Specifications

Chapter 3 Media 41
MPEG-2. High quality. Used on DVD video discs. Optimized for camera
video at normal frame sizes. Also supports high definition formats with some
encoders (see “High Definition Video” on page 37). The WATCHOUT MPEG-
2 decoder performs de-interlacing automatically when required.
Quicktime Animation. Very low compression. Optimized for computer-
generated material. Supports transparency when set to “Millions+” of colors.
DV. High quality. Medium compression. Optimized for video editing. Gener-
ated directly by most digital video camcorders. Native frame size is fixed,
based on video format’s frame size. For best performance, use the AVI file
format for DV content to be used with WATCHOUT.
Windows Media 9. High quality. Flexible in terms of frame size (useful for
making tall or narrow movies), frame rate and interlacing/progressive
options. Demanding on processor speed when using high resolutions.
H.264/AVC. High quality. Flexible in terms of frame size (varies with
encoder). Demanding on processor speed when using high resolutions.
Choosing the right codec and codec settings for your source material and play-
back hardware may require some experimentation.
Recommended Compression
Formats
Although WATCHOUT supports most video file formats, some formats tend to
give better results. As a general guideline, use MPEG-2, Windows Media 9 or
H.264 unless an alpha channel is required, in which case QuickTime Anima-
tion is the recommended codec. WM9 as well as H.264 requires more
processor power, but provides greater flexibility then MPEG-2 in terms of
supported frame sizes.