8 11 comarant/duckling clip
 

I was on the way home from a promo shoot and had a good shoot on ducks and ducklings and comerants. Here is brief glimpse. Bright day, no wind for a change. It has been reduced to 320 by 240.

So many good points, Dale

... 25 seconds compressed to 1.63 Mbs at 320 x 240 showing some plumage detail on both birds, good colour on cormorant's cheek pouch and partial reflections on the water PLUS it was yourself shot, edited & posted it and it's so easy now for me to view it ... I am glad to be learning from you how to do this and my technician is trying to resolve my wmp problem so I too may be able to post clips before I die ... but in the meantime I wonder if you have any ideas on how the quality of your footage would be improved if you could compress to 400 x 300 and how much that would increase the file size ... I'd be happy to spend a few minutes downloading a bigger file just to see better footage ... you have the original file and you know how much is lost in the compression. Are we in danger of sacrificing image quality for instant convenience?

Brendan,

Considering that its 720 x 480 normally it is about half of what you would see in actual footage. it is amazing they are as good as they are. and yes, you give up a lot to see it on the web without waiting a long time for it. If you have high speed it is not to bad to wait for larger files.

I will send it to you as a full file for your comparison. They were not close and I had the 20x zoom out the entire way. no duplex.

Dale

Dale,
sorry that I haven't commented your footage until now, but I have been very busy.
I think you footage would have been much improved by using a tripod. (I always use a tripod, even if I have to walk for hours). I would also tried to shoot from a lower angle.

Brendan,
I did a sample of some footage. I cut it to exactly 30 seconds. The original avi-file was 111mb. I use Sorenson Squeeze Suite to convert my avi-files to wmv and other internet formats. As the sample below shows you got pretty small file sizes compared to the original 111mb.
The smallest sample is 748kb - 320x180 - I think this too small to view any details and I do not recommend it.
The medium sample is 1.8mb - 480x240 - details begin to show up, and for dial-up connections this is not to hard to download
The large sample is 3.7mb - 640x360 - This is the format I use on my website. The quality is not bad, consider the original avi-file is 111mb, details in the plumage is pretty good.

Download samples:
http://www.video-film.no/snutter/Sample-sml.wmv (small 784kb)
http://www.video-film.no/snutter/Sample-med.wmv (medium 1.857kb)
http://www.video-film.no/snutter/Sample-lg.wmv (large 3.740kb)

To view the full footage as a flash-video click here:
http://video-film.no/snutter/sunday.html - lenght 1:10 min, you can also download a full wmv-version if you got a dial-up connection or not able to view the flash version.

Technical information: All footage are shoot with Canon XL-2 (PAL) camcorder. I've used the 20x standard lense and a Sigma 300mm SLR-lense. No color correction have been done in post. I also used a polarization filter during the shoot. Time of day was late afternoon, just before sunset.

I would like to hear your opinion about this, what kind of footage (file-size) do you prefer. How many of you have broadband (DSL) connections? What do you thing about the different samples quality?

Had several good looks at your footage, Per. Very useful to compare how the file sizes effected image quality e.g. the water is jagged and the plumage fuzzy sometimes at lowest compression: the water is rippling naturally and the fuzz has become down (=new plumage) at highest compression. This is very helpful & encouraging for me to study. Your Sorenson Squeeze is giving you more options when compressing. I am also impressed by the speed of download ... 3.7Mbs in 10 seconds is better than I've seen elsewhere and the flash video was even quicker (though not as sharp, of course).

Several questions arise; the most urgent:

1. Is it essential to own your website to put Sorenson output on the web?
2. What are the economics of owning/using the website you used?
3. Can Sorenson be used to produce and refine clips like Dale's clip (I have yet to discover how he posted the cormorant clip so neatly on this thread)?

I know you're busy but your answers in due course would be much appreciated.

Brendan,
I try to give you a quick answer to your questions:

1. It's not essential at all. In fact you may use any compression tool of your liking to get the job done. The reason I choose Sorenenson was its flexibility, you can do several compressions of several formats in one run. I'm also very satisfied with the quality of its output files.

2. I'm not sure what you ask for? The reason for me to have my own website, is to promote myself as a wildlifephotographer. Potential customers can reach me easly, by filling out a form or send meg an email. Customers can also view footage and get an idea what I'm able to achieve. This is also a display window for me to get known among colleagues, like in this forum and hopefully discussions with other colleagues can make me a better wildlifephotographer!

3. My impression is that you can't refine any compressed clip. But you can certainly produce a clip like Dale's by using Sorenson Squeeze if you have a clean uncompressed file to start with. You have tons of settings that able you to make almost any file size you like.

At the bottom line I will ensure that I have nothing to do with Sorenson Squeeze as a business partner. I'm just a satisfied customer using what I think is one of the best compression tools out there.

Thank you very much for your speedy answers, Per.

I apologise that my question No. 2 was badly worded. What I should have said was ... How much does it cost (approx) to design/set up and run a website like yours? That question sounds a bit personal and You are of course free to tell me to mind my own business !!! No offence taken I promise. Your website is very easy to access and friendly to use (I wish I knew your language, but it's not too foreign to figure out some of it.)

Question No.1 was really about the necessity of having a website IF all I wanted was some method of posting a clip or 2 now and again, like Dale. I realise that you have serious professional reasons for having a website. Perhaps, if I may, I would revise that question to: Could you post your 3.7Mb clip on DVInfo forum using exactly the same method that Dale used to post his clip? (this question is not actually about production or compression ... it's just about the way Dale's clip appears on DVInfo ... can you make your clip appear in the same way?)

Tell me to go away and ...

Hei Brendan,
you don't have to apologise. English is not my first language so it may be my fault not understanding you correctly.

I think it's some restrictions on the size of files you can attach to this forum. As far as I can see, max file size for a wmv-file is 3.72MB, hmm... should be possible to upload my file, lets try:
(To view the full footage se my first thread above!)

Ooops forgot to answer your first question. I'm also working as a computer engineer, so I'm able to design and set up my website by myself :-)

The only thing I need is a good ISP (internet service provider), with a fast server where I can put my webstuff. I think I found a good one as you experienced with the fast file download.

Yippee folks get a load of this footage
 

You've done it Per, you divil you (we applaud here like that, all the time).

Now let us in on how you put up that quality of footage on DVInfo Forum ... a suitable tutorial on cd or for download would be sold out in no time ... good for you and good for all of us IF we are able to learn how to do it ...

... anybody know of better quality footage on DVInfo do tell us ... enjoy this folks while you're young; I wish it was me put it up. But now, between the combined efforts of Per and Dale, life appears much brighter and the detail is excellent and downloads in 12 seconds with soundtrack ... onward, gentlemen ! This is a cause for celebration across the Forum.

How to upload files
 

Brendan, it's very easy to upload a file to this forum. I'll try to explain this for you:

When you click on the Post Reply, look beneath the area where you write. You should see a frame called Additional Options, there you got a button named Manage Attachments. (if you can't see this frame contact this forums administrators, Chris Hurd and I think he will help you and open this options for you!)
Click on that button, a small uploadwindow open. The text says Upload File from your Computer, click on one of the Browse buttons, find your compressed files on your computers harddisk, when you have located your file, mark it (click on it), click Open, the small window disappears.
Now you can see your file path in one of the text fields. Click Upload button, the upload will start. This will take som time, cause you are now copying your file to the DvInfo's server. When the upload is finished, you can see your attached file in the uploadwindow. Scroll down to the bottom of the window and click the Close this window button.

OK, Congratulations, if you have followed me so far you are now able to upload files to the forum. Brendan I will be very happy to see some of your footage!

Good luck!

Well done Per, Well done!

Dale,
hope you not feel that I've hijacked your thread? My point was to help Brendan about file size vs quality you could upload here at this forum.

Hope to hear from you soon Dale!

here goes
 

If I don't get it half wrong I'll never get it half right ... using Premiere Elements 2.0 ... 17.18 seconds @ 320 x 240 @ 962 kbps comes to 2.04 Mbs ... I can't get it to play any bigger than half-size and the quality is poor and jagged compared to the originals [which added to 52Mbs @ 720 x 576] ... but if I keep following Per's instructions who knows, anything is possible