ypg

Hi i currently use easy Video player however i find the reliability and speed lacking. I host my video files with Amazon and i wondered if anybody knows of a programme that delivers fast video. This guy below is also using amazon by the look of his script but I am unsure what system he uses for videos. This is the speed i need!! ps i am not promoting this fellow (there is no affiliate link in my link below) it is just an example of what i consider fast video and what i want to progress to

Cheers

Example below

Inner Circle Membership | Ryan Lee

Jill Carpenter

How big are your current video files? For example, what size you get for a 5 minute video?

If they are bloated this could slow your speed down.

hashbury

This is the link in the media video eZs3.com - Making Media Easy by Unleashing the Power of Amazon S3 Hosting

Loren Woirhaye

The player you use won't affect playability much. You need
to look at how your video is compressed and how much it is
buffered at the beginning, so it plays without additional
buffering. When a video stops and buffers, it's perceived
as playing slowly, so it's a good idea to load for 3-5 seconds
at the front to avoid the additional buffering.

Also, that guy is using a still picture on his video (what I
watched of it) which means he can turn the frame rate
way down to maybe 5 frames per second or less. Frames
equal bandwidth, so the fewer frames per second, the
faster your video will load.

In general stereo sound isn't useful for marketing videos
and just eats bandwidth.

Ken_Caudill

I'm using flowplayer and have no complaints. There's a WP plugin (free) for it that makes life easy.

Hope this helps.

Josh Anderson

Just as Loren mentioned you are blaming the player when the issue is in fact most likely your video.

To load a video fast requires the ability to set buffer time but it also requires a strategy known as video optimization.

You must encode your video at a bit rate that is lower than that of the internet connection you are viewing it on for it to load fast.

I can load any video and play it in as little as one second if its optimized and it does not matter how long or how big the video file is.

The rule of thumb is to encode where the combined video and audio bit rate are lower than that of your average website visitor.

Once you master this basic principle of video optimization the only thing you need is any player that supports a buffer time setting. You can then set your buffer time at the lowest feasible amount of time. I prefer 3 seconds or less.

ypg

Thanks Guys.I will view the plugins etc however i thought with easy Video player i did not need to worry about all this stuff but it would appear i need to. i going back to the members area to re-read the buffering section as i know we get some options there which may improve it. I would appreciate if anybody could take a look at one of my sites here and report if the videos load fast for them?? I am only going on my own experiences plus client feedback cheers. this is a site with some on cheers Internet Marketing Specialist

ypg

they average 10MB so not overly huge. easy video is fast as today for me but that can change tomorow which is the issue.

Josh Anderson

Your video is NOT optimized at all. In fact its almost 1mbps. The video stream is 862kbps + the audio stream is 128kbps.

You are totally missing the point... how fast a video loads has NOTHING to do with how big your video file is. It also has nothing to do with EVP being fast for you today... EVP does not speed up and slow down so that its fast one day and slow the next. NO video player does.

Let me break it down for you to two basic elements:

1. The bit rate of your video
2. The buffer time you set on your player

There are other very minor factors but if you get those two right then you really wont need to worry about anything else.

Right now the main problem you have is the bit rate of your video.

You encoded your video at WAY too high a bit rate. Encode it at a lower bit rate and you will eliminate buffer stutter issues (when a video plays and stops and loads and plays and stops and loads over and over again and does not play smoothly) and cut down on your load time.

My rule of thumb is to encode at a bit rate that is lower than the connection speed of my slowest average website visitor. For those targeting the US market this means under 256kbps for both video and audio streams combined. You can go higher... but the higher you go the more loading issues you will have.

Also remember... that YOUR experience is NOT the same as everyone else visiting your site.

You can have a terribly unoptimized video on your site and watch it fine over a 20mb fiber connection... but then huge % of your visitors may not be able to load and watch it at all on other slower connections.

That is why it is absolutely CRITICAL that you understand that your bit rate of your video should be no higher than the average slowest connection of your target market.

We teach these strategies comprehensively in Optimize Your Video 2.0: Increase Response, Boost Consumption, Make Video Sell More but what I have explained above is enough for anyone to overcome this issue. Just encode your video at a lower bit rate and then you will be able to use shorter buffer time settings in your video players and not have any loading issues.

ypg

is there a course that you are aware of that shows how to set up flowpayer as none of my easy player videos are showing today and i have had enough!. i need a reliable system for my members sites.

Cheers

ypg

I am keen to do your course however do you cover the set up and use of flowplayer. i am using camtastia so i cannot see anywhere to change bit rates? cheesr

Scott Lundergan

Even though there are presets for exporting with Camtasia or Screenflow, I like to export a high quality master file and then use that file to encode my videos with third party encoding software. Some affordable ones that come to mind are Wildform.com for FLV, Quicktime Pro, or free alternatives like Handbrake or this free mp4 encoder as long as you make sure you add the mp4 extension to the end.

It's a personal preference, but the main reason is that I can then use that master file for editing in another video editor if needed or use that file to create different formats for YouTube, a client's website, or even podcasting if I go that route. This way, I don't have to export multiple times from Camtasia or Screenflow.

(To answer your question, we don't cover setup and use of Flow Player, but there's a complete step by step setup and use of the JWPlayer and a few other players.)

Hope that helps

Scott

Kenji

This is an interesting thread but no proper closure to the problem. How are the videos playing now after going under the knife?

Todd R

How do I reset buffering time in Handbrake..?

seankaye

IN the video section there is an "average Bitrate" setting. By default it is set at 1000 kbps.

Josh Anderson

Encoding with handbrake has nothing to do with buffering time... You do not set buffer times when encoding a video.

Buffer times are controlled by the player you are using. Good players will have a setting where you can set how many seconds to buffer. Bad players will not.

Also the last response should be ignored because it does not effect buffering either. Lowering your bit rate will help you optimize your video so that you can use shorter buffer times but again the buffer time is ONLY controlled by whatever player you are using.

Todd R

Josh & Sean Thanks..

Is there a buffering adjustment setting in Easy Video Player. The settings page has an on and off button that toggles "auto-buffer." when I turned it on for one of my videos it said... "You have CloudFront enabled, and that means your videos will stream. This means that you cannot automatically buffer them. You can autoplay or set a splash image!" as far as I can tell that's the only choice I have regarding buffering settings... Is there something I'm missing?





'

Josh Anderson

Sorry... I can only answer questions about the functionality of our product Transparent Video Player - h.264 Flash Video Player - html5 Video Player - Alpha Channel Video Player which supports both progressive play options and supplies a buffer time setting and also supports RTMP.

If I were to take a guess since you are using RTMP buffering does not apply with EVP.

In that case the only other thing to consider is that you should optimize your video by encoding at the lowest acceptable bit rate for the image quality you are seeking. The lower the better for fast delivery without buffer stutter issues.

Jason Fladlien

If you're using camtasia to render your videos, here are the settings I use for simple power point videos...

MP4 format, key frame every 5 seconds, encoding mode: quality, with the wuality set at 50%, and the audio at 64 kpbs.

Works perfect with flowplayer buffer set to 1 second

Josh Anderson

It will only work perfectly IF the bitrate of the video is LOWER than the average nitrate of your target market. So though it may work great on your connection it could suck on another.

The key to being able to use buffer times 3 seconds or less is encoding your video so the total bit rate (combined audio and video bit rates) is 252kbps or less. To achieve that I recommend 32kbps audio and 180-220kbps video. Otherwise anyone on 256k connections (rural America) and other slow broadband connections may encounter buffer stutter.

uebomoyi

I've been using screen-cast-o-matic and it's done wonders for me. Also camtasia is a pretty good video editing software I use as well to make my videos a little more high quality.

Jason Fladlien

Not sure how you're calucating kbps, but I just checked my latest video I did with these settings. It's 9.06 mb, it's 6 minutes and 44 seconds in length, with 64kbps for audio.

Total bitrate is 186kbps and the video quality is very good. Usually the bitrate is even lower, but the video I just checked it on was 960 width by 576 height, and most of my videos are smaller than that.

Josh Anderson

Total kbps for a video is calculated by adding the video bit rate to the audio bit rate.

If a video is 180kbps video and 64kbps audio then the total is 244kbps.

So the key is to keep audiokbps + videokbps total below the average bit rate of your target market's internet connection speed.

If anyone is curious about the bit rate of their video and does not know how to check it...

Just drag and drop your video file onto mediainfo (free app) and it will tell you:

MediaInfo

Media Inspector for Mac :: Multimedia file analyzer for the Macintosh (for mac)

Jason Fladlien

Yeah but my TOTAL bitrate (including audio and video) with the settings mentioned above was 186kbps.

The bitrate of my audio is 64kbps and the bitrate of my video is 122kbps.

That's why I said we never really have a streaming problem for our viewers with those camtasia settings.

Todd R

Hey.. Jason, Josh and uebomoyl thanks for the help.... I just took a stab at lower bite rate based on all your comments and got a good load up time and the quality of the sound and video seem fine.. The people at Easy Video Player suggest such high biterates that the load up time is
crazy... and they don't have a adjustment setting on the software for buffering time... that sucks.. so I have to do it with the biterate and when I keep the video below 180 bpm and the audio around 60 bpm everything seems to be fine.. Of course, I've got a webinar video that doesn't show much motion. Just switching between a few browser screens and the mouse moving around.. If I do a more motion intense video I suppose I'll have to play with the bpm settings some more...

Hey Jason.. my son enjoyed meeting you last month.... and, of course, I enjoyed getting a chance to catch up with you. Cheers..

Josh.. I'm going to check out your products... thanks for the help..

Josh Anderson

Yeah, less motion and you can go lower nitrate without much impact on the image quality. Higher motion you generally up your bit rate to keep image quality.

Glad we could help.