Hi! I use Snapz to make simple "teaching videos". I teach math for an online school, and I will use the computer screen like a whiteboard, and write on the screen while talking through the example. Snapz has been invaluable for this. My problem is that I tend to work in spurts. I do a whole bunch of videos, then I work on curriculum writing, etc. etc.

I used to have a set of "good" settings that created reasonable sized videos at reasonable quality. I don't take huge movies, just a small part of the screen, and I don't need fantastic audio quality. The movies get shipped out to students on a CD so the file size again needs to be 'reasonable', not tiny. Now, I can't seem to find a setting that works, at least not like it used to? I am using Snazp 2.03

I've spent some time experimenting and wondered if anyone out there has a good "template" for the kinds of movies I am producing. What settings would work well for "reasonable" quality and size?

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Tom

Many screencasts done these days are captured at 800x600 or 1024x768 at about 8fps and seem to have quite reasonable file sizes. For example, the screencasts for Billable are 4:41 long and with the screen sizes noted above are only 3.4MB and 8.4MB, respectively.

Here's the settings from the 1024x768 file:


Another screencast from the same folks I have is 17:19 long at 1024x768 and is only 18.28MB with the above settings.

Kepi's advice is good. One thing though: only people with QuickTime 7 or later can decode H.264 videos. If you decide to go with those settings, you should also include the full installer (both Mac OS X and Windows versions) of QuickTime 7 on the CD.

An alternative video codec that works well with older versions of QuickTime is Sorenson 3. MPEG-4 is decent as well, but isn't much better in compatibility being that you have to have QuickTime 6 or later installed.

Here's the settings from the 1024x768 file:

[code]AAC, Mono, 44.100 kHz
H.264 Decoder, 1024 x 768, Millions
7.50 fps




Thanks for the help, that sounds reasonable and the settings are helpful. I'll use those and see what kind of results I get.

I appreciate your input!

Tom

I appreciate the suggestions as to which codecs work best. I have a question about the AAC setting for audio... Where do I find that option? I don't have an AAC option in the audio compressor drop down. What am I missing?

Thanks,
Rob

Ah, I see the issue here. AAC is part of the MPEG-4 codec (if I'm understanding this properly). The list Snapz offers is more or less the same as that offered by QuickTime Pro when exporting the sound track to an AIFF. If you're exporting a video file as MPEG-4 in QuickTime Pro, there is a separate Audio tab within the settings dialog that allows you to select from a few flavours of AAC.

One longish workaround for this is to save your movie in Snapz as Animation or some such similar lightly compressed codec and have no compression on the audio. Then open the video in QuickTime Pro and export it using the Video to MPEG-4 selection. Note that with just a sound track in the file, you can still use this option to export audio to AAC.

Never use the Apple Animation codec for anything. It is basically the same as RAW video. See below for elaboration.

[edit - I forgot about the licensing issue—if I recall, Ambrosia would have had to pay for a license to use the AAC codec (way too expensive for a shareware company), which is why the option is absent. I just use QuickTime Pro to export everything in perfect settings. In this specific case, I think you could just get away with IMA 4:1 Audio, it's not too bad compression wise and should fit on a CD. Qualcomm PureVoice is also okay for voice-only stuff, I believe.]

... yeah, I know. That's precisely why I suggested it for use in this case. If you're making a video, you don't want to have to compress it twice. Plus, saving as Animation is reasonably fast.

The Apple Intermediate Codec were designed to be used with Final Cut Pro, Final Cut Express and iMovie HD and so was designed to be recompressed. Pixlet is much the same; if you recall when it came out, it was touted as being a way for in house transport of actual quality high definition video that you can scrub through.


Though Animation may dub faster, any time lost in that process using AIC is made up for when rewriting the movie file to the disk, which is the slowest part of the process in my experience.

[I feel like an ass for some reason...]

Cause .... cause you're being mean to me! *sniff* Whaaaaaaaa!!!!!