Window Media Files?

[Floh Peters]

Get the Flip4Mac encoder. As far as I know this is the only working Mac solution to encode Windows Media 9 files.

[Bob Karsner]

Thank, will that encoder install into the Media 100 or will I have to use the flip4Mac software?

[Floh Peters]

I think you should be able to encode from Media 100 directly, but I never do that (with any format). I always export by-ref files and do the encoding in the background (e.g. from QuickTime player for WMV or with BitVice for MPEG2). On the 8Core systems you can prettily continue editing in the foreground while the encoding happens in the backg.

[Bob Karsner]

Thanks

I will check out flip4Mac.

[Jim Brodie]

Here is my formula below. I’ve found flip4mac a waste of time and inferior. A better solution would be Visual Hub (the swiss army knife of encoders). I you can afford it buy Sorenson Squeeze. Here is my tried and true encoding recipe.

prior to Sorenson Squeeze

Media100 Export
range or program
Other
Field dominance: progressive
Colour Range – 0-255

Options

Settings
Compression type: none or motion jpeg A

Motion
Frame rate: 29.97
Key frame: 300 frames (or blank – when compression is set for

Compressor :
Millions of colours plus
Quality – best

Size:
Compressor native
check Deinterlace Source Video

Prepare for internet streaming
uncheck fast start for

Sound
mono

Sorenson Squeeze

contrast = 10 or 5
Bright = 16 or 14
Gamma= 38 or 43
Black restore 5, 10
Video noise reduction – light
cropping – top&bottom < 8 >
Deinterlace = automatic (I know you did it in QT, do it again if you have a lot of motion)

[Paul Crowe]

Hey Jim

I’m pretty sure F4M does the WMV encode for Squeeze. The write up on the Sorenson Squeeze site says the WMV Flip 4 Mac encoder comes with the squeeze mac package. So it seems F4M does the encode for WMV anyhow. Or am I missing something here?

Because if Bob just wants to do a bit of WMV encoding on his mac, F4M would be a cheaper way to go rather than to buy the whole os Squeeze just to get F4M to do this task for him – but as I say I could be missing something about this package and the way it works.

Cheers
John

[Bob Karsner]

I appreciate all the input on the WMV compression. This helps tremendously. I would like to take the discussion in another direction… What formats are most people using to do quality proofs via the internet? I send daily updates to clients and I have been showing them progress and concepts fairly frequent. Due to the distance it is not feasible to send DVDs for proofing. Is there a better option than wmv that is widely accepted on PCs and Macs?

Thanks
Bob

[Felix Halter]

I have tried many codecs fo the internet. WMV9 flip4mac has a very good qualtiy but I was surprised of how many computers out there were not updated enough to read wmv9. Since I changed to Flash Video ( On2 Flix Pro encoding from reference files) most computers out there can read that. Remember, you must include the swf player in the same folder as the flv video file). Everything gets explained very nicely in Aharon Rabinovitz’ DVD (check the compression forum)

regards, Felix

[Andrew Mehta]

I’m oldskool myself, and encode everything WMP7…at the settings I have [300kb @ 288×216, 500k @ 400×300, 1mb @ 640×480] I’ve not noticed much difference between encoding WMP7 with Discreet Cleaner in OSX Panther, and encoding WMP9 with Flip4Mac in OSX Tiger…except, on a humble G4, WMP7 encodes are a lot faster than both WMP9 and Flash Encoding.
If I had a faster computer, I’d probably encode everything in Flash, as it’s the most universally acceptable, and now the standard for online video, following its use in YouTube, MySpace.tv and others, etc. But I find WMP7 easier to encode and host.

Btw- you can use Cleaner in OSX Tiger too, but it crashes after the first encode. So any batch encoding of more than one clip, I usually boot into OSX Panther, from an external hard drive and encode there, where I don’t get any errors.

Yours,
Andrew “Very old skool” Mehta.
^_^ Will upgrade when I get cash. 😉

[Kenny Reff]

I just purchased Flip4Mac and it’s working just great. after installation, it appears as an option in Media 100 when you go to export, in the same popup menu that list Quicktime. It encodes in WMV v9 and on my Quad Core Mac Pro, does it FAST. No more exporting as reference or otherwise and then using Cleaner. It all works right from within M100. Nice job.

———————————————-
Kenny Reff & Limelight Communications
Creative and Effective Digital Video
In the National Capital area:
Local: 703-242-4596
http://www.LimelightDC.com