A codec is the format in which your video will be encoded. Different codecs have different features and varying quality. For best results, we recommend using H.264 (sometimes referred to as MP4) for the video codec and AAC (short for Advanced Audio Codec) for the audio codec. If you're on a Windows machine, WMV3 is a good choice for video codec.
If there is an option that says "current," it is best to just go with that. Otherwise, this is usually 30 fps (frames per second) for USA, Canada, and Japan, while in Europe and rest of the world it's usually 25 fps. If there is an option for keyframes, use the same value you used for framerate.
This setting controls both the visual quality of the video and how big the file will be. In most video editors, this is done in terms of kilobits per second (kbits/sec or kbps). Use 2000 kbits/sec for standard definition 4:3 video, 3000 kbits/sec for widescreen DV, or 5000 kbits/sec for high definition footage.
640x480 for standard definition 4:3 video, 853x480 for widescreen DV, or 1280x720 for high definition. It is also best to export 1920x1080 or 1440x1080 video as 1280x720 too, since we will automatically scale it down. If you have the option to control the pixel aspect ratio (not display aspect ratio) make sure it's set to "1:1" or "1.00", also sometimes called "square pixels."
If you have this option, enable it. If you shoot in DV format, this is an especially important. If you do not deinterlace, you will often get weird-looking horizontal lines in your video.
Choose AAC for the audio codec. You'll want to set the bit rate to 320 kbps and the sample rate to 44.100 kHz.
While we like MP4 the best, we will generally accept any of the following formats: 3g2, 3gp, 3gp2, 3gpp, asf, asx, avi, divx, mts, m2t, m2ts, m2v, m4v, mkv, mov, mp4, mpe, mpeg, mpg, ogg, wmv.
Okay, 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.
