Encoding Your Video for E- Mail, Mobile Phones and Mobile Devices

With the advent of portable devices, limiting your video to being able to be screened only on DVD players, computers, and like devices is a negative. The technology is now here to show high quality video on mobile phones, iPODs, and similar tools for the mobile traveller. With this in mind, more and more people are taking advantage of their commute and lunch breaks to catch up on their video content, sharing video content with Bluetooth between phones and transferring via email. While the large percentage of this is viral videos (comedy, advertising), more and more content producers are converting their existing content to "portable friendly" formats and creating content specifically for mobile devices.

There is an art with converting content for mobile phone, as not all content is shot in such a manner as to make playback on the smaller screens something anyone wants to do. The key is to give it a high enough bitrate that the darker parts of the image are not washed out. This of course, causes the file size to rise. It is only the later generation of technology that is capable of handling this type of mobile content.

When you create content for mobile phones, the main thing to remember is that people are watching it on the smaller screen so close-ups are a must, as opposed to watching it on a wide screen TV or in a movie theatre. Keeping this in mind will allow your content to be seen clearly and comfortably on the standard mobile phone screen or mobile device.

Pragmatically, another difference in making content for mobile devices is to cut out the credits, opening sequence and closing titles, as they just are a waste of space. Using a title card with a relevant website will have more of an impact than trying to read scrolling credits on a mobile phone.

File formats are normally proprietary to the mobile phone makers, with each having a specific data setting for video images. More and more are accepting MPEG-4 as a generic across the board file format for video. While many encoders can convert to MPEG-4, Super Video Encoder is free, updateable and easy to learn. I have also included a template in these instructions to make your work easier.

To ensure your content works across platforms, test your content on as many phones/mobile devices as you can. This will allow you to tweak your content for your audience and offer multiple formats, ensuring proper market saturation.

1) Download Super Video Encoder
If you need a simple, yet very efficient tool to convert (encode) or play any
Multimedia file, without reading manuals or spending long hours training, then
SUPER © is all you need.
It is a Multimedia Encoder and a Multimedia Player, easy-to-use with 1 simple
click.
(www.erightsoft.com/SUPER.html)
2) Go here and download this specific profile
(www.digitalcinemapictures.com/lessons/nokiaphone.spf)
to this location
C:\Program Files\eRightSoft\SUPER\Profiles
3) Open Super Video Encoder from your Start Menu
4) Drag and drop your video into the lower grey section (see image mobile_001)
5) Right click in the grey area and bring up the menu
select "Import (load) an internal Super Profile" (see image mobile_002)
6) Load the NokiaPhone.spf profile by selecting it and then clicking open (see image mobile_003)
7) Right click on the grey area again and left click on "select the output folder destination" (see image mobile_004)
8) Choose My Documents by scrolling to the top of the list and left clicking on it to
highlight it then selecting "save changes"
Encoding Your Video For E- mail and Mobile Phones
9) Left click on Encode Active Jobs
10) Your file, when encoded (which is indicated by the yellow bar that moves across
the program), will be in My Documents for you to mail at about 1/4th size to mobile phones or through email