Rendering a full wedding in MP4

[Ian Whelan]

Hi - I have a client who wants their wedding in full 1080P on an MP4 USB stick. The film is about 2 hours long and when I render it is almost 15GBs in size. Is this normal? Is there any way to get this file smaller and fit it on a 4GB stick without suffering too much quality loss? Thanks!

[Frans Meijer]

2 hours is 7200 seconds
4 Gb is 4000 Mbytes is 32000 Mbits
32000 / 7200 is about 4 Mbit/sec with some room for audio.

All in all, customize your MP4/AVC template for an average of 4 Mbit/sec, rather low for a good quality 1080p but it might be good enough.

[Vince Pachiano]

I know this is not the question you asked, but why limit yourself to a 4Gb stick?
(It's not like an iPhone where Apple charges $100 more for twice the memory.)

You may need to partition the movie into 4GB clips if you are worried about file size limitations
(PreWedding, Ceremony, Reception, etc)

[Noa Put]

I recently bought a bunch of 16 and 32gb usb2.0 sandisc sticks to give my clients, they are dirt cheap right now, I also would opt for more capacity on the sticks instead of lower quality of the file you are delivering.

[Steven Davis]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

I recently bought a bunch of 16 and 32gb usb2.0 sandisc sticks to give my clients, they are dirt cheap right now, I also would opt for more capacity on the sticks instead of lower quality of the file you are delivering.

Hey Noa,

What % of your clients want their wedding on usb drive? If you want, you can PM me. I'm thinking about offering the usb route in addition to DVD/Bluray and was thinking about getting custom printed USB drives. I wonder how many clients in the US go USB vs disk. Hmmm...

[Noa Put]

That's a simple answer; every client :) I have had 1 request for bluray this year, people just don't care about bluray and I don't make any effort in pushing it. I started getting several sandisc cruzer switch (16 and 32gb) usb stick but now also got a bunch of kingston datatravelers, the 16gb version is only 7(!) euro. The only disadvantage is they are very slow to copy, I can only get about 3 to 4mbs while that should be at least 15mbs but they come with a 3 year warranty and just to carry the files they are ok, I tell the client to make a copy right away to a harddrive or 2

[Steven Davis]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

That's a simple answer; every client :) I have had 1 request for bluray this year, people just don't care about bluray and I don't make any effort in pushing it. I started getting several sandisc cruzer switch (16 and 32gb) usb stick but now also got a bunch of kingston datatravelers, the 16gb version is only 7(!) euro. The only disadvantage is they are very slow to copy, I can only get about 3 to 4mbs while that should be at least 15mbs but they come with a 3 year warranty and just to carry the files they are ok, I tell the client to make a copy right away to a harddrive or 2

So are you just cutting the wedding up in MP4?

[Noa Put]

No, I still deliver dvd's with a 20 minute film and as an option the ceremony completely or long speeches etc and the same parts in HD as separate files on a usb stick.

[Steven Davis]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

No, I still deliver dvd's with a 20 minute film and as an option the ceremony completely or long speeches etc and the same parts in HD as separate files on a usb stick.

Interesting. I may start testing the USB option to see. I'm guessing some clients would want both, and that would mean a couple of lines to the package/price list.

[Noa Put]

Every client of mine has a ipad, every mail I get ends with "send from my ipad" so the mp4 file will play on their ipad also which they take along to their friends, delivering HD files on a stick means mobility, take it with you wherever you go, plug it into the tv, laptop, tablet and it just plays. Bluray doesn't offer that.

[Peter Riding]

I supply every client with a 1080p MP4 file in addition to a DVD.

I supply these on DVD - dual layer if necessary - as I don't yet trust the archive qualities of USB sticks.

But this does mean that the MP4's need to be copied to a hard drive or tablet or smartphone as the read speed direct from a DVD will not be fast enough to avoid choppy playback.

My default MP4 settings are 14m max, 10m average, 2-pass, 384 audio. This just about gets 2 hours onto a dual layer DVD and looks great. If you go for higher settings its likely that the file will be unplayable by the customer and they will have to convert it down in Itunes or whatever.

Pete

[Steven Davis]

I was thinking about trying these drives out. Wafer USB Card, Wafer USB Flash Drive, Credit Card Flash Drive You can put your logo etc on them.

[Chris Harding]

What I do is break the wedding down into event clips and then intelligently name them like "0001BridalPrep.mp4" and "0002Arrival.mp4" etc etc (the leading zeros make sure they stay in sequence as you are likely to have more than 10 clips) and they appear on the device in chronological order and the naming allows the user to identify the file instantly so they almost have a USB menu.

Works well for me !

Chris

[Steven Davis]

Originally Posted by Chris Harding

What I do is break the wedding down into event clips and then intelligently name them like "0001BridalPrep.mp4" and "0002Arrival.mp4" etc etc (the leading zeros make sure they stay in sequence as you are likely to have more than 10 clips) and they appear on the device in chronological order and the naming allows the user to identify the file instantly so they almost have a USB menu.

Works well for me !

Chris

Sweet, I have a few weddings coming up that need editing. What's that address again Chris? lol

[Chris Harding]

No problem Steve

My edit computer is on the Cocos Keeling Islands so you can simply fly me out there for, say, 2 months all expenses paid and IF the diving is not up to par I will edit for you. How's that? (It's my favourite holiday destination and the diving is always good BTW.. so nothing will get done naturally) I'm going back in December after our first half of our hectic season!

Seriously .. I always edit my weddings in multiple clips (one per event) so making MP4's as well is no effort. It's much easier than trying to struggle with a 80 minute timeline!! If I'm doing DVD delivery and USB I render the event as an MPEG2 and then render again as a MP4 with the intelligent naming.

Chris