What do y’all recommend for a distribution format/file size

[Shane Ross]

Distribution too….? Web? Theater screening? TV? video billboard? Phone?

Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def

[Robert Withers]

Distribution to classrooms, small theaters.
Thanks,
Robert

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Tero Ahlfors]

Ask for delivery specs if it’s going out. There’s no one size fits all with this.

[Robert Withers]

Thanks, Tero. The decades flicker by so quickly. We used to spend a few thousand dollars with a film lab and purchase 16mm prints to sit on a shelf somewhere and go out to renters. Everybody used the same kind of projectors to show these standard release prints.
Now the distributors I’m talking with are willing and happy to rent digital files for streaming or on thumbdrives but they have no clear idea of what are the best file sizes and file types. So I’m asking about general practices, if there are any. 44 G ProRes seems too big, so what are alternatives for classrooms and small screening rooms? People show mp4 files and .mov files and I’ve only seen a few screenings fail.
Cheers,
Robert

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Tero Ahlfors]

Classroom and small screening room are not specs. What is it being played on? Is there a special playback system or is it shown from a computer with VLC/WMP/Quicktime? Windows or Mac?

Also classrooms (at least in Finland) can be notoriously bad when it comes to doing anything because the computer software is locked down and the only media player you have is probably Windows Media Player.

It depends.

[Mark Suszko]

A real “screening in theaters” would imply you need to make a DCP file. But it sounds like you just want to screen this in a classroom.

Classrooms and informal local gatherings in a hotel ballroom or something like that will be using consumer grade and prosumer-grade display gear, most likely. Something like 80 percent of the computer gear out there in the field where you show the things is Windows-based, the rest is Mac and a little Linux-based stuff. I’m not saying that’s good or bad; just that it’s the reality of the installed base.

Prores is going to be a higher quality than the mpeg4 IMO but the installed base of *consumer* oriented gear out there today won’t generally recognize a ProRes file, much less play it without needing a conversion. They *will* recognize an MPEG4, and MPEG2 (with a really high bit rate), as well as a .WMA file.

I can’t tell you how often a client will be asked for the specific format and codec and come back with: “it’s just a Quicktime file“. (facepalm)

[Robert Withers]

Thanks, Mark.
Yes, “Classrooms and informal local gatherings in a hotel ballroom or something like that” is pretty much the target . . .
An important concern is file size — for a 25 minute film I have a ProRes file that is 44 GB and a .mov and an .mp4 version that is about 2 GB. The smaller ones are much easier to upload/download and load onto thumb drives and maybe are ideal for most purposes. I’m mostly wondering if there are any formats that would come in between 2 and 44 G that I should be aware of.
Haha to “client specs”
Cheers,
Roert

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Mark Suszko]

You can make that 2 gig Mpeg 4 file still smaller by adjusting the date rate down when you compress the render, but there’s always going to be a a quality/size trade-off involved.

You might also want to look at the audio encoding when you compress because, if you’re not actually going to be feeding a 5.1 surround system, you can slim down the file size of the audio as well.

[Tim Taylor]

I like h.264 (.mp4 wrapper) for the deliverable file size and playback quality. I’d shoot for a target bit rate of 12Mbps. I think the codec is pretty ubiquitous, used for most streaming purposes. Also, reasonable to up/download. In other words, your 1.4 GB files sounds pretty good. Some experimentation with higher bit rate might be helpful for the “theatrical” screening (30ish Mbps).

Tim Taylor, Producer/Editor
RESolution Media Services, LLC

[Mark Suszko]

H.265 is more recent and offers the same or better quality at half the bandwidth/file size. It’s great for streaming from a bonded cellular system, for example.

But the installed base of suitable players for it out in the wild is still relatively small. If you’re looking for maximum potential playability on unknown local equipment, right now I think your two best options are mpeg4 and high-data rate mpeg-2.

And maybe bundle a copy of VLC Player for mac and windows with the memory stick:-)