Thread

Hello all.  Just looking for input from anyone who’s been down this road already.

Built a new site for my employer. Product pages link to embedded videos of the product in action.

Here is an example of a product page with related video links (vid links on left):

http://products.acs-coupler.com/wheel_loader/coupler_pro_series_2000

Videos are currently hosted by Vimeo. We’re pay members of the ‘Plus’ plan that gives more control over the embeds.  I love Vimeo.

Our current videos are not branded or edited to ‘sell’ - they just demonstrate the products in action. In the future I would like to brand (add superimposed logo, brief intros, voice overs, etc.) the videos and edit-in more audio & content that will help sell the product. Doing so will violate the TOS on our current video host, so we will have to find a new home to host the vids.

I can produce the flash videos easily enough - just wondering what considerations I should be take in as far as hosting the streaming videos once they are produced.

Our site (everything but the video) is hosted by EngineHosting.  Any reason why I couldn’t just stream from there?  Or is it more complicated than that?

Thanks in advance!

Our site itself is currently hosted by EngineHosting.  Any reason why I couldn’t just stream from there?  Or is it more complicated than that?

I have a similar project that I’m beginning regarding streaming video; both QuickTime and Flash.

My current host (as does EngineHosting) charges by bandwidth used (as well as fine print regarding CPU usage), so there might be a problem with streaming videos from a cost and resources perspective.

I’ve considered and set up Amazon’s S3 for testing and it seems to work very well, costs very little even with a lot of streaming video, but I haven’t found a way to “protect” the videos yet. In other words, keep other sites from streaming my videos onto their sites. I’m sure there’s a way, but I don’t know what it is yet.

I have a dedicated server myself with ffmpeg installed, and my host has ded servers with 1.5TB bandwidth for around/starting at just under 500.00/year (unmanaged)or managed for 900 something.
Thats cheaper than amazon if you need that much, which I tried out once.
I also added ffmpeg so upload, convert, creates images etc is automated.
Then making it all simple and easy phpmotion has a script that I use as a “media management tool”

One option.

Thank you for your input. I am exploring everything you both mentioned as it is all new to me.  And to flesh out this thread, here is EngineHosting’s reply to my question:

Hi Eric,

While we do not support true streaming we do however support HTTP streaming, you can find out more about it here: http://www.mediacollege.com/video/streaming/http.html

This is usually how most video clips/segments are displayed on sites using Quicktime, Windows Media player, or even some of the Flash based players out there. They simply start the download and once it has a few seconds of buffered download it starts to play, while the file continues its download. One thing to also think about is how much traffic you expect to hit these videos, as HTTP streaming is going to put a bit of a demand on the server.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

- Chris

Hey Egwiley, just popping in to say hi, we chatted a bit on the eescreencasts channel.
Sounds like your a media rockstar.
Not sure about actual streaming, a requisite for me is the player at least needs to be able to jump forward or backward with a scrubber bar, and not have to wait for the whole download. Most probably do that now.

I think Vimeo is an excellent solution and (for now at least) pretty cheap.
I’m switching at least 1 client’s videos (hosted at Engine) over to Vimeo to handle their video needs.

We embedded the vimeo player alongside several other players (FLV player, flowplayer, quicktime etc…) on the same webpage so we could do a side-by-side comparison, tested this page on several locations,  hardware configurations, browsers and OS’s and the Vimeo player was the most constant in terms of loading and playback. So yeah, I’m a fan 😊