which output format is the best one?

[horizonstar]

Hi,

Sorry for the stupid question. Which output format is a more clear one among all sorts of HD format?

Thanks!

[BrianCee]

The output you choose depends entirely on where and how you intend to view the finished video - for instance a video for Youtube is quite different to a video you are going to watch on a large screen TV - and would be different depending on how you would get the video on the TV screen - for instance via DVD player - or via direct link (HDMI?) from your computer.

So it's more a case of "Horses for Courses" rather than 'which is best'

[pvreditor]

Hi,

Sorry for the stupid question. Which output format is a more clear one among all sorts of HD format?

I think you will get a variety of answers, depending on the source format and the planned use for the final video. For example, I mostly shoot with an AVCHD camcorder, so I prefer to output AVCHD to speed up rendering time and minimize encoding errors. However, if the tracks are filled with graphics/titles, voice-overs, narration, transitions and inserts, then there's no speed benefit for rendering AVCHD-to-AVCHD. (There still might be an encoding quality benefit, however... I'm hazy about that.)

On the other hand, I load lots of video to YouTube, and long AVCHD files take f-o-r-e-v-e-r for YouTube to process for viewing. So I usually render videos destined for YouTube as MP4, which YouTube processes quickly.

If I know the video is going to be primarily played on PCs (as opposed to Apple Mac computers), I render to WMV files. PCs seem to have the least trouble handling HD WMV files, but Macs can't show WMV files at all.

Of course, if it is for a standard DVD, I render as MPEG2 standard-definition (720 x 480) files.

So in my experience, the answer to your question is: It depends.

Bob Kovacs
http://www.bobkovacs.com

[Kingston]

... but Macs can't show WMV files at all.

See "Flip4Mac" plug-in here: http://www.apple.com/quicktime/extendin ... nents.html

[wstagner]

I shot some 720avchd yesterday and output to mpg4 ipad/ipadHD. File ended up 1/3 the size of the original and even after uploading to u toob, looked great, at least to me.
You can see the files here: http://www.youtube.com/user/wstagner?ob ... sults_main

They're the Penny files.

Rendered in x4 approx 1 min files took maybe 30 secs to render.

I used the builtin x4 utoob uploader but I don't like it because if u tube encounters a processing error, you have to go into u toob and check it anyway. You might as well upload directly from u toob.

[horizonstar]

Thank you guys for your detailed answers.

I mostly view the file on PC, sometimes on my 40" 720P TV, may upgrade to 1080p in the future. But since I got the 24" monitor, seldom to view them on TV any more.

Is WMV file larger than other format?

[BrianCee]

no - wmv is one of the smaller file sizes which is why it is often chosen for upload to websites such as youtube, there are many formats which are much larger.