Video FAQ
From Doc
- What types of video files are supported?
- What are the video size limits?
- I need to upload a video longer than 10 minutes. What do I do?
- The video on my shared album says, "This video has not yet been converted to Flash". What does this mean?
- The video on my shared album says, "The video failed to convert to Flash format". What does this mean?
- The video on my shared album says, "Video unavailable." What does this mean?
- Do you support widescreen video?
- Can I rotate a video?
- I downloaded a video and I can't get it to play locally. Why?
- Why does the video appear small during playback?
- My camcorder produces .vob files. Do you accept these?
- Why does my video take so long to upload?
- I use iMovie to edit my video. What settings should I use when exporting for best results?
- The quality of my video when played on my Phanfare site is not as good as when I play the original file. Why?
- Can I embed my video onto another website or on my blog?
- Can I edit video in Phanfare?
- Can I feature a video on my home/table of contents page?
Q: What types of video files are supported?
A: For videos, we currently support the following formats:
- avi
- mpg
- mov
- wmv
- .mp4 or .m4v
In some cases, we also support * 3gp, *3gpp, * .3g2, or .3gpp2 files. Read more about our support for these file types. Back to top.
Q: What are the video size limits?
A: Each video must be shorter than ten minutes in length. A movie clip must also be less than 2GB, although practically speaking, there are no non-HD video cameras or still cameras in production today that will produce a 10 min clip in excess of 2GB. (Read more on video limits and how we encode video.) As with still images, we will periodically adjust the limit upward to accommodate changing camera technology. Back to top.
Q: I need to upload a video longer than 10 minutes. What do I do?
A: There is no way to upload a video longer than 10 minutes to Phanfare. The limit can not be waived for any one account, album, etc., nor can you pay an additional fee to upload longer videos. We recommend using outside video editing programs, like Windows MovieMaker, to splice the clip into increments that are less than 10 minutes each and then upload them in sequence to Phanfare. They will play one after the other if viewed in the slideshow. Back to top.
Q: The video on my shared album says, "This video has not yet been converted to Flash". What does this mean?
A: When you add a video to Phanfare, we automatically convert your video to Macromedia Flash Video format (FLV). This format plays in the Macromedia Flash player which is supported across a wide range of platforms and browsers for maximum compatibility. Once the full-size video is uploaded, it will be available on your website in its original format (e.g., QuickTime, MPEG, etc.), and you will see this "not yet been converted to Flash" message. Within a few minutes, we will convert the video to FLV format. As soon as the conversion is done your guests will see the FLV version of the video. There is nothing you need to do to convert existing videos. Back to top.
Q: The video on my shared album says, "The video failed to convert to Flash format". What does this mean?
A: Phanfare automatically attempts to convert every video uploaded to the service to Macromedia Flash Video format (FLV). If you get a message that the video failed to convert to Flash, there may be something about the way it was encoded that the Flash encoder had an issue with. If you are able to re-save the video as another file type we support, try importing that to see if it works better. Otherwise, you can contact support@phanfare.com, and we will be happy to investigate. Back to top.
Q: The video on my shared album says, "Video unavailable." What does this mean?
A: The “Video unavailable” message indicates that the video has not been fully uploaded to Phanfare. If the video is in the process of uploading, the “Video unavailable” message will appear on your Phanfare site. Back to top.
Q: Do you support widescreen video?
A: Phanfare supports the correction of a video’s aspect ratio for proper widescreen playback. In the desktop application, select the video you want to correct, then click the Properties button in the lower right and choose the aspect ratio next to Playback Aspect Ratio. Currently, there is no way to alter the aspect ratio of a video from the Phanfare web-browser client. You need the desktop client to alter this. Back to top.
Q: Can I rotate a video?
A: Yes, you can rotate a video 90 degrees vertically or horizontally. Open an album on using the web-browser client at http://www.phanfare.com and select the video you want to rotate, then click the Rotate Left or Rotate Right button. You can also right click on the video in the Phanfare desktop application, and choose Rotate Right or Rotate Left, or use the buttons at the bottom of the application window. Note, that rotating a video in Phanfare only rotates it's playback on the site. If you download/export the video from Phanfare, it will apply in its original orientation. Back to top.
Q: I downloaded a video and I can't get it to play locally. Why?
A: Phanfare maintains both a web-streaming version of each uploaded video and an archival version. The web-streaming version is encoded to Flash 7 at 1 Mb/second. The archival version is encoded to MPEG 4 at 4 megabits/second, essentially DVD quality. Oddly enough, neither a Mac nor a PC can play and MPEG 4 video in an AVI file without additional software.
On a PC, you can use: Divx (http://www.divx.com)
On the mac, you will need an MPEG 4 player for the Mac. The following free solutions will work:
- Divx (http://www.divx.com)
- Perian (http://perian.org)
- VLC Media Player (http://www.videolan.org)]
Note that if your original video was under 4 megabits/second we will keep the original as the archival version. In that case the format will be whatever you uploaded to us.Back to top.
Q: Why does my video appear small during playback?
A: When you play a video on a Phanfare site, we automatically detect the speed of your connection. Based on the result, we serve you a Flash rendition with a bitrate that it appears your connection can sustain. This should reduce the chance that you see a video that is jerky, stalls, etc. If you feel the test did not detect a fast enough connection, you can click the words "Bitrate" on the bottom right of the video player after you start to play the video and choose a higher rate. The system will remember this override and continue to serve you the higher rate videos unless you select a lower setting. Back to top.
Q: My camcorder produces .vob files. Do you accept these?
A: Phanfare doesn’t currently support .vob files. You should be able to find a program to convert the video to a file type that we support via a search engine. Here is a list of our supported file types (http://support.phanfare.com/doc/Supported_file_types). Back to top.
Q: Why does my video take so long to upload?
A: Video clips can be extremely large files, especially if they are in an uncompressed format. It is important to realize that if your video is 500MB in size, that importing it is roughly the equivalent of importing 500 1MB images to the service. Depending on your connection, it may take hours to upload to the service. There is nothing we can do to speed up the process. If the uploading time is a problem, consider compressing the file by converting to a different file format prior to uploading. Back to top.
Q: I use iMovie to edit my video. What settings should I use when exporting for best results?
A: After editing the movie in iMovie, to create a filetype that Phanfare will accept:
- Go to File --> Export, and under "Compress Movie For" select "expert settings".
- Click on "Share"
- Enter the filename and location to save the file, and under export select "Movie to Quicktime Movie"
- Click "options" and set the video compression to H.264 video, and sound settings to AAC audio.
- Upload the .mov video to Phanfare.
Q: The quality of my video when played on my Phanfare site is not as good as when I play the original file. Why?
A: Videos that have a lot of quick movement and/or are shot outdoors can sometimes appear pixelated when converted to Flash and streamed at 1 mb/sec or less. These are the limitations of Flash video, which is the standard for streaming video across the Internet. Some videos, especially if they come from camcorders, often have incredibly high bitrates. In these cases, compressing the video down to stream at 1 mb/sec will affect the quality, but most connections can't stream more than 700 kb-1mb/sec. There is a high resolution copy of the video, created for archival purposes, that is available for download in the option menu on the right when viewing your albums. Back to top.
Q: Can I embed my video onto another website or on my blog?
A: If you have purchased Phanfare's unlimited storage plan, you are able to embed images and videos in another site. Click here for more information. Back to top.
Q: Can I edit video in Phanfare?
A: The only editing Phanfare offers for videos is rotation. You will need to use an outside editor for all other changes prior to import. Back to top.
Q: Can I feature a video on my home/table of contents page?
A: Currently, only images can be featured on the table of contents page. The first frame of a video can be set as the thumbnail image for sections and albums. Back to top.