mydeo - Streaming Video Service - PapaJohn's Archive

When opting for The Web in Movie Maker 2, I have 2 choices of video hosting providers... Neptune for file downloads and mydeo for streaming. Your choices will vary depending on the country you live in. You might have both, one of them, or none. I'm not aware of anyone having a service other than these.

This newsletter is about mydeo, the streaming service choice. To get started, here's a chart that shows the 9 steps from deciding to save your movie to the web to viewing it as it streams from a mydeo server.

What's the difference between a file downloading service like Neptune and a streaming one like mydeo?

Earlier this year mydeo significantly reduced the price of their service. Unlike many free hosting services that convert uploaded files to lower quality and smother it with commercials, mydeo streams what you upload, leaving any commercials for you to add either in the video or on your website.

The chart above shows the steps to go from a Movie Maker 2 project to the playing of the streaming video. Photo Story 3 doesn't have such a build in menu option, but it's just as easy to take a saved story from your hard drive and upload it to your account at mydeo.... and viewing a story at high definition quality is fantastic!!! We'll take a look at both.

Vista Corner... I've been using GoToMeeting software to conduct training and support sessions, showing users things on their systems by remote control. A few days ago I took a test drive of my Vista system from my XP laptop, and it worked great, letting me make a DVD project and take screen snapshots... without leaving my XP computer.

Seven come Eleven... a day after upgrading to Internet Explorer 7 on my laptop, I upgraded Windows Media Player to version 11. Both installed easily and work well, making it harder to check into why some Movie Maker users are experiencing crashing after installing IE7. I don't have any good clues yet.

Europe 301 - I spun off a 2-3/4 minute commercial video for the B&B we stayed at in Florence. The video is on the mydeo service...

I received an early birthday present... a 500 GB external USB2 hard drive, one of those neat Western Digital My Books. It's our 3rd My Book and they all work great. The vacation footage and pictures are going to it now. With 20 hours of video and 9,200 pictures, my approach to sorting and making them easily usable to movie projects is:

If you opt for mydeo during the saving process, you can opt for any of the quality profile settings that Movie Maker provides.

To help you target today's typical broadband user, mydeo has a downloadable custom profile for Movie Maker that you can add to your folder of custom profiles. It's settings include 320x240 (428x240 if widescreen), 29.97 fps, 268 kbps video, 63 kbps stereo audio.

After the movie is uploaded, you can log into your mydeo account and copy/paste one or more of the 3 html code options they provide:

I made a sample website page with the code for each option in it, all pointing to the same video. Here's the link to the page:

Streaming photo stories are great, from lower quality to standard DVD quality and all the way up to those that align with high-definition... and they all use considerably less bandwidth than movies.

There isn't the option built into Photo Story to interface directly with the online service. Save the story to your hard drive, use your browser to open the mydeo website, log in and upload. The smaller file sizes for stories make them quicker to upload than movies.

Here are 4 links to the same story, but saved with 4 different quality profiles... to help you calibrate your connection to the mydeo server. See how high you can go before the playing isn't smooth.

Sorry for the first 20 seconds of audio... it was a mistake putting the noise of a waterfall into the video without showing you once what was making the noise. It's easily taken to be audio noise/static...

At home I can get through the first 3 smoothly, but it starts hesitating at spots on the 1920x1080

At Barnes & Noble, the first 2 are fine... the 3rd one turns into a slide show at about the 2/3 point... the last one stops at a frame about the 2/3 point and shows the picture all the rest of the way. The audio plays fine and all the way through for each.

Different internet connections from mydeo to you give you different results. Each of them play fine on my laptop when the story file is on my hard drive.

The mydeo streaming service is easy to use and plays movies well... and plays stories even better. I was very pleasantly surprised to roll out a few links to the high definition story files I used for this issue and get feedback that they played smoothly. My audio of a waterfall was the only issue reported, which wasn't an issue when I told them what it was.

Thanks to Cary Marsh, the CEO and Founder of mydeo, for helping me get setup for the testing that went into this issue.

Notice that I didn't say anything about the cost of the service... when I first wrote about mydeo I emphasized cost considerations to help users avoid being surprised by the bills. The prices today are much lower and very reasonable, but I say that understanding that the word 'reasonable' varies with the individual. Many or most users on newsgroups and forums are looking for the best free service... for those the mydeo service can never be reasonable enough. The same goes for the neptune file download service.

I look forward to comments and discussion about this and other newsletters on the forums at:

Windows Movie Makers.net

I'm involved in anything and everything that supports the users of Movie Maker and Photo Story, and adding more regularly. Some are free and others reasonably priced.

TheDVShow is the only weekly Podcast having more useful information about desktop video editing and production than anywhere else on the Web. Digital video editing, nonlinear editing, streaming media, software releases, tutorials, business tips, technical help, download of the day and news on the latest products to make everything easier. It's where professional and consumer desktop video users go to stay on the cutting edge.

Call the phone mail machine to get your technical question answered on the air... call (206)-203-3516

The radio broadcast is from Boston, and the website has downloadable podcast files. The June 19th 2005 podcast was the first 'bi-weekly' show with a segment about Movie Maker 2. The frequency of radio Q&A sessions about Movie Maker has fallen off.

Movie Maker 2 - Do Amazing Things (with its online companion on www.papajohn.org ), published by Microsoft Press...

Movie Maker 2 - Zero to Hero - with support on the publisher's forum - Friends of Ed

MaximumPC's winter 2005 quarterly special... had a 7 page tutorial 'Make a Killer Home Movie with Maker 2'. The special edition of the video made for it is now on my website as a file download.

The November 2005 edition of Maximum PC had a well done reworked 6 page reprint of the same article, starting on page 42 after the Happy 20th Birthday article for Windows.

A 7 page tutorial about Photo Story 3 is in the 2006 Summer Special edition, still on bookstands.

Learning VirtualDub - published by Packt Publishing in April 2005, is the first book about VirtualDub software. I wrote the introductory chapter about downloading and setting up the software: VirtualDub, VDubMod and AVISynth.

Movie Maker 2 and Photo Story 3 - www.papajohn.org - the site's goals are: doing amazing things, providing a detailed tutorial for PhotoStory 3, and helping you solve Movie Maker 2 problems.

It's being expanded to include the new version of Movie Maker in Vista, with Photo Gallery and DVD Maker.

Forums are open to all for viewing, but require registration of those who want to post. Moderators actively participate to ensure the forum discussions move forward and stay on track.

Newsgroups are wide open for all to view and post... moderation is collective by the participants.

Movie Maker 2/Photo Story newsletter. The subscription is $20 for 52 issues, and the link to subscribe is on the main page of www.papajohn.org

Newsletters issued more than 6 weeks ago are posted by Rob Morris to an Archive Site on his Windows Movie Makers' website. Links from my website pages to specific newsletters make it easier for viewers to see the content of both while browsing a topic.

Transition Maker 2 (TM2) is a utility for the ultimate in making your own personal and custom transitions for Movie Maker 2. It's a joint product from Patrick Leabo, the programmer, and myself.

I've beta tested some of the Pixelan packages and think very highly of their people and products.

ProDAD's Adorage packages for Movie Maker 2 are additional sources of very professionally developed transitions and effects. Here are links

I use a lot of professional background music for movies and stories that was created by Randon Myles, and act as his agent in selling the tunes individually.

There are 62 tunes available from 4 of his many albums... at 99 cents per tune (MP3 or WMA format). Here's a Sample - 45 seconds from 'Groove 2'. The 4 albums are: In the Fields of the on-Feretin , Music for Film Volume III, the Emerald Way, and the Fourth Door.

I don't have a full set of online samples yet, but if you hear something you like in one of my videos, there's a good chance it was done by Randon. Send an email if you are interested.

My personal database has been an ongoing project over many years, and is now available to others. A tutorial about using it is on the Managing > Personal Database page of my site, and more info is in the database package itself.

It's free for the asking to regular newsletter subscribers... send an email request and I'll return it with the zipped file, which is less than 1 MB.

To others it's $10. To order, use the button on the top of the Managing > Personal Database page.

On my list of things to do is a video tutorial showing users tips about using it.

An online gallery that fully aligns with the main priority of the website is the 'PapaJohn Expert Zone' at neptune.

Check it at N eptune and the Distributing > Neptune page of the website, where there's a developing tutorial about how to use the service.

In conjunction with the Portage, Michigan library , I offer two free training sessions about Movie Maker and Photo Story, an intro session and a workshop. Scheduled sessions are at 7-8:30 PM on :

The classroom has a large screen overhead projection system... and individual laptops for each attendee. You learn by doing, with some coaching.

If you can't save a movie because your project has become too complex, e-mail a copy and I'll divide it into manageable sub-projects, and provide detailed instructions about how to render the parts and assemble them into your final movie. $49.95 (no cost if it's not the right solution or doesn't work) - for details, see the sidebar on the Problem Solving > Can't Save a Movie page of www.papajohn.org

Movie Maker 2/Photo Story training and support services start at $75 per hour - send an email - PapaJohn@CharterMi.net and I'll help you determine your needs, and work with you to plan and implement them.

Wedding combo website/video packages - check the Living Projects section of the Movie Maker 2/Photo Story website for samples of what you can expect for the online portion of a package.

2006 - PapaJohn; Microsoft is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

About John 'PapaJohn' Buechler from Microsoft.com

John "PapaJohn" Buechler, of Kalamazoo, Mich., goes by PapaJohn online. An avid user of Movie Maker since its first release, and a regular supporter of the community of Movie Maker users, John received a 2003 MVP award from Microsoft for that support. In March 2003, he started a comprehensive website about Movie Maker 2 at www.PapaJohn.org. He maintains the website, writes books and articles, teaches, and provides support services - all for the community of Movie Maker 2 users. An engineer by formal education, John is a computer database and multimedia expert by business and personal experience. He co-authored the first book about Movie Maker 2 and is actively working on a second one. You can find his advice in the Windows XP Movie Maker newsgroup and in the Windows Movie Makers Forums.

This newsletter is republished with permission of John "PapaJohn" Buechler.
Please note that this is an archive of newsletters and some information may become outdated. PapaJohn, and the webmaster of this site, provides this information "AS IS" with no warranties.

Visit - PapaJohn's Movie Maker 2 and Photo Story 2 Newsletter Index

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mydeo - Streaming Video Service