How to show my files with a PC ??

	Re: How to show my files with a PC ?? by Alan Okey on Sep 24, 2009 at 10:41:11 pm [Jakob Mortensen] "Now I can for the life of me not understand why Apple didnt make sure that quicktime movies made on a Mac can be played flawlessly on a pc ??? " Apple has no control over what happens on Windows PCs beyond offering a Windows version of Quicktime Player. You need to take some responsibility for this and educate yourself about what proper delivery codecs are. Make sure to choose a delivery codec that is supported on multiple platforms and doesn't require the end user to download and install additional codecs that aren't included in Quicktime Player in order to play properly. For instance, do not export Quicktime movies using DVCPRO HD or Apple ProRes 422 and expect that clients will be able to play them on a PC without first downloading and installing those codecs. There are editing codecs and delivery codecs. Avoid sending people movie files that are encoded with editing codecs, as they are not likely to be installed by default on other systems, even other Macs that don't have Final Cut Pro installed. Proper delivery codecs include MPEG-4 (including variants like h.264), Sorenson, Windows Media (which requires third-party software to create on a Mac), etc. Editing codecs that are not installed by default on PCs or included with Quicktime Player include DVCPRO HD, Apple ProRes 422, XDCAM EX, etc. You've given us precious little information about your particular situation to be of much help to this forum in offering you reasonable solutions. Video compression is a very deep topic that can't be adequately addressed in a few lines on a forum. Suffice it to say that you have the tools at your disposal (Apple Compressor) to create very high-quality cross-platform compatible videos for delivery. Instead of blaming Apple for your problems, perhaps you should take some initiative and start reading the Compressor manual for some guidance. Respond to this post   •   Return to posts index

	Re: How to show my files with a PC ?? by Alan Okey on Sep 25, 2009 at 1:43:18 pm [Jakob Mortensen] "Well i would assume that Apple has some possibility to offer a crossplatform codec rooted in the quicktime player if they really wanted to support cross platform portability, so I dont really buy that argument of yours. " Animation Apple Pixlet Video Apple VC H.263 DV - PAL DV/DVCPRO - NTSC H.264 JPEG 2000 MPEG-4 Video None Photo - JPEG PNG All of these cross-platform codecs are included with Quicktime Player. MPEG-1 MPEG-2 program stream MPEG-2 transport stream These options are available through Compressor. The Apple ProRes 422 playback codec for Windows is available as a free download, as are AVID's codecs. Panasonic may also offer DVCPRO HD codec as a free download (at least the playback component), but I'm not sure. [Jakob Mortensen] "I have actually tried your suggestions before posting" You failed to offer that fact in your post. In fact, your post contains almost no useful information about your problem to make it easy for this forum to offer useful suggestions. You could start by offering basic information such as what type of footage you are working with (format/codec/etc.), what type of Quicktime files you have tried creating that aren't meeting your standards, and what the sub-standard footage looks like when you play it on a PC. Saying that "it looks terrible" offers no real information about what the problem might be. Is it too low of a bit rate in encoding, i.e. are you seeing compression artifacts? Is it gamma shift issues? Are green aliens showing up on your footage? You're pretty much leaving it all up to our collective imagination by failing to include such basic details. As for FCP not supporting Flash, that's not accurate. Flash files can be payed back on a Mac just fine. Flash is proprietary Adobe technology, which Apple would have to license form Adobe in order to provide encoding capability. With the plethora of other open-standards-based codecs that Apple has chosen to offer, there's little incentive for Apple to pay Adobe for their proprietary solution. Additionally, Flash itself is not a video codec - it's a wrapper, similar to Quicktime. There is no magic Flash fairy dust that makes better videos than is possible with other tools. Flash is merely a delivery method. Some codecs that Flash uses include Sorenson Spark, On2 VP6 and H.264. YouTube's HQ movies are actually Flash files encoded with H.264. In some cases, it's possible to simply change the file extension on H.264-encoded Quicktime movies to .flv and have them play back in Flash player. There are free tools available to convert files to Flash. [Jakob Mortensen] "What I need is a format that the end user can use to easily display the file via a standard pc in high quality. I have now relied on web hosting, but its not very convenient. " If the codecs included with Quicktime Player by default are not good enough for your needs, you could include special codecs with your movie files that the end user could install on their PCs in order to view your files. Perhaps you could try ProRes 422 or DVCPRO HD. The downside is that files using these codecs are obviously far too large to post online, and would require physical delivery to the client in some form. Have you tried using the Quicktime Animation codec? The file sizes are large, but the quality is visually lossless. [Jakob Mortensen] "When that is said I dont realy get your kind of offended attitude. Its something often seen in web forums when newbies ask a question in groups where a close nitted community spends there coffee break. "How dares those newbies ask a basic question like that". I imagine you with eyes rolling back, and that makes me smile a bit. " If I were offended, I wouldn't have bothered to answer your post. We were all newbies at some point, that's not the issue here. The lack of useful information and the frustrated tone in your original post makes me wonder if you actually want help, or simply want to rant. It seems that you believe that Apple is at fault, despite the fact that many people are able to share high-quality Quicktime files with clients without issue. If the problem were really that endemic, I think we'd be haring a lot more about it on a regular basis than we do. There is something specific to your situation that is causing results that are not commonly reported as a problem. Allow us to help diagnose your issue by providing more detailed and relevant information. Respond to this post   •   Return to posts index

	Re: How to show my files with a PC ?? by Alan Okey on Sep 25, 2009 at 3:13:37 pm Jakob, I'm glad I was able to provide you with some helpful information. Let us know what codec ends up being a good choice for you for delivering files to clients. Good luck! Respond to this post   •   Return to posts index

	Re: How to show my files with a PC ?? by Alan Okey on Nov 2, 2009 at 9:05:29 pm Does the client need to see the original footage in HD? If not, and if you have a video interface card like an AJA Kona or Blackmagic Decklink, you could use the card to downconvert your raw footage to SD and connect the card to a standalone DVD recorder to make client review DVD dubs of your source footage. Otherwise, I would suggest that you use Compressor to transcode your source clips to h.264 Quicktime movies. h.264 is an ideal codec for cross-platform compatibility and small file sizes. Just make sure the client doesn't want to use these clips to edit with - h.264 is a delivery codec, not an editing codec. You could also try transcoding to ProRes 422 (not HQ) and making sure the client installs the ProRes codec on their PC. ProRes is a much higher quality codec, and it might be faster to transcode to ProRes than to h.264. The caveat is that the client must first install the ProRes playback codec to view the footage. The codec is available here: http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/apple/application_updates/appleprores... Respond to this post   •   Return to posts index

	Re: How to show my files with a PC ?? by Stuart Simpson on Sep 25, 2009 at 4:22:34 pm What's wrong with a good old-fashioned DVD? :-) -Simmie 6 MacPros - Kona 3 & Kona LH 1 G5s - Kona LH xbox360, Wii, PSP, PS3 http://www.speak.co.uk Respond to this post   •   Return to posts index