Best video format for web?

[Jeff_NJ]

I am looking to take some of my footage from a dvd I made and upload to the web. What is the most sensible format that will be manageable in size, yet retain decent quality? Thanks.

Jeff

[thecoalman]

WMV or DivX , my personal choice is WMv because most people can view it without doing anything.

[89SDML]

I'm no pro but I use WMV a lot, they seem to compress pretty well without getting very fuzzy looking. That's just my opinion though, I too would like to see what others think.

[Baldrick]

Or Flash video using Flash Professional or On2 Flix.

[jman98]

My suggestions, not necessarily in any order. I suggest you research them and decide what is best for you.

MPEG-1 - EVERY system there is can play good old MPEG-1 video.
Size and bit rate do influence the quality though and both WMV and QT will produce smaller files at the same quality level. The smaller your resolution, the lower the bit rate you will need, but using a higher bit rate does improve quality at the expensive of larger file size.

WMV - It is a good choice, but WMV is not officially supported on any platform other than Windows, meaning that Mac and Linux (or other Unix) users will have to deliberately have loaded optional non-official support libraries to support this format. If you don't care about anyone other than Windows users, it is a good choice.

QuickTime - Runs on Windows and Mac. Linux users have to load optional non-official support libraries to play it. I don't know how well they work. I think WMV is higher quality though.

[Soopafresh]

Mpeg1 can be played by any system out there, but the file sizes can get big.

[Jeff_NJ]

Thanks alot for the feedback fellas.

Jeff

[zoobie]

I also use wmv but read a review last year between wmv, mov, and rm that gave rm a slight edge in quality...nothing fantastic
flash always seemed to bloat my files but lots like it

[edDV]

For amateur wmv is easy. Mpeg1 is large and easy. Divx is easy for you and ??? what the ? for the noob receiving.

For a pro website, wmv or flash or maybe quicktime.