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HD Video on FacebookI have been keeping a close eye on the evolution of HD video on the internet over the last two years. For a while, YouTube was really the only game in town and the video quality was terrible. And people seemed to be dropping F*bombs constantly in the comment section under the videos. Then, just over a year ago, I watched a video in full screen, high definition video over the internet. I was amazed. I did not think the technology was at that point and that it could be possible to post high quality video to a world wide audience with the click of a button. The HD video website is called Vimeo, and they are simply, hands-down, THE BEST. Other websites followed, like Exposure Room, giving people a free method of HD delivery to the masses. But, sometimes the Flash encoding on Vimeo and XR does not meet up to my high expectations. Vimeo has a great comment and community system setup, but occasionally, the video quality suffers as it is encoded into Flash. I am not certain why, but some of my videos look better than others (compression wise) and I am exporting them the exact same way out of Final Cut Pro. I also found that when uploading video to Vimeo, it is best to do it around 10am EST. If I were to set an upload at 10pm EST, the up speed is super slow and sometimes the encode screws up. Lots of people set the video to upload and encode before they go to sleep. Perhaps this is directly related to the number of encodes going on at the Vimeo servers at a given time. Now, a new HD web video option is available and from my first experiences, it looks better than Vimeo, YouTubeHD and Exposure Room. Perhaps the Flash encoders are even more powerful at Facebook. I know that this technology has been available with Facebook since the end of 2008, but I think that the company may have upgraded their encoding servers or Flash codec. The HD video looks very good on the site right now. When I click full screen on my iMac computer, the Facebook HD looks far better than anything I have ever seen. I have posted an embed of the first video I have uploaded to Facebook HD. I think the embed will only play in standard definition. In order to view it in HD, you must click the “Facebook” logo in the upper left of the window and watch it from their site. Unfortunately, I think you must be a member of Facebook to view HD. It is free, so sign up now, just to try it out. I hope Vimeo can use similar encoding technology and improve their website. Perhaps, because Vimeo got so big, so fast, they are trying to sort things out. Time will tell. UPDATE: Looks like Vimeo is working on this problem. Click here to see the mp4 conversation at Vimeo. Let me know what you think. When you post a comment, please let me know what type of computer you are using to view the HD video and tell me how it played out on your screen (ie. choppy, smooth, ect) I must say one last thing about web video. All the video on my website is hosted by my server and all of the videos are in 720p HD quicktime. This is the clearest and best way to view HD internet video, in my opinion. But it takes a toll on the web hosting, server bandwidth and you need a decent computer to view it. A lot of people are looking for third parties to host HD video for new and old computers. Perhaps, Facebook will allow HD embeds with their great Flash encoding in the future for people who have video intensive websites. To address some of the concerns about who actually owns your content on Facebook, I cut and pasted a little part of the May 1, 2009 terms and conditions.
So as far as I see it, you are in control of your content and allow Facebook to send it where they please. But, if you want that roller coaster to end, you simply delete the content and all is well. The content no longer is used on or by Facebook. June 3rd, 2009 | Category: TV Geekery, Website Related
19 comments to HD Video on Facebook |
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it actually never got sharp for me. especially not fullscreen. motion was a tad bit choppy at times, but overall seemed pretty good.
nice reel btw.
@Bill T: Did you watch it in HD over on Facebook? It would be nice if I could post an HD embed like Vimeo allows you (for a price of course). Plus, you can remove all branding from the embed. I wonder if Facebook would let me do all that for a price? Again, I love Facebook’s Flash encoding.
The version posted here (as an embedded video) is standard def and if watched full screen, it would look soft.
Thanks Bill!
TG
tom – i just viewed the HD version in full screen mode on my wife’s macbook. it looked great. I had a few hickups here and there, but overall it played great. picture was very sharp on my computer. your reel is very impressive.
I always kind of liked exposure room a touch better than vimeo… they are both great though.
btw – finally got letus. will shoot this weekend. thanks for your helpful emails. when I have something to put together, I would love your critique.
Hello Tom,
First of all I’m a big fan of your videos that i follow on Vimeo. I actually pay on Vimeo to put any video I want on HD although I’m really just doing families video…
Anyway I already noticed the quality of Facebook HD video vs Vimeo and that bother me since Facebook is a social network where nobody really cares the HD quality (of course as soon as they will realize the quality of it they won’t go back to the crappy flv format…).
Vimeo got a real quality audience and they need to improve their encoding system because except for the not proliferation of advertising, there is less and less advantage to pay the $59 yearly to get your videos HD on this website. You now just need to create a fanpage on Facebook and you’ll be able to publish as much as you want your work that I admire.
I saw your video with my pc and the quality was amazing. I publish it on my profile to show it to my friends.
Keep the good work.
Cheers
Romain
PS:Excuse my english, I’m french!
can’t agree more. i’ve been uploading the same 720p clips to youtubeHD, dailymotion, vimeo, facebook, etc… for a while and it’s by far the best experience so far even if it’s more of a semi-private circle of viewers than other video sites.
of course when upping content anywhere, there’s always copyright concerns and sharing policies…
keep up the great work
best, R
@christopher h.: Looking forward to your Letus videos. Let me know if you have any questions as you learn it.
@Romain: Thank you. Lets give Vimeo just a little time to sort out the MP4 issue. I was just so surprised at how well the stuff looks on Facebook. You make a great point about people paying $60 to have HD video on Vimeo (when Facebook looks better!)
@rhervag: yea. I just got involved with Facebook and do not fully understand just how powerful it could be as a way for people to publish and promote videos. I will be keeping an eye on Vimeos next move. Viewing quality of video is very important to me. I would not even touch YouTube until they offered HD. If you have copyrighted material in your films or videos, there is a good chance that certain websites will just delete without notice.
Watched on two different machines on facebook over 10Mbit DSL.
First machine was an original iMac 2 GHz Intel CoreDuo on WiFi and the second machine was a MacPro 2.66 GHz Intel QuadCore on wired GHz network.
iMac defaulted to regular quality. I started video then hit watch in HD, then full screen. Chugged big time. Played for 5 sec then buffered for 10 and so on. Video looked great for web video. Still noticeable boxy pixelation but, highly acceptable quality.
MacPro defaulted to HD. Started video then went to full screen and experienced the same chugness. I presume the problem is actually facebook’s stream. Right now, just trying to get around facebook it’s reacting slow.
However I recently posted a fun video for some family to enjoy with copyrighted music and it was taken down by facebook and I was slapped with a warning email stating if I upload videos with copyrighted music in the future I will lose my facebook privileges.
Worth watching where this all goes. Thanks for the post Tom.
Tom, with a free software called MediaInfo (also available for Mac), you can see exactly which codec is being used, sometimes including detailed encoding settings. The Vimeo HD looks fairly good when they use mp4 with h.264 encoding, but on the downside it requires powerful computers (current generations) and a good internet connection. I also have the impression, that playing mp4 in Flash 10 goes less smoothly compared to the Quicktime player. Ideally Vimeo would offer playback options (SD/HD, Flash/Quicktime/…), so that the viewer can set his preferences.
biggest problem with facebook is they are fascists when it comes to copyright infringement. They pull stuff down and disable your ability to upload if they think something is infringing copyright. I have put up my own films, with royalty free music and labelled it as such and had HUGE battles with them over a matter of weeks to get them reinstated. Basically, if they look too professional they think you nicked it!
The quality of the encode is directly related to what you pass along to them as far as your encode rate and size, but if it’s the same file,for two different websites then two things are possible.
1.The bitrate the service is using to re-encode your encoded upload.
2.The playback player.
The facebook video has been the best I have seen so far. I am gald I was able to get this conversation going. At least I contributed something instead of just drooling over you and Philip’s work
The Vimeo Staff posted this to the forums:
“We’re still working on it before fully releasing HD MP4 encoding, the above videos will be in MP4 HD form shortly.”
I use mp4 on my vid blogs for this site and they look great in standard definition.
Keep an eye on what Vimeo does in the next few weeks as they upgrade their hd video service.
How did you get your facebook video on your blog?
hahahja i hadn’t seen that real before the base ball hitting the lens , and you getting clobbered by the player!. Lucky you though i saw a game once dont remeber who anout two years ago when a ball het a lans a smashed the front elemenet. ouch !!
Very helpful post. Much appreciated. FBK playback on your site was mostly solid and remarkably clear. Some minor stutters took place here and there, but that’s likely my Mac G4 mirror door 1.42 GHz (yes I need an upgrade), running OSX 10.4.11, 2GB SDRam on a ATI Radeon ATI 9800 graphics card. Excellent reel btw!
Tom,
Your right on about the quality on Facebook check it out. Here is a link to a video we did on the EX1. Shot 1080/24p with the Letus and Nikon lenses for the interviews and select DOF shots. Also used the stock lens which I have to say looks pretty good. You have some great stuff, thanks for all the vids keep up the good work!
-Scott
Here’s the link: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=88376422438
Ok, for those of us that are a little slow. What format to upload to FB that starts out 1080 30p and use Adobe CS4 on a PC? Want to try uploading a 7 minute standup my kid did at Gotham in NYC.
@Matt Stapleton: Use the embed code that they include on the facebook video page. Just add that code to your blog where you want the vid to show up.
@Andrew McMillan: Yea, I will never forget that!
@Adam Walker: Thanks for taking the time to check it out. FaceBook HD video does look quite good and Vimeo is working hard to match it. Sweet system too!
@Scott Maiocchi: That addventures video is very well done. I loved the lighting in the sit downs and the dolly moves where super smooth. nice work telling the story.
@George Thompson: Take a look at my FAQ SECTION on this site. I posted all the settings I use when encoding for the web. I use a mac, but if you still have questions feel free to email them to me.
Tom