Compressor Output Questions.

Hey everyone,

I've got a few questions about a project I've finished editing, set up in FCP, and I'm outputing using Compressor. The time-line is set at 1440x1080 (see picture), and in the past, I've used Export using QT, exporting using the setting a 720x480 (16x9) file, and it looks great H.264, but with compressor, I used some of the presets the 300KPS/sec, and the 800KPS/sec. Does anyone have any special settings, or any advanced things that they not only like to do, like "crush the blacks" inside of compressor's advanced tab settings, but does anyone have any thoughts on how to best export this out of compressor? Or a better or standard way, using Compressor? I've heard of people outputting to 8-bit uncompressed, then dragging that into Compressor, but that seams like extra work. Has anyone compared Compressors output to an equal output using Sorenson Squeeze? Would outputting to Apple Pro Res, or another file like DV-NTSC QT, be better, if this eventually goes to web?

Also, I had a client in the past say that the file that I emailed to the client, they said it was 'buffering too much' and I explained to her that an H.264 800KPS/Sec (QT file totaling 18MB) encoded file sometimes eats up CPU power to play, though it has a great look and extremely low file size capability, does anyone know if I'm correct? I got a 3 minute clip down to about 18MB, and I tested it on multiple computers, and it played fine. So, I'm not sure what she is experiencing, as files play differently on everyone's computers. They want to put this up on their website, so if anyone has any presets for web video using compressor as well, much appreciated.

Tom Laughlin
Producer/Editor
Salt Lake City, UT
FCS3/Sony EX-3/Mac Intel