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High Quality Video on Youtube

G

ghanakidd

macrumors member
Original poster
Nov 7, 2006
32
0
Okay,

So, I'm trying to figure out how to squeeze out the very best video quality for posting content on Youtube and similar video sharing websites.

Here's what I'm working with

Software - Final Cut Express 2.0
Camera - Canon ZR45 MiniDV
Hardware - Macbook Pro 2ghz 2MB

Anyone have any tips, tricks, or other kind of advice on this?

Thanks.
 
It really has nothing to do with the video you export, it has much more to do with the codec that YouTube, etc... uses. Unfortunately you can't set manual key frames and such like you can if you're exporting the video for your own server.

In general, the less motion in your frames the better. I know that sound stupid, but don't add in motion titles and stuff. It will just make things look worse.

And this title made me laugh a little bit... high quality + youtube = almost oxymoron.
 
crazzyeddie said:
And this title made me laugh a little bit... high quality + youtube = almost oxymoron.
Click to expand...

Hopefully now that YouTube is reencoding everything in H.264 (10,000 videos done now, rest to be done by fall) the quality should go up and motion artifacts won't be as much of a problem.
 
ghanakidd said:
So, I'm trying to figure out how to squeeze out the very best video quality for posting content on Youtube and similar video sharing websites.
Click to expand...
To get the highest possible quality in YouTube, you should encode to Flash Video (FLV) at 352x288. Make it as high bitrate as possible while still staying under YouTube's limits (100MB, 10 minutes). I don't know of any reliable, free FLV encoders but maybe someone else does.

To get the second-highest quality, encode in QuickTime Pro to MPEG4 Improved, 320x240, keyframe every 2-6 frames, 3500kbits/sec. If you don't have QuickTime Pro, use iSquint and set "TV Quality" at the highest quality.

In QT Pro, check "Preserve aspect ratio using: Letterbox," if you're encoding something 16:9. Otherwise, for 4:3 material you don't have to bother.
 
Peel said:
Hopefully now that YouTube is reencoding everything in H.264 (10,000 videos done now, rest to be done by fall) the quality should go up and motion artifacts won't be as much of a problem.
Click to expand...

Are the original uploaded videos held on a separate server then?
 
I'll throw in my recommendation for Veoh. High quality video, and you can configure it so that your video will automatically be uploaded to YouTube when you upload to Veoh.

Definitely worth a look.
 
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