Posting Videos

I don't really know which forum this would go in so I'll post it here for now.

Basically the situation is I have some videos of sky news that I would quite like to post, but I have no idea about which format to put them in.

Real seems a bit dated, and the quality is poor in comparison. These videos have a fair amount of detail which i would quite like to show.

Flash - I understand you can post videos on this forum, but the format that my card captures in is mpeg2 (I think!) so how would I convert them.

Quicktime/Apple thingy (H.264)? - I've seen a couple of videos in this from other forums and blogs and this quality is superb, but again i don't know how to convert them.

If you can suggest anything, software, avice,opinions, please do as I am a humble novice compared to the rest of you

http://rivavx.de/index.php?encoder&L=3 does converting

Or SUPER
Scroll down to the bottom for the download links.

Good to hear no-one recommending WMV...

Thanks t everyone's suggestions.

I actually forgot WMV...but I take it it's not something thats recommended?

Not really, good for one platform only if you're not into squiffing about with a workaround and not so great quality anyway.

H.264 videos can be encoded with Quicktime, but I think you need the Pro version. Also, I haven't got it to work on my system, but that is probably just my PC.

As for Flash, there are many freely available encoders which will convert to Flash Video, but they only support the Spark codec originally used for Flash. Flash 8 and 9 supports the newer On2 VP6 codec, which delievers better quality video at the same bitrate, but due to the commercial nature of the codec, only the official Flash Video Converter (included with Flash 8 - not the player) can create FLV's using it.

I think if you've got a Mac you can encode H.264 straight from iMovie without Pro. No doubt on a PC though you'd need Pro.

Echoing one of the earlier comments regarding Flash, if you are going to use it, I too would advise using the On2 codec for it, as the Spark comes out more blocky at the same rates.

http://media-convert.com/

Virtually converts anything to anything.