to fill up the space allocated to you by your hosting company - which just ends up meaning more dollars for more server space.

as far as playability, what you need to be concerned with is the player of choice and typical net connection of your target demographic and the bitrate of the movie.