Compressing video files

van utd

Hi,



Does anyone know the best way to compress video files from digital cameras? What's the best way to do it? Any special software required?



Any suggestions would be appreciated Cheers

xool

iMovie should be fine. It can import all your DV footage and then you can export it using Quicktime. You can pick any compression setting you want.



And you probably already have it.

van utd

Cheers Xool Tried iMovie but it doesn't let me import .MPG files. Is there anyway to get them into iMovie? Thanks

mr. me

Quote:

Originally posted by Van Utd

Cheers Xool Tried iMovie but it doesn't let me import .MPG files. Is there anyway to get them into iMovie? Thanks

iMovie does indeed handle .mpg files. It may be that your camera uses a nonstandard implementation of MPEG-1. If it uses MPEG-2, then you may need to the fee-based Sorensen MPEG-2 codec installed.

van utd

Thanks for the replies. I have a sony DSC-T1 camera. Not sure exaclty which form of MPEG it uses. How would I go about finding out, and installing codecs so that I could import to iMovie? Cheers.

drumsticks

You might want to check out http://www.alfanet.it/squared5/mpegstreamclip.html



It's totally free and you can convert your clips to DV, which iMovie recognizes fine...

mr. me

Quote:

Originally posted by Van Utd

Thanks for the replies. I have a sony DSC-T1 camera. Not sure exaclty which form of MPEG it uses. How would I go about finding out, and installing codecs so that I could import to iMovie? Cheers.

Your camera uses Sony's MPEG VX as the video format. When you plug it into your Mac, it should mount on your Mac's desktop. You can simply drag your MPEGs to your favorite folder. iPhoto or Image Capture will handle your stills. I am at a lost as to why you are having trouble. Sony explicitly supports both MacOS 9 and MacOS X with this camera.

van utd

Thanks for the reply Mr. Me. I am not having trouble playing the videos. I can do that with no problem. The problem is the size of the videos. They range for 10 Mb to 30 Mb in size. This is an issue when it comes to sharing/e-mailing videos. Is there any simple way for compressing them enough to be fit in e-mails and also to reduce storing space? Thanks

mr. me

Quote:

Originally posted by Van Utd

Thanks for the reply Mr. Me. I am not having trouble playing the videos. I can do that with no problem. The problem is the size of the videos. They range for 10 Mb to 30 Mb in size. This is an issue when it comes to sharing/e-mailing videos. Is there any simple way for compressing them enough to be fit in e-mails and also to reduce storing space? Thanks

You have to understand the nature of a video. It is a sequence of stills shown in rapid succession. A 10 MB video is really not much of a video. That is the size of an uncompressed 9-second 160x120 clip played at 15 frames/second. Compression will allow you to increase your runtime, frame rate, and screen size, but it will not fix your fundamental problem. Video consumes an enormous amount of bandwidth. You really don't want to email video. It is much better to place the video on a server and email your friends a link to it.

zo

in the Sony cameras, you can usually change the resolutions. I think you can convert a 640x460 into a 160x120 or something like that.. not sure though.