How do I export from FCE optimized for YouTube.com?
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaYBuWUne_c

The video I created above was 39 MB exported to MPEG format from Final Cut Express. It is very grainy and I don't know why that is. I have tried different settings, including streaming and it won't come out right under 100 MB. The best I have exports at 700 MB.

Any suggestions on what settings to optimize for YouTube? Thanks!

Gilbert

I have success when I export for QuickTime 7 (h.264) at 800MB.

Alas, how I wish we were allowed 800MB on youtube. Sadly they give you a 100 MB limit. How long is your video? What size is it (dimensions)? All of mine are a bit grainy too, so I'm not in this to teach but to learn. You can check out my videos (http://youtube.com/profile?user=hawkteflon) so you don't have to waste hours exporting in a way you don't like. Most of mine have the broadband setting. Another option, if it's a LONG video is to split it up. I had to cut a video of mine up into three parts because it's 26 minutes long.

One thing to try (and I have not really used uTube) if they support H.264 is

export either 320 x 240 for 4:3 or 320x180 for 16:9 and set the fps to 15 fps, and use H.264 (or maybe sorenson3 if they support it)

This seems to give me pretty good video quality (H.264 is easily the best for low-res exports in my opinion). I have never had good luck with small filesizes on the MPEG4 options for some reason.

YouTube resizes the clip you send so it's best to send a clip with higher resolution. All the 800 h.264 files I have sent look about as good as YouTube is ever going to get.

So I guess increase res until you are just below the 100M limit is the trick?

Export using QuickTime Coversion, then set it to streaming-medium. This should do a 3-5 minute clip at 10-12 MB.

Thank you!

What ever you output from FCE, Youtube will recompress it to Flash video (.FLV) 320x240 (4:3) at about 300kb/s.

I uploaded my wife's film as an XviD (16:9, 512x288, 432kb/s). I then created my own .FLV version direct from the HDV master with FFmpegX using settings close to or better than the estimated Youtube settings (the Youtube FLV was 21MB for a 9 minute film, mine was 30MB). Comparing them the difference was negligable. [I got the Youtube file using http://keepvid.com - since the original video is ours, I believe we're not violating any copyright laws by doing this.)

I think the Youtube encoders do a pretty good job, it's the nature of the settings they use that really limit the quality. It's better to shoot and edit in such a way that doesn't stress the codec.

To generalise, high key, contrasty images, especially close ups, with minimal camera movement compress well. Low contrast, low light images, high detail, wide shots, dissolves and shots with a lot of camera movement don't compress well.

you can see the film, here and judge for youtself which shots do better in the compression process:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttZxONzWOlU

Interesting. I am fortunate that my vid is just a 60 sec trailer for a DVD.

I exported it as 426x240 at highest H.264 encoding and am reasonably happy with the results. For some reason my local file was 38M!!

youtube also displays it letterboxed, not squashed, so I am happy about that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmnfN_ZdqX4