Video Compression for YouTube (ENews Exclusive)

So your movie is ready for the world. It may not be a summer blockbuster about morphing golf carts from beyond space and time, but you're still proud of your work. Now it's time to put your little epic up on YouTube for the world to see.

Just one problem: how the heck do you shrink your movie to fit under YouTube's 100MB file size limit without turning your video into a muddy mess?

Not to worry, folks. We'll help you find a way.

Before we get started, it's important to understand one basic rule: Not all videos work well on the Web.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• Is your video fast-paced?
• Does it have lots of cuts?
• Does it have a lot of complex and dynamic visuals?
• Is it longer than seven minutes?

If you answered "Yes" to two or more of those questions, we've got some bad news. First, your video won't compress well, no matter what technique you use. Second, if your run time clocks in longer than seven minutes, don't expect a lot of hits. Web viewers are the definition of the phrase "short attention span." They want their entertainment in bite-sized chunks. Anything longer than four minutes has two strikes against it right from the start.

If your video does pass those first tests, you're ready for YouTube.

There's an old saying in computing: "Garbage in, garbage out." Nowhere does this axiom hold more true than with video quality on YouTube. The better the file that gets uploaded, the better it will look on the Web.

Due to this fact, remember this very simple rule: You must, must, must upload the highest-quality video that you possibly can to YouTube.

There's no room for compromise on this rule, folks. YouTube's Flash-based player is not forgiving. If your video doesn't look great on your PC, it's going to look a whole lot worse when it's played in a Web browser.

So, how do you upload a good-looking video to YouTube anyway?

According to YouTube's website, your video must:

• Be no larger than 100MB
• Run no longer than 10 minutes

In addition, YouTube recommends the following video and compression settings:

• MPEG4 (Divx, Xvid) format
• 320x240 resolution
• MP3 audio
• 30 frames per second

While these are good guidelines, they are by no means the only way you can get a great-looking video on the Web. Indeed, most people tend to be more comfortable with one of the following formats:

• Quicktime .mov files.
• Windows Media Format (.wmv)

Given their prevalence, we'll explain the steps you'll need to take to compress those formats below.

NOTE: Though we're using Adobe Premiere Pro for our examples, this isn't a problem. These steps work just as well in Final Cut, Vegas or almost any other video editing application on the market.

Let's say we want to upload our 45-second movie trailer to YouTube using a .mov file. We'll compress that file down as follows:

1. Click on File / Export / Adobe Media Encoder. (fig.A)
2. In the "Format" dropdown menu, select "QuickTime." (fig.B)
3. In the "Preset" dropdown menu, select "QT 256 streaming NTSC." (fig.C)
4. Click on "Video."
5. In the "Codec" dropdown menu, select "H.264 Encoder."
6. Set the "Pixel Aspect Ratio" to "Square Pixels (1.0)."
7. Set the resolution to 640x480.
8. Click the "Set Bitrate" option and set the bitrate to "2000" kbps. (fig.D)
9. Click "OK."
10. Click on "Audio." (fig.E)
11. In the "Codec" dropdown menu, select "32-bit integer."
12. In the "Frequency" dropdown menu, select "44 KHz."
13. Click "OK."
14. Type in a file name and click "Save."

The video will now compress.

The time it takes to compress the file varies from machine to machine depending upon processing power. A good rule of thumb is that the compression will take roughly five to six times the length of the source video. Example: If you have an eight-minute video, the compression process should take 40 to 48 minutes (8 x 6 = 40).

The key points to remember from this compression technique are:

• Use the H.264 encoder.
• Keep your pixel aspect ratio square.
• Set your resolution to 640x480.
• Set your bitrate to 2000kbps.