Forums / Technical Help / General Compression Guidlines for Vimeo

Ok, we're going to be honest with you: There's no way we can make exporting/compression guides for every kind of video software on the market. It's just overwhelming! However, we do want to give you some guidelines for compressing your videos for Vimeo, so look over these tips, find the corresponding settings in your software, and you should be able to make it work for you.

Note: Sometimes these settings are in 'Advanced' or 'Options' when exporting.

Standard Videos (that is to say, not HD):

Codec: Choose h.264 for the "video codec." Choose AAC for the "audio codec."
Frame rate: This is usually 30. In Europe, it is usually 25. If there is an option that says "Current," just go with that.
Keyframes: Every 30 frames. This is basically how often the compression references your uncompressed video.
Data rate: 1800 kbits/sec (same thing as 1.8 mbps). Making this number higher will increase both quality and file size.
Size: (pixel dimensions): 640 x 480 (If you shot a widescreen video, make this 640x360)
Deinterlace: If you do not deinterlace, you will often get weird looking horizontal lines in your video.
Sound sample rate: 44.100 khz
Audio quality: You want audio with a bitrate of 128 kbps. You can set your audio to really good quality without increasing file size too much.

HD (High Definition) Videos:

Codec: Choose h.264 for the "video codec." Choose AAC for the "audio codec."
Frame rate: This is usually 30. In Europe, it is usually 25. If there is an option that says "Current," just go with that.
Keyframes: Every 30 frames. This is basically how often the compression references your uncompressed video.
Data rate: 3000 kbits/sec (same thing as 3 mbps). Making this number higher will increase both quality and file size.
Size: (pixel dimensions): 1280 x 720 (Please note, 1440 x 1080 videos will not be widescreen on Vimeo, you must compress them as 1280 x 720)
Deinterlace: Yes. If you do not deinterlace, you will often get weird looking horizontal lines in your video.
Sound sample rate: 44.100 khz
Audio quality: You want audio with a bitrate of 128 kbps. You can set your audio to really good quality without increasing file size too much.

For those of you with a little more technical know-how here is some additional info from technical master Eugenia.

"Here are the 1.000 aspect ratio resolutions for various SD DV sizes. The values below are after their designated aspect ratios are applied:
NTSC 4:3: 656x480 or 640x480 (at 1800 kbps)
PAL 4:3: 768x576 (at 2300 kbps)
NTSC & PAL 16:9: 874x480 or 880x480 (at 3000 kbps)
For HVX or DVX 16:9 Panasonic cameras, its 848x480 (at 3000 kbps)"


Those are the basic principles that will apply to almost all of the video programs out there. Eugenia, an active member in the Vimeo community, has made some tutorials for specific programs that you can view here:

vimeo.com/forums/topic:3671
http:/vimeo.com/forums/topic:4038