I don't know if this is really the best place for this question or not. I have several questions about streaming video. 1)What is the best way to embed videos in a page for streaming content so that it plays across multiple browsers? What is everyone using: object, embed, object and embed, adding javascript? 2)What is the most preferred video format for streaming video for cross OS/browser support, file size and quality? 3)What audio and video codec are you using? Basically, I have a series of videos ranging from 10 seconds to a few minutes. I’m using Premiere Pro to edit them. Highest quality isn’t necessary because they are mostly silly little humorous clips. I’m planning on displaying them at 320 X 240. Thank you
1) Gonna have to ask somebody else - I never streamed vids from my site... 2) Depends on your target group - if you've got a lot of Macs (say any more than 25% of total # of users), go QuickTime, if you've got a couple Macs and a lot of Windows machines, go WMP9 3) If you're streaming - probably go for no more than 500-600 Kbits/sec. 320x240 is a good idea.
I've got our corporate tv spot online, it's windows media. here's my embed tag: <OBJECT id='mediaPlayer' width="320" height="285" classid='CLSID:22d6f312-b0f6-11d0-94ab-0080c74c7e95' codebase='http://activex.microsoft.com/activex/controls/mplayer/en/nsmp2inf.cab#Version=5,1,52,701' standby='Loading Microsoft Windows Media Player components...' type='application/x-oleobject'> <param name='fileName' value="http://primeinc.com/primesingle.wmv"> <param name='animationatStart' value='true'> <param name='transparentatStart' value='true'> <param name='autoStart' value="true"> <param name='showControls' value="true"> <param name='loop' value="false"> <EMBED type='application/x-mplayer2' pluginspage='http://microsoft.com/windows/mediaplayer/en/download/' id='mediaPlayer' name='mediaPlayer' displaysize='4' autosize='-1' bgcolor='black' showcontrols="true" showtracker='-1' showdisplay='0' showstatusbar='-1' videoborder3d='-1' width="320" height="285" src="http://primeinc.com/primesingle.wmv" autostart="true" designtimesp='5311' loop="false"> </EMBED> </OBJECT> seems to work pretty well. if you want to view it go to http://www.primeinc.com and click on the "drivers needed" link in the "Primeinc.com Latest News Releases" section. I used windows media because it seemed fairly ubiquitous in terms of browser support. VG
Yeah I see a lot of places that just use the embed tag and I tried that and it works. I don't think it is the most robust solution though. Did you check yours out across muliple OS and browsers? I think that is probably the way to go.
sorry, i should have clarified that in my post. It works in netscape, firefox, ie, and opera, and it also works both with and without javascript enabled. About the OS, sorry i haven't had a chance to check it in mac or linux, i'm limited to checking it in M$.
i have a friend who uses a mac... i'll ask him and let you know. might take a while... he's not exactly an internet whiz I think it might work, with the "codebase" reference in the classid tag. just a hunch though. any other mac users here?
OBJECT and EMBED tags are browser specific. WMV and Quicktime video formats are OS specific. Ideal way for multi-OS video streaming is to use FLASH. Seehttp://www.gieson.com/Library/projects/wimpyAV.html for example. All you need is FLASH plugin in the browser. Caveat: You need to convert videos to SWF format. Mark
I use object code. It's small and efficient: <OBJECT ID="PlayerCzech" height="425" width="450" CLASSID="CLSID:6BF52A52-394A-11d3-B153-00C04F79FAA6"> <PARAM NAME="url" VALUE="/video/absintheczech.wmv"> <PARAM NAME="AutoStart" VALUE="false"> </OBJECT> Code (markup): It's used on this page: http://www.absinthesupply.com/rituals/czech.html