VideoInstructionInJ/DetailsOnScreenResolutionForWebVideo

This is a branch of the main discussion on using web video to inform people about J and how to use it. This branch goes into some detailed discussion of video resolution and quality.

Further Considerations on Web Video Screen Resolution

This was in reply to Bill Lam's suggestion about specifying the quality of a You-Tube video in the URL.

from	Brian Schott <schott.brian@gmail.com>
to	General forum <general@jsoftware.com>
date	Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 9:45 PM
subject	Re: [Jgeneral] screen cast of downloading J
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Bill,

As usual your comments are very helpful. I looked at the link you gave and have a couple questions -- no, I have a million questions.

I have also looked at the following link which suggests to me that the "export" stage I mention below in Screenium should not be used at all because this link suggests that you avoid reencoding videos before uploading.

http://help.youtube.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=132460&topic=16612&hl=en-US

I am not clear about the information provided. Consider the following example.

fmt=18

• Sound: Stereo, 44KHz
• Max Best Resolution: 480×360
• Video Output Format: FLV
• Sound Output Format: H264/AAC
• Video Download Format: MP4

On Screenium there is a "record: stage where you set things like the window on the screen to record, and the "export" stage where another level of encoding occurs. After all that, from my browser I go to Youtube.com, and click on an "Upload video" button which sends me to browse my drive for the .move file to upload. Then there is the stage where I watch the video on Youtube.com. I count 4 stages there.

What part/stage is "Output"? Is it the first stage above? What part/stage is "Download"? Is it the second stage above?

How would I add the format code to my upload. Would I just add "&xx" to the end of my file name? And would that go after .mov?

It is particularly confusing that my support person at Screenium contradicts these other links.

The default window size for J is 700x500 on my Mac. I think I need 750x724 to get the menu bar, also. I believe 700x500 can be configured differently, but none of the options at your link are even close to 700^500. According to my reading of the YouTube link above, the aspect ratio is more important than the size itself for encoding.

This is clearly a complicated issue about which I am not confident I have much patience. I was pretty pleased with my most recent upload, though. So don't put much (any?) effort into answering my questions.

Thanks,

Bill replied

Hi Brian.

In fact you are the pioneer in this field among us. I am only a YouTube viewer and remember some URLs have a frm=xx. Not sure what codec YouTube uses but I believe the resolution of fmt=18 is better.

I googled a sample video with quite good picture quality.

http://www.gadgetell.com/tech/comment/youtube-testing-hd-video-and-improved-audio/

Maybe you could also upload a screencast on how to author a screencast and how to upload it to You-Tube. :-)

Update on Further Adventures in Uploading

from	Brian Schott <schott.brian@gmail.com>
to	General forum <general@jsoftware.com>
date	Fri, Apr 3, 2009 at 4:46 PM
subject	Re: [Jgeneral] screen cast of downloading J

Just to keep the list informed.

I have been unsuccessful at uploading the full 6:19 (m:s) screencast after 4 tries; only 5:59 uploads. The help at YouTube suggests that I do the following.

1. Remove the partial video from your account.

2. Use an editing program to add some empty frames to the end of your complete video.

3. Find a secure internet connection.

4. Upload your complete video again.

http://help.youtube.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=94455&topic=16609

Because I do not have a video editing program, I have put the video on my flash drive and next time I am at a library with a high speed web connection I will attempt to upload the full video.

I will advise you when/if it is uploaded.

Further Questions

Oleg had this questions in response to Brian's experiences.

What is the size of the video?

If you have a choice of formats, H.264 gives the best compression/quality ratio (mp4 QuickTime movie).

The installation video with HD option is nice. Except that it is stretched: do you know how to avoid the stretch?

The HD format is 1280x720, and it's what displayed in full screen. The in-browser view for HD is 854x480. Both 16:9.

HD video resolution should have square pixels, right? Unlike, DVD resolutions which are anisotropic.

Also did you consider using the feature of your image capturing software to dynamically zoom and pan, following the cursor? So that you could use reasonable font sizes and still fit stuff on the screen.

Matthew Brand <mtthwbrnd@googlemail.com>, on Fri, Apr 3, 2009 at 7:48 PM, had this suggestion

What about google video or megavideo.com they seem to allow videos of any size/length. I don't understand why people chose youtube, it seems ultra restrictive.

And Bill replied:

Isn't YouTube owned by google? Anyway youtube has better third party support that allow me to view using mplayer (my default browser does not support javascript or flash player).