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vidding_livejournal_ark22010-08-22 01:55 pm
fifmeister.livejournal.com) wrote in vidding_livejournal_ark22010-08-22 01:55 pm
Entry tags:
Newbie vidder question about ffmpegX, or alternatively, about compression
So, this has been my weekend. On Friday, I finished the vid I've been working on for the past couple of months. I exported it out of iMovie in DV format and then transferred it to MPEG Streamclip and exported it from there in MP4 and MOV formats. Problem was, the smallest file size I could get while still keeping the quality high was 97 MB. (Erk!) The vid is a little over four minutes long, and the frame size is 854 x 480, which may be part of the problem--I couldn't figure out how to downsize it in MPEG Streamclip without destroying the aspect ratio.
I know I've downloaded plenty of fanvids in the past that were great quality, comparable length to mine, and yet had file sizes of only 20-40 MB. So on Saturday, I spent practically the entire afternoon scouring tutorials, LJ vid communities, and pretty much any other place I could find that might help me figure out how to compress my vid.
During my search, I saw ffmpegX favorably mentioned a number of times, so I downloaded it and gave it a try (actually, many tries). Using that program, I was able to compress the vid to about 37 MB, but the vid ended up so dark I could barely see what was going on. None of the tutorials or posts I saw about ffmpegX mentioned this problem, so I'm at a loss as to how to fix it.
I should mention that I actually couldn't get ffmpegX properly installed--I located all the different components, but when I tried to install, I got this error message: ##sh: -c: line 1: unexpected EOF while looking for matching `'' sh: -c: line 2: syntax error: unexpected end of file. I was still able to use the program (to my surprise), but I'm wondering if the darkness issue might have something to do with those missing components that apparently didn't get installed.
So, all that to say, my question is: can anybody help me figure out how to use ffmpegX to get my vid compressed while still keeping it nice and bright, or alternatively, can anyone tell me how to export it out of iMovie or MPEG Streamclip without ending up with a huge file size? Any help would be appreciated, because I'm still obviously very new at this and it's driving me nuts.
Sorry for the tl;dr. :(
I know I've downloaded plenty of fanvids in the past that were great quality, comparable length to mine, and yet had file sizes of only 20-40 MB. So on Saturday, I spent practically the entire afternoon scouring tutorials, LJ vid communities, and pretty much any other place I could find that might help me figure out how to compress my vid.
During my search, I saw ffmpegX favorably mentioned a number of times, so I downloaded it and gave it a try (actually, many tries). Using that program, I was able to compress the vid to about 37 MB, but the vid ended up so dark I could barely see what was going on. None of the tutorials or posts I saw about ffmpegX mentioned this problem, so I'm at a loss as to how to fix it.
I should mention that I actually couldn't get ffmpegX properly installed--I located all the different components, but when I tried to install, I got this error message: ##sh: -c: line 1: unexpected EOF while looking for matching `'' sh: -c: line 2: syntax error: unexpected end of file. I was still able to use the program (to my surprise), but I'm wondering if the darkness issue might have something to do with those missing components that apparently didn't get installed.
So, all that to say, my question is: can anybody help me figure out how to use ffmpegX to get my vid compressed while still keeping it nice and bright, or alternatively, can anyone tell me how to export it out of iMovie or MPEG Streamclip without ending up with a huge file size? Any help would be appreciated, because I'm still obviously very new at this and it's driving me nuts.
Sorry for the tl;dr. :(