What's the best Flash Encoder?

[john FVC]

We are looking encode the whole of our back catalogue and need to know what others have found best for encoding. We have tried a few things but have not been happy with the quality. We will be converting our current wmv files and want the quality to be as good as them.

What has given you the best results?

[XD2]

I built a CMS for a guy recently who was streaming HD videos in f4v and flv format. He was using Adobe Premier I believe, video quality was excellent.

[john FVC]

I built a CMS for a guy recently who was streaming HD videos in f4v and flv format. He was using Adobe Premier I believe, video quality was excellent.

Any idea what version of Adobe it was?

[XD2]

I couldn't say 100% but I presume the latest version will have the best features and most up to date encoding. So I would suggest CS4.

[john FVC]

Bump for more expert input..

[Loch]

You dont really want to be using Permiere to be honest, its good for editing but Encoding is not something its designed for.

John you are asking what is pretty much impossible to answer.
Most post companies have a large rooster of programs for this type of work as it all depends on the source file "Master".
Even if your Master is WMV which is not good to begin with its comes down to the specifics of that WMV file....

Some programs are good for some wmv files and some for others etc etc

[NextBigTube]

bump for more answers

[mmcfadden]

Bump for some knowledge. I have a game that calls points in a swf file for flash and quality sucks.

[fris]

adobe flash cs4 encoder

[john FVC]

You dont really want to be using Permiere to be honest, its good for editing but Encoding is not something its designed for.

John you are asking what is pretty much impossible to answer.
Most post companies have a large rooster of programs for this type of work as it all depends on the source file "Master".
Even if your Master is WMV which is not good to begin with its comes down to the specifics of that WMV file....

Some programs are good for some wmv files and some for others etc etc

Thanks Loch, that makes a lot of sense from the experiments I have carried out myself so far.

[john FVC]

adobe flash cs4 encoder

Do you use it yourself?

[ruff]

on2.com - just purchased by Google. I've been using Flix Pro for several years. There is nothing else that compares.

[RadicalSights]

Adobe Flash CS3 Video Encoder.... Comes with Photoshop CS3 extended edition..

or CS4 I guess.

[sojproductions]

Adobe CS4 media encoder is excellent, I found it really easy to use without much experience, fully customisable sizing and output with predictive file sizes etc, made life nice and easy!

[Amputate Your Head]

Adobe CS4 Media Encoder.

[VGeorgie]

Adobe Media Encoder is going to use the On2 VP6 encoder for FLVs, same as Flix Standard and Flix Pro. If you don't have that, like Ruff says you can't go wrong with Flix.

When selecting the profile be sure to choose VP6-E, not VP6-S. The "S" stands for Simplified, and while it may seem that's the one you want, you don't unless you restrict your users to Flash Player 9 update 3 or later - same as H.264. VP6-E is supported going back to Flash Player 8.

What you do not want is to use FFmpeg, which (without additional libraries compiled in) supports only the older Sorenson Spark codec.

[AntiChrist]

ffmpeg does the job quite well and it's free.
Command line , takes some study but good mass encoding wit a script.

[john FVC]

I found this the other day and have been experimenting with the trial version.

http://www.moyea.com/video-to-flash

Really nice program to use and encodes very quickly..

[WpC]

Sorenson Queeze

http://www.sorensonmedia.com

[JarvisEncoding]

Hi buddy, my advice as follow:
1. ON2 Flix Video -- http://www.on2.com/index.php?316
2. Sorenson Queeze 6 for Flash -- http://www.sorensonmedia.com/flash-video-encoding/
Both 1 & 2 are excellent, I have been using 4 yrs, however Sorenson's speed little bit slow.
3. Adobe CS4 Media Encoder -- http://www.adobe.com/downloads/
Faster, quality is fine, and can be .f4v file extention.

Any questions are welcome to contact me in sig.

[digitaldivas]

Adobe CS4 media encoder is excellent, I found it really easy to use without much experience, fully customisable sizing and output with predictive file sizes etc, made life nice and easy!

thats what i use

[Kroy]

For those who are confused by all this:
Currently the highest quality Flash (and the standard you see used on non-tube/free sites) is created with the On2 VP6 codec. (Don't worry about VP7 or VP8) The Adobe CS4 Media Encoder, On2's Flix Pro, and Sorenson Squeeze, Autodesk Cleaner XL ,among others, all use this codec.
Besides that codec, individual settings matter, some of those were already pointed out in this thread.

FFMPEG is not the most ideal way to get Flash. It's a free 'workaround" because On2 VP6 is a proprietary codec for which the companies that sell professional encoders (like Sorenson, Adobe etc. etc.) have to pay. FFMPEG is free. And you get what you pay for.

The Adobe Media Encoder (AME) comes with Premiere Pro CS4, After Effects CS4, Flash Professional CS4, and any of the Creative Suites (CS) that have one of both of those programs. Premiere Pro no longer encodes by itself, it uses the AME.

If settings are done right there should be no visually significant difference between encoding a file to Flash regardless if you use AME, Squeeze, or Flix Pro.
The latter might be the most economical choice if all you need is Flash.

All of them do batch encoding which you'll want in your case. All of them do 2 pass encoding which takes a lot longer but tends to result in better quality and /or smaller file sizes, provided all other settings are correct.

BTW, If you go the Flix Pro route, it was mentioned to not use the On2 VP6-S. That's incorrect, the S profile is for High Definition Flash. It's also available in the AME. If you choose Flix, be sure to get Flix Pro, not standard, as only Pro allows you to do batch encoding, 2 pass encoding, and better customization.

If you want to go the cheapest route and are okay with FFMPEG quality but don't want to learn server side/command line stuff you can get free encoders like SUPER from erightsoft which do an okay job. Not recommended unless you're a tube site or do this as a hobby.

Whatever encoder you choose, do get the trial first to make sure it can work with whatever input format(s) you have, and that it plays well with your system.

[TheSenator]

Download the latest codec.
K-Lite Codec Pack 5.7.0
http://www.codecguide.com/download_kl.htm

AVS Video Converter 6.3
http://www.avs4you.com/AVS-Video-Converter.aspx

I was skeptical at first using AVS Video Converter at first because it didn't look like much but after using the trial version I was hooked.

AVS Video Converter uses all 4 cores on my overclocked i7 920 intel chip. They use ffmpeg and h.264 codec in their software.

I can convert a 30 minute WMV file to an FLV file in less than 3 minutes.