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Here is a listing of some frequently asked questions regarding media production and streaming services. If you need further information, please contact us.
- Streaming Format
Comparisons
- Hardware
Requirements and Suggestions
- Video Software
Laboratory Services
- Advanced &
Innovative Streaming
Send us a question:
Q1: What is Media Streaming?
All
audio or video clips that are replayed on the Internet, either by direct
download or streaming, require conversion and compression to digital format for
transmission and playback. This process is called digital encoding. Media
Streaming is the ability to play media, such as audio and video, directly over
the internet without downloading the entire file before play begins.
Q2: What is the difference between streaming video like
RealVideo or Windows Media or Quicktime and downloadable video like MPEG and
AVI?
Downloadable video requires the user to wait until a large file is downloaded
before playing that video. For a high quality 30 second clip, users may wait for
up to an hour since MPEG and AVI are not highly compressed (about 10:1).
Streaming video is highly compressed (about 200: 1) and allows the user to begin
watching the video immediately when they click on the link. On a low bandwidth
connection today the quality will be slightly lower than downloadable, but the
total experience is far more satisfying - often making the difference as to
whether the video is watched at all.
Q3: What are the benefits of Multimedia Streaming?
There are three main benefits of streaming multimedia: Statistically, sites with
multimedia content have a significantly higher exposure rate. Multimedia allows
a more personal and effective representation of your services and products
Multimedia places your website on the cutting edge of Internet technology
Q4: Do I need my own equipment?
Only
if you want to perform the capture and encoding functions yourself. Otherwise,
you can deliver your original content to us in any audio, video or digital video
format available today and we will apply our proprietary technology and
knowledge to produce the state-of-the-art in streaming video for playback on the
most widely distributed Web video players.
Q5: Can I improve the image quality on my monitor?
Most
video display cards are good for normal display, if you use the monitor settings
for better than 256 colors. Very often using the 256 color setting on your
monitor will give washed-out and faded colors seriously distorting the image.
Higher resolutions are better. For monitor sizes of 600 x 800 pixel size and
better, as well as, a higher number of colors, improvement in the quality of the
image up to a maximum of the original authors capture settings is possible. BE
CAREFUL however, when changing your monitor settings. This requires changing the
Control Panel settings for Monitors and requires restarting the operating
system. If you select settings incompatible with your hardware it can cause a
system windows crash.
Q6: What capture cards can be used to capture video?
You
can use many different video capture cards to capture *.avi files and then you
will need compression software to produce streaming files for yourself. However,
only Osprey cards (and one, or two others), can be used for LIVE broadcast
streaming. The quality of the *.avi file sets the limit of the quality of the
streaming video compression. Therefore, the better the *.avi file the better the
streaming file. We recommend that you capture the video in RAW uncompressed AVI
format. While this produces a very large uncompressed file it also prodcues the
best streaming video after compression. The *.avi file is optimized for a high
quality capture card, like Ospery-200. A fast computer is necessary to capture
the avi file without breaks and image failures. This means minimum of Pentium
III 800 MHz with a SCSI harddrive.
Q7: What do I need to do to get multimedia on my site?
Q8: In what form may I send my media to VSL?
For
video media, we are currently accepting conventional analog VHS, S-VHS, 8-mm,
Hi8 tapes, and Betacam SP, as well as, DVCAM mini tapes. We can accept files in
the form of AVI (*.avi), Quicktime (*.mov, *qt), RealVideo (*.rm - already
encoded), and Vivo (*.viv - already encoded). We can accept visual aid material
in the following format: Jpeg (*.jpg), Pcx (*.pcx), Windows Metafile (*.wmf),
Bitmap (*.bmp), and convert them to the above formats. Any of the above files
can be mailed, e-mailed, or delivered using the following disk & tape formats:
High Density Floppy (PC), CD-ROM (PC).
Q9: Can I serve my own Audio and Video files myself?
Yes,
you can, however, you need the appropriate hardware, software, and Internet
connection to do this. RealVideo Servers are dedicated streaming support that
significantly improves transmission rates. Video Software Labortory offers
hosting service (using symmetric routing provides one-hop delivery to 96% of the
Internet) support for streaming formats with pricing based on data transfer,
enabling clients to experience larger spikes in viewership without having to pay
for streams that are under-utilized.
Q10: Can I stream live broadcasts?
We
can provide consulting and hosting capabilities. See Live Broadcast tutorial.
Please contact us to further information.
Q11: Can you edit my videos?
We
can edit a video into segments, truncate a video, or insert sponsor spots, add
text or graphics or voice-overs.. Please contact us to further discuss your
needs.
Q12: Why can't my in-house computer resources team do this for
me?
They
probably could do an adequate job if given the time, training and leading-edge
technology required to encode audio and video for the net. Most in-house
computer resource teams, however, have equally pressing duties that have nothing
to do with encoding. Just as you wouldn't buy video dubbing equipment or a photo
film processor to do jobs in-house, it makes little economic sense to do your
own encoding when you can have it done faster, cheaper and better with an
outside digital service bureau.
Q13: Do you support other video and audio platforms?
Yes,
we can encode, edit, host and stream RealAudio, RealVideo, Streaming MPEG,
Windows Media, Emblaze, Vivo and Quicktime. Other options may become available
in the future.
Q14: What are VSL's scheduling and billing arrangements?
Our
normal turnaround time is 2 working days for orders up to 300 minutes of media
encoding. For rush orders, we can turnaround in one days. For larger orders,
please contact us to discuss your particular needs.
Q15: Where can I get the proper player to view my videos?
See
Download
Q16: Can you compare RealVideo to Windows Media and Emblaze?
Currently, RealVideo provides 85% of all streaming content (over 400,000
streaming pages) and has distributed over 60,000,000 players. Microsoft's Media
Player (is distributed within Windows) provides about 10% of the market. All
other's provide the remaining 5%. While Emblaze does not require a player it
does take time to download the java applet. In terms of video quality, it is
generally agreed that RealVideo = A, Microsoft Media Player = A, Emblaze = B.
Q17: What about Quick Time ?
We
have found that Quicktime provides superior image quality at larger sizes, with
smoother transitions, it is easy and cheap to encode, however, it comes at a
price. The disadvantages include: 1/. there are less than 1 million QT player
distributed worldwide and the new QT player requires a 2 to 6 MB download for
the client which is too demanding for most client modems, 2/. Quicktime uses
heavy-cache streaming, that is, instead of just-in-time delivery of packets it
builds up a larger cache, thus increasing the initial waiting period, 3/.
Quicklime does not yet provide mixing of text, graphics and URL links within the
player, 4/. server software and requirements are steep, 5/. Quicktime is a
straight codec and not a packaged format like Microsoft ASF, or RealVideo RM,
which can player competitor codecs when arranged. In fact, I would be surprised
if one of them didn't reach an agreement to play the apple codec in their
players in the near future. However, Apple has released the source code to
Open-Source for public distribution. So there may be some surprising future
developments.
Q18:What is the Process to put streaming video on a Web
Page?
Simply Express Mail your video tape or PC CD-ROM to:
Video Software Laboratory
- or
E-mail AVI or MOV files less than 2 MB's to mailto:videos@video-software.com
- or
make an FPT connection to your files on your site and we will down load any
files less than 100 MBs.
WE
DO EVERYTHING ELSE. We will convert your tapes to the AVI, QT, or MOV files and
then convert them into streaming video and put it on a web page with the
background and graphics from the web site you designate. We can host that page
on our web server or we can mail you the converted files so that you can change
and reuse the material at your discretion. We will give your the URL address of
the just complete streaming video page.
All
you have to do is put the URL address on your web site. Then when a visitor
clicks on the URL our page with the appropriate background and the streaming
video will rapidly appear as if from the your web site. We can put the streaming
video in one, or all, of the popular streaming formats including RealVideo (85%
of all existing streaming video), Microsoft's Media Player (10% of existing
streaming video), Emblaze (java applet doesn't require a player) or Apple's
Quicktime 4.0 (brand new).
Can you help train my existing in-house video support staff
to handle our own streaming video production ?
Video Software Laboratory will provide consulting support to training your
existing in-house video staff to become proficient at producing your own
streaming video. Video Software Laboratory will provide you with a list of the
necessary software and software vendors, hardware manufacturers, and server
hosting providers. In addition, Video Software Laboratory will provide 3 hours
(over a 10 day period) direct technical support (via phone or e-mail) to
instruct your staff on hardware and software installation, video capture
parameter and compression setting, streaming optimization suggestions for your
configured systems, sample streaming embedding code, hosting and delivery
settings for streaming, as well as, debugging and software patch fixes for
well-known problem areas. In addition, Video Software Laboratory will keep you
posted with the latest advances and offers in streaming video through our
Streaming Video Newsletter.
Can you provide customized SMIL code Templates for my
RealVideo ?
For
vertical scrolling text with video streaming and URL links to time points in the
video and additional accent graphics and text. Simply e-mail us that you would
like to purchase a template and we will express mail a diskette with the the
text, image and SMI files along with instructions for set-up. If you provide
specifics of your template needs VSL will provide a Demo in rapid order for you
to consider.
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