subject: Digital Video File Formats Explained [print this page] Digital Video File Formats Explained Digital Video File Formats Explained
Common Digital File Formats
Internet video intimidates lots of folks because there's so much technical jargon. It's like an alien language. Fear not video enthusiasts!
I have compiled this helpful guide to help you wade through it all. This is the second in a multipart series that explains all the technical mumbo-jumbo you need to know in order to enjoy producing, sharing and watching Internet video files.
IF YOU KNOW NOTHING ELSE....
FLASH VIDEO
Flash video, which is given the file extention .flv is perhaps the most common format on the web today. You'll see the .FLV file extension on videos encoded by Adobe Flash software to play on Adobe Flash Player. Virtually everyone has these since they're free downloads. Flash delivers more video over the Internet than any other file format.
Flash was originally a Macromedia product but is now Adobe.
Notable users of the Flash Video format include YouTube, Google Video, Reuters.com, Yahoo! Video, and MySpace. Many television news operations are also using Flash Video on their websites.
FLV is probably the single most common format on the internet. .FLV gives one of the smallest file sizes after compression.
Flash Video is viewable on most operating systems, via the widely available Adobe Flash Player and web browser plug-in. Flash video also plays on several third-party programs such as MPlayer, VLC media player, Quicktime, or any player which uses DirectShow filters such as Media Player Classic, Windows Media Player, and Windows Media Center. Did we leave anybody out?
You can trust the fact that Flash is virtually universal. To give a try and compare, download VLC Player and see all its features.
GOOGLE RULES
.GVI is the file extension for Google Video File, a video format developed by Google and used as their proprietary video format.
Developed to solve compatibility issues, Google Video Player was another way to view Google videos and it runs smoothly on both Windows and Mac OS X. The Google Video Player rendered files in Google's own Google Video File (.gvi) media format and supported playlists in "Google Video Pointer" (.gvp) format. (More on that confusing duo in a second)
Why two Google video formats? Size. When users downloaded to their computers, the resulting file used to be a small .gvp pointer file rather than the full sized .gvi video file. Much like a link, the pointer file, when run, would point to and then download the actually video file to the user's default directory. Seems like the long way around, but what do I know?
As of August 17, 2007, Google Video Player has been discontinued and is no longer available for download from Google Video website. I don't miss it. The option to download videos in GVI format has also been removed, the only download option remaining for iPod/PSP (MP4 format). Guess it all just got too confusing for words.
FROM THE NEW BACK TO THE OLD
Graphics Interchange Format with the file extension .GIF is one of the original digital still formats. It dates back to the pre-historic days of CompuServe in 1987 and has since come into widespread usage on the web due to wide support and portability.
The biggest drawback if GIF was poor color reproduction. Many people thought it wasn't adequate for reproducing photographs when brilliant and accurate color was important. It's better suited for more simple images such as graphics or logos with solid areas of color.
GIF is for still images only and can not handle moving video files.
Tagged Image File Format (abbreviated TIFF) is a container format for storing images, including photographs and line art. It is now under the ownership of Adobe. Originally created by the company Aldus for use with what was then called "desktop publishing," TIFF is a popular format for color and black and white images. The TIFF format is widely supported by image-manipulation applications, by publishing and page layout applications, by scanning, faxing, word processing, optical character recognition and other applications.
Adobe Systems, which acquired Aldus, now holds the copyright to the TIFF specification. TIFF has not had a major update since 1992, though several Aldus/Adobe technical notes have been published with minor extensions to the format.
