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Article on Digital File Formats – Part 2

Video compression is a balancing act between making the file size more manageable and keeping a decent level of quality in the recording.  Some of the file formats used are lossy, like the aforementioned .wmv.  The format is excellent for size sensitive movie use, but not to so good if you want quality playback.

We are going to continue the discussion of file formats and will explore some of the others on offer.

Apple wasn’t late getting in on the act and produced the .mov file format.  They are just the same as .avi files, not very compressed.  They look good but then they should if they are up to twenty times larger than a .wmv file.  Apple users will probably extol the virtues of this format, but if you’re a Windows or Linux user, it doesn’t offer anything new.

Flash also have their own file format in the .flv.  This is the middle ground between .avi and .mov as the file size is reasonable but it retains much of the original quality.  The .flv format is the most popular web-based movie format there is.  Sites like YouTube will take a movie of any format and encode it to .flv format in order to be able to stream it.

No list of file formats would be complete without mentioning MPEG.  In this case MPEG2.  This is the format of the domestic DVD.  These files are also large as they are completely uncompressed.  MPEG2 is not suitable for any kind of streamed or portable media at all, but is ideal for home use with a DVD player.  MPEG2 is often the final phase of a production as once it’s MPG2 you can’t edit it or modify it in any way.  Many digital movie cameras will shoot in MPEG2 to offer consumers the ability to “plug and record” home movies straight into their DVDE players.

The other MPEG entry is MPEG4.  This is a more recent file format that combines a good file size with decent quality.  MPG4 is popular for sharing movie files as the size is small enough to be able to download without hitting any bandwidth caps.  It’s also becoming more popular with mobile video providers too as it is easily small enough for a cell phone but good enough quality for some of the higher resolution screens now available.

Those are just some of the most popular file formats around.  They all offer something different and lend themselves well to different situations.  If you want a small file size to email then use .wmv, if quality is utmost then use MPEG2, if you want to export to a mobile device MPEG4, or use on the internet use .flv.

Fort Myers Video Production is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design