The Elgato Turbo .264

So here’s the story.  A friend recently asked me what tools I used to compress my High Definition video files down into Flash FLV or Quicktime H.264, both of which are excellent compression formats for presenting online video.

Both formats produce files that are a small fraction of the original file size yet still manage to maintain a good looking image.

The tool I actually currently use is called VisualHub version 1.34.1 and it converts most any video format to most any other video format with excellent results.  I think it cost me $20 or so but it was actually worth much more.  Here’s the problem, the developer behind this great piece of software just a few days ago called it quits and basically shut down his site.  So no more VisualHub.  You can probably find a trial version still online at sites like CNET downloads but the problem I think will be that once the free trial period runs out you won’t be able to pay for and register it, it will then effectively become a dead piece of software sitting on your hard drive; all potential, no compression. (or put another way “all hat and no cattle”)

So what should you do now?  A recent Leo Laporte podcast reminded me of the Elgato turbo .264 which is both a hardware and software device.  But get this….the hardware is a simple USB device that looks like an ordinary thumb drive.  Inside is actually a chip that offloads your computer’s CPU of the heavy task of compressing large video files into smaller files suitable for playback on the Web.  For around $100 or less Elgato does it faster.  Unlike VisualHub it only compresses video into the H.264 format but that’s an excellent codec which most Flash players (like the ever popular JW FLV Media Player) can play back.  The Web site says the Elgato can “Quickly and easily export content to iPhone™, iPod®, Apple TV® and PSP®” and I don’t doubt it from everything I’ve read and heard about it.  In fact it comes with sofware that makes it easy to upload videos directly to YouTube once you’ve compressed them (YouTube switched from Flash to H.264 compression for all their videos some months back.)

If it hasn’t been clear so far, I don’t actually own nor have I ever used the Elgato device but read the reviews and you will see why I don’t have any problem recommending it.

By the way, I found this video on Tim Street’s blog who is the producer of the wildly successful online hit “French Maid TV” - so why not check him out while you are it too?

On the lefthand side of the Web page are multiple small banner graphics leading to various Heroes related content. As a fan of the show my eye was caught by a particular banner, this one promoting an online video clip of Conan O’Brien interviewing Masi Oka, one of the stars of the hit show. So far so good.

But instead of leading me directly to the clip what they really do is link to another Flash site (”NBC Video Rewind”) presenting Conan’s last ten shows…you have to read through each night’s show description just to find the correct episode to play.

Okay, that’s very stupid but in the grand scheme of things perhaps not sooo terrible that anyone should be fired over it- just extremely annoying to say the least.  Next comes the part that IS extremely stupid and/or a sign of NBC’s overwhelming greed and fear of this new Web 2.0 world.  Before you can watch the Conan episode that they made you hunt for in the first place…you now have to watch a 20 second commercial!

When that was finally over the Conan show began, literally. I mean you begin watching each night’s show at the beginning.  Hey, where’s the Heroes segment?  I haven’t a clue or the time to watch a full hour just to see one segment of interest. 

It’s then I noticed they had provided little chapter markers which you could click on and skip to but didn’t make any notation of what content was contained in each chapter so you literally had to select each one in turn to find the part of the show you’re looking for.

And guess what?  At the start of each chapter was….another 20 second commercial.  At that point I threw up my hands in disgust and left the site!

So what can the rest of us learn from this dreadful online user experience provided courtesy of NBC?

1)  MAKE IT EASY:  if you promote something on your site…then lead me directly to it, don’t make me hunt or wait.  The worst part is I think they actually did it on purpose!  My uber-cynical side thinks some lunatic at the network thought this was a good idea because it would force me to watch more of their commercials.  Of course, that is  stupid because most people do what I do, turn down the sound and bring up another application or shove the browser waaay over to the side so that they don’t have to be bothered by the annoying ad.

2)  PRE-ROLLS ARE EVIL:  Granted not “Hilter” level evil but still really bad because they both interrupt and delay the promise made to the consumer…that is to show us the content we were promised.  In trying to “force” visitors to watch ad content (a foolish pursuit to begin with) the only thing they really achieve is to irritate them.

3)  IF YOU HAVE TO try and force people to watch your ad content, doesn’t that say something about the ads?  There are ways to make money on your online video content without becoming a heel in the process!

Now That's a Red Truck

What does an antique car show have to do with online video or Web 2.0?  Nothing really, but I still had a fantastic couple of hours walking around and videotaping the goings on at San Jose’s History Park last Sunday.  The Santa Clara Valley Model T Ford Club and History San Jose put on the 8th annual “Antique Autos in History Park” event drawing impressive crowds. 

Musical entertainment was provided by JP and the Rhythm Chasers , a San Francisco band “whose style is deeply rooted in Chicago Hot Jazz, Small band Swing & Traditional Rhythms.”

Anyways, enjoy the videos featuring Joe Sernach and his 1908 REO (Model C) and Trudi’s vintage Hat Collection.

Let me bring to your attention a fantastic Wordpress plugin called Sociable from Yoast.com .

Simply put, this plugin allows you to automatically add a row of buttons beneath your blog post or page that users can click on to forward your content onto one or several of the social media sharing sites like Digg, Facebook and Twitter. There’s even an option making it simple for a site visitor to email your blog posting to a friend. The Sociable setup screen allows you to choose which social media sites you want your site visitors to be able to select from, it couldn’t be any easier.

I’ve just recently added this plugin to the Crow Digital Media blog

I have a few ideas of topics but I would really like to hear your suggestions! Something confusing you? Want to know more about X but don’t have the time or energy to investigate it for yourself? All my screencasts will be kept to under 3.5 minutes and most will be in the 1-2 minute range because I know that’s what most people like.

Use the comments field below to give me your suggestions!

Don LaFontaine, R.I.P.

The news was brought to my attention via the respected Steve Rubel Lifestream blog and his coverage of the obit written by CNN.

His passing had a definite impact on me. I never met him but somehow I feel we all came to know him just a little through his work. LaFontaine was simply THE voice for movie trailers and the person we judged all other voice over artists against, at least in terms of movie previews. In fact, I was wondering just a couple of days ago why I hadn’t heard him recently.

Besides maybe Mason Adams’ “With a name like Smuckers it has to be good” and the voice over guy for Hallmark (”When you care enough to send the very best”) how many other voice over artists does the average person recognize just by hearing their distinctive sound?

Giving us a peek into his technique, Don was quoted by CNN as saying: “My philosophy is that you have to really believe what you’re reading, even if you think the film’s a piece of junk,” he told Swindle magazine. “Even the worst picture is someone’s favorite film, and that someone is the fan I am always talking to.”

That’s good advice for all of us to follow I think.

And if you ever wondered if he used that voice outside the studio, here’s Don’s answer: “If I tried to use that voice in public,” he said, “they’d be calling security.”

Thanks for the memories Mr. LaFontaine.

Google is making it much easier for companies to allow their employees to create and share videos internally without fearing the information will get out to the general Internet. I’m so excited about this that I’ve already signed Crow Digital Media up and will be testing it out very soon! The formal announcement is supposed to come later today (meaning Tuesday). Part of Google Apps Premiere Edition, Google is providing both the streaming video publishing platform and storage space for the actual videos.

It’s called “Google video for Business.” Click the link below for the information I have so far.

Again this is for internal use only, meaning it is designed for companies to allow their employees to quickly and easily create, upload and share videos with each other. All it takes is a simple Webcam and an Internet connection for an employee to publish a video to the site. Training is one of their highlighted applications but video could simply be used as an alternative to sending text email messages to colleagues. One of the great features I wanted to check out is that each video is automatically segmented into “scenes” and viewers are able to skip ahead to watch the scenes they are most interested in.

No longer do companies have to worry about building out expensive server infrastructure or launching a huge new development effort.

The application is entirely Web-based and provides a user experience very much like YouTube meaning videos can be rated, tagged and team members can even write comments about individual videos. I believe there is also an embed function but that you would only be allowed to embed a video into another page within the same site (the same “domain” in Web speak)

Another aspect worth pointing out is that the video functions are integrated within the Google Apps online suite meaning sharing emails, calendars, docs, site bookmarks and even chat.

There is a small cost: “$50 / user account / year.” I’m not 100% sure how they define a user yet but I suspect that an employee simply browsing videos internally does not incur a user fee. I would think that only when an employee wants to be able to create and upload videos to the site would the fee kick in.

Google is also announcing a new Web browser called Chrome which is going to shake things up a lot for Microsoft which is sure to have a hissy fit over this, but that’s a subject for another post. In the meantime, I will be sharing more news about this exciting Video platform development in the coming days.

Not yet officially released but available in beta form for downloading (beta means it is still undergoing development and testing but they want you to try it out and provide feedback so that they can make it ready for its official launch) the Wizzard Media Player is attempting to provide something really intriguing to all of us generating online video content.

Some of the features include:

• Built for content that is released in episodes. Each new episode is automatically pulled into the player via an RSS feed
• Auto detects the viewers connection speed and gives them the video at at a playback rate calculated to provide the best possible viewing experience.
• It’s a Flash-based player that can play back video encoded in the highly popular MPEG 4 format known as H.264
• Can display ad content (in addition to your video) and send viewers to other Web sites for more information - so, yes, your online video CAN make you money someday
• Has some built-in view tracking and audience behavior analysis capabilities
• Your content can be easily distributed out to popular video sharing sites

All of this sounds really terrific, in fact I encourage you to scan their press release to get more information.

I haven’t had much hands-on experience with it besides doing a quick test with some of my own video and chatting with the development team (who are very responsive to user feedback which is always an excellent predictor of good things to come!) I even pitched them the idea of a “Wizzard Wizard” to help publishers enter in the correct setup parameters and it appears they liked that idea since they’ve already begun working on it. (I can’t say for sure that their decision was based on my feedback alone but I am sure it played a part!)