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1-2-3 Guide to Making Internet Movies-
by
Mark Shapiro
Are you just starting out making movies and
want to learn how to put them up on the net?
Here are the basics with links to additional
articles and details.
1. Shoot the video -
Of course you got to
shoot the video first.
Whether you use a new DV camcorder or an
older VHS machine, you got to have pictures
and sound. If you have watched a lot of
Internet videos and short films, you may
have noticed a few things. Internet video,
like TV, but more so, relies on close-ups of
faces. Big wide shots and vistas simply do
not work well - especially if someone is
watching the video on a tiny little window
on the computer screen. Try to keep the
background simple and extraneous action to a
minimum. Unlike film and TV, where action is
paramount, introducing lots of motion
makes it more difficult to compress. I am
referring not only to the motion of your
subjects but camera motion as well as
background motion. Try to cut down or even
eliminate all live zooms. Simply cut
from wide shot to medium shot to CU - not
only will it work better for the net, it
looks more professional.
Best hint -
use a tripod! -
Because the less shake and movement, the
better and smoother your final Internet
movie will be. No
matter how great you think your camcorder's image
stabilization - even if your eye can't see
it, the software that does the encoding
can.
Articles & Links
How
to Shoot for the Edit- Hints from a
Pro
Get a Tripod Please! - a plea from 4Video
How
to Shoot Video for the Net
Why
and How to use the Net to distribute your
films
Guide
to the Best Consumer Cam
corders
How
to Shoot Your Kids, Pets and other little
squirmy, moving and unhelpful creatures
2. Edit and Compress the Video
Once you have all your footage, you need
to input it into your computer, edit it
together and then compress it for
distribution over the Internet. Most editing
programs will do all of that.
There are a wide variety of editing
programs that range from free entry level
programs like Windows MovieMaker and Macintosh
iMovie, to affordable and easy use
programs from companies like ArcSoft,
Dazzle, Nova, Pinnacle, Sony and Ulead. If
you want the best, check out programs like
Adobe Premiere, Apple Final Cut Pro,
Sonic Foundry's Vegas Video, Ulead
MediaStudio Pro, etc.
If you are in a hurry, or don't want to
bother doing a lot of editing, you can use
an automatic video editing program like muvee
and then save the final movie as a streaming
video file. This program is the best of all
the automatic video editing products.
In addition to capturing and editing the
video, most of these offer video compression
capabilities that allow you to output your
finished video in a variety of streaming
formats. However, if you are a professional,
you will need programs like Canopus ProCoder.
Sorenson Squeeze or Discreet
cleaner, to get
the best possible compression and quality
options.
Create stylish and professional-looking video montages quickly and easily online from your digital photos and video.
One True Media.
Remember, the more complicated your
movie, the more difficult it will be to
maintain quality of the streaming video,
especially at low bandwidth rates. You may
choose to avoid scenes with lots of layers,
special effects, action and moving cameras. The fewer dissolves and
effects you use, the happier your
compression program will be.
Always
use a tripod to reduce the jitter and
shaking that severely taxes compression
software. It may appear that your
camcorder's onboard image stabilization
feature is eliminating the shaking - but
even if you can't see it, the compression
software will!
When you are saving and compressing your
finished production - you have two options
for compression and distribution -
saving it as a streaming media file or
saving it as a downloadable file. (Of
course, if you
have the extra bandwidth on your site, you can do both)
If you want to present your movies in a
streaming format, you will have to choose
between the three most common streaming
media formats - QuickTime, Real Video and
Windows Media. In addition, you may want to
compress the file at several different rates
- one for dial-up users (28 kbps), one for
low end broadband (100 kbps) and one for
high quality broadband (300 kbps).
Once again, if you have the space on your
web site or video server, you can save your
movie in all three formats, in all three
compression sizes. That means nine files!
Another option is to use the variable ratio
option with the three formats that enables
you to only save the file once. It then
plays at various speeds depending on what
speed the viewer connects at. The gotcha
here is that you often need a special video
server for this capability.
If you want to provide your videos as
downloads - you have a variety of options as
well. The downside is that once downloaded
to a viewers hard drive, the videos are out
of your control. You can save your
productions as mpeg1, mpeg2 or mpeg4 files;
standard AVI or even a proprietary format
like DivX. Once saved, you can also zip them
to provide extra space. Some web video
providers zip together the movie as well as
text file that explains copyright and
ownership.
More info about Video
and Audio Capture and Editing
Digital
Editing FAQ
Real World
Editing Tips - How to Edit Your Digital
Video Production
How
to Edit - Basics
Automatic
Video Editing Programs - muvee
Review
How to Compress (MPEG, QuickTime, Real
Video or Windows Media MV)
Getting good
audio is a lot more difficult than capturing
good looking video. Check out this basic
guide for getting good sounding audio for
your video projects. Also includes a
review of SmartSound SonicFire for creating
customized soundtracks.
Compression
and Streaming
Importance
of Bandwidth
Review
of Canopus ProCoder
Review of
Discreet Cleaner for Macintosh
Review
of Discreet cleaner XL for Windows
All About DivX for
video compression
 You
can easily create a customized video player
for your web site by using Wildform
Flix, Read
the review. Nobody offers a simpler and
easier to use solution, especially at this price.
3. Put your movie on the web
The final step is to stick your movies on
the Internet. This can be very easy - or it
can quite difficult and expensive. It all
depends on the length of videos, how many
you want to post, what kinds of special
features you want to include, etc.
Here are some of your choices
a. You can post your videos on "free" video sites - there are anl assortment of web sites that
specialize in posting and hosting videos for
free. Most are linked to a specific hardware
or software manufacturer who has an interest
in selling you more stuff. Most of these
sites seem to specialize in "home"
movie" type clips and only provide
limited storage space. The advantage is that
they are FREE and make it very easy to
upload and post your movies.
Free
and Cheap Video Hosting
Online
video and film festivals are also a great
option - checkout
Online
Film and Video Festivals - Get Your Work
Seen
Create stylish and professional-looking video montages quickly and easily online from your digital photos and video.
One True Media.
Another option is to post your video
files to free sites. Because they are free,
you can expect to share your site with the
sponsors advertising and promotions. Also,
because they are free, you can't expect much
in the way of video streaming support or
technical help. It is likely that you will
not be able to use fancy customized players
or be able to host videos that require
specialized video servers.
Many of these free sites only offer a
limited about of traffic and storage space.
An option is to sign up for a bunch of them
and then ink them together. Use one as your
home page and then store the actual videos
on other sites.
There are many inexpensive and affordable
web hosting options - in general the more
money you pay per month, the more traffic
and storage space you get, as well as more
handholding and special capabilities.
Check this page for links to various
affordable web sites.
Another option is to host it
yourself.
This is the most complicated option but
provides you with the most security and
control of your videos and content. Aside
from requiring a big pipe Internet
connection, you will need to invest in, and
maintain, one or more special video servers,
as well as possibly a standalone web server.
Check out
the Internet Video Server pages at
Microsoft, Real and Apple for more details
on how to set this up for yourself.
Microsoft
Internet Video Server
Apple
Internet Video Server
Real
Internet Video Server
Another option, especially if you are a
large organization or business that plans to
distribute lots of high quality video
streams is to use a professional video hosting service.
Yes, this can be expensive, but they can
provide the expertise, technology and
bandwidth to handle even the most demanding
events and distribution programs.
You can
also submit your video to a "pay for
play" video site where they host your
video for a fee. Fort example, MP4.com's "Show
It" program will give you up to 50 Megs of video/flash file storage,
up to 5 Gigs per month of streaming, and
Inclusion of your uploaded content in
MP4.com's genre-based listings - all for
$9.95 a month. Obviously, this is targeted
to those who want to just stream a few short
films or projects. Another good inexpensive
option is Apple's
.mac site for posting QuickTime movies
and projects..
Finally,
another way to get your videos on the net,
is to submit them to one of the many online video festivals like iFilm.
TriggerStreet,
AtomFilms,
etc. Some of them are free - some charge a
small handling and posting fee.
IFilm for instance, has a sliding scale.
If they think your film is really good,
they'll host it for free. If not, they'll
charge you.
Check out
our online links to the 10
Top Video Web Sites, the
10 Coolest Video Web Sites, and our Guide
to the Best Video Web Sites. Many of
these are online film and video festivals
that are looking for new content and
materials.
* Check out
these links for more info - How
to put Your Short Film on the Net and Online
Film and Video Festivals - Get Your Work
Seen
Read
the fine print before you enter into any
deals- some of them want a percentage of
your video or film - you may be giving up
some ownership rights. Be careful regarding
exclusivity deals. You want your film being
seen by as many people as possible.
Other
Good Links and Pages of Interest
The
new muvee AutoProducer - the best automatic
video editing software
Looking for Links to Free and Inexpensive
Web Hosting - check out this Top
20 Page
Top
100 Free Web Space Providers
CNET
Guide to Free Web Space Providers
Microsoft
MovieMaker 2- Maybe the easiest way to
create your own movies
Microsoft How To page -
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/howto.aspx
Real
Video Helix Producer-
Helix Producer converts
live and/or existing audio and video files
into RealMedia files, ready for delivery on
the Internet or corporate intranet. FREE.
For an extra $200, you can get Helix
Producer Plus that provides enhanced
quality, flexibility and productivity
capabilities.
Online
Film and Video Festivals - Get Your Work
Seen
How
to embed a Windows Media Player in your Web Site
by Adam
Powell of Web Monkey.
How
To Add Windows Media to Your Web Page
by Microsoft
Online
video and animation festivals
Real
Video for Small Businesses -
Basics of Using Real Video
Free Places
to Host Your Personal Videos
How
to Create a Video Production Using RealVideo
You
Got To Read "Creating Web Video" by Thomas Luehrsen
THIS IS GREAT!
Read This - 10 New
Years Resolutions for the Video Maker - How
to make your family and event videos look
and sound better
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