Overview
The Media Library is a feature that will automatically upload and encode your video files for you. Once you put a video in your Media Library, you can use, and reuse it as many times as you like.Note: The video you upload is commonly referred to as your “source” video.
When you add a new file to the Media Library, you can do this by going right to your Media Library in the Super User Dashboard, or you can also do it right inline, while you are adding or editing a Course.
Each file you add will need a “File Name”. This is for your internal reference only and are not displayed to your user on the front end. This is simply to make it easy for you to find and use these files at a future time.
For “Video Files”, we will put a “Duration Time” along with an “Added on” date and time so you may refer back to the file if needed.
For “Image Files” and Document Files” this will only include the “Added On” date feature.
These “Features” are added just in case there are some mistakes with adding a double later on or need to know when the file was added to the Media Library.
Furthermore, there are features for after the file has been uploaded. These features are: Preview, Copy, Edit, Delete.
- Preview will allow you to look at the file without having to download it.
- Copy will allow you to copy the link of the source video and be placed where ever need be.
(Copying the link of video files will allow you to copy 3 different links. These links pertain to the quality of the video you want copied. The 3 different links are: Streaming, Download High, Download Low. “Streaming” will adjust and buffer to the connection speed of your internet and the quality will adjust when need be. “Download High” will play the video in the highest quality of the source video that was uploaded but may take longer to buffer. “Download Low” will play the video in a low quality form but will buffer faster due to the lack of definition of the video.) - Edit will allow you to change the name and add a description of the file.
- Delete will allow you to delete the file all together. It will prompt a window that will ask you if you are sure to delete this file selected.
Encoding Settings
When encoding videos, you will want to have as high quality video as you can to start with – the ole’ Garbage In = Garbage Out analogy. Below are some answers to commonly asked questions about this process to best assist you in making your video look the best it can.
What video format should my source video be?
The Media Library can accept any format of video and file type that you upload, that is indeed a video (a Powerpoint file is not a video, no matter how many “cool” slide transitions you know how to make – nor is an Animated GIF… sorry). The files that seem like a video file but are not, will be distributed to either the “Images” tab or the “Documents” tab.
What resolution or size should my source video be?
We playback videos at a 16:9 ratio, ideally your source video should be 1920 (width) by 1080 (height). However any size of 16:9 will scale in fine. If your video is not a 16:9 ratio, we will help you and add a “pad” around it to fill up the space to that ratio. We don’t goof up your video by stretching it to an odd size that looks bad.
How long will it take to encode my video?
That depends how fast your Internet upload speed is to upload it, and then also how long (in duration) your video is to encode it.
The process goes like this:
– We will upload your video, and you will see a progress bar on this process. A five minute video typically takes less than 30 seconds to upload.
– We will encode your video to all of the different target formats to be compatible across desktop and mobile formats. A five minute video typically takes about three minutes to encode.
What type of video player do we use?
It isn’t any “type” of video player – it is our “Custom VT Player” which uses some industry standard elements, and then added a lot of customizations that are specific to our System.
Tip
When you are adding files to the Media Library, a bar will pop up next to the file that was put inside, that bar will fill up green and will begin “Processing”. Once the file starts to process then you may close the window, it will notify you through email when each file has been uploaded. When they are done uploading and encoding they will save back to the Media Library on their own for convenience.Note: You may only upload up to 100 files at one time.
Encoding Output Specifics
Videos are encoding using a different keyframe per second based on the duration of the video.
Keyframe intervals interact with video players in two ways:
- Size of timescale header load, the more keyframes the bigger the header file size and more waiting for the player to buffer before the video begins to play.
- Trickplay jumping ahead and back in the playbar, the player locks to the nearest keyframe so more frames = more accuracy.
For optimum results we encode using the following settings:
5 minutes or less:
| Segment Duration | 3 seconds |
| Framerate | 30 |
| Keyframe | 90 |
| Still Image | 2 seconds into the first segment |
| 90 / 30 = 3 second keyframe |
6 to 40 minutes:
| Segment Duration | 5 seconds |
| Framerate | 30 |
| Keyframe | 150 |
| Still Image | 4 seconds into the first segment |
| 150 / 30 = 5 second keyframe |
41 minutes or more:
| Segment Duration | 9 seconds |
| Framerate | 30 |
| Keyframe | 270 |
| Still Image | 8 seconds into the first segment |
| 270 / 30 = 9 second keyframe |
Other Settings per Quality Stream:
Size: 416×234
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 200k |
| Audio Bitrate | 64k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 480×270
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 400k |
| Audio Bitrate< | 64k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 640×360
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 600k |
| Audio Bitrate | 64k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 640×360
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 1200k |
| Audio Bitrate | 96k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 960×540
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 3500k |
| Audio Bitrate | 96k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 1280×720
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 5000k |
| >Audio Bitrate | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 1280×720
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 6500k |
| Audio Bitrate | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
Size: 1920×1080
*This stream is only included if the source video height is equal to or greater than 1080
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
| Bitrate | 8500k |
| Audio Bitrate | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
MP4 – Low & MP4 – High
Videos are encoded using different settings based on the source video:
If the Video height is:
Less than equal to 240
| Size | 0x240 |
| Bitrate Low | 350k |
| Bitrate High | 800k |
| Audio Bitrate Low | 64k |
| Audio Bitrate High | 64k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 22050 |
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
Between 241 and 360:
| Size | 0x360 |
| Bitrate Low | 800k |
| Bitrate High | 1500k |
| Audio Bitrate Low | 64k |
| Audio Bitrate High | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
Between 361 and 480:
| Size | 0x480 |
| Bitrate Low | 1000k |
| Bitrate High | 2500k |
| Audio Bitrate Low | 64k |
| Audio Bitrate High | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
Between 481 and 576:
| Size | 0x576 |
| Bitrate Low | 2500k |
| Bitrate High | 3500k |
| Audio Bitrate Low | 80k |
| Audio Bitrate High | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |
Over 576:
| Size | 0x720 |
| Bitrate Low | 3600k |
| Bitrate High | 5800k |
| Audio Bitrate Low | 128k |
| Audio Bitrate High | 128k |
| Audio Sample Rate | 44100 |
| Video Codec | libx264 |
| Audio Codec | dolby_heaac |