Feedback please! About videos on the site....

[SnowJapan 178]

OK it's time for some feedback, if you would be so kind!

 

Some people have been telling us that the videos uploaded to our snowjapan.tv site are running slow recently. We do appreciate all the comments and over the last few days we have been looking into this in-depth and have now made some changes to our server configuration and the software that the site runs on - and hope that there will soon be improvements in speed that we can implement.

 

But before we fix up our settings for future use, a bit of feedback would be a big help.

 

What we need to do is try to find a good balance between size and quality. As you might expect the bigger a file, the longer it takes to stream.

 

We have made a few adjustments to the settings of the system and uploaded one clip (the same clip) 6 times - each time using a different system setting. You can see the clip below.

 

The top one is best quality but it will take much longer to load.

The bottom one should load the quickest, but there has been some compromise in quality.

 

Of course, whatever we do on our end the internet connection that you have when viewing the clips is also going to be a factor in speed and one that we don't control.

 

-------

 

DELETED THE TEST VIDEOS.

Thanks for the feedback.

Edited: 4th Feb 2011

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Please take a look at the above clips and let us know how they look to you.

[Please only have one going at any one time!]

 

Which is best for you?

 

Once we get some feedback we will then decide which setting is best all round and hopefully things should seem much quicker to most people using the site.

 

Thanks in advance for the feedback.

[BagOfCrisps 24]

The first one is heavy and stops a few times, the last 4 whizz along without stopping at all, so for me the best one seems to be Clip 3.

[69 5]

Clip 4.

The first few are too heavy and interrupted often for my modest connection here. Clip 4 still looks decent to me.

[grungy-gonads 54]

1 is groaning under the pressure.

2 stopped a few times.

3 didn't stop, just about.

4-6 --- no problems.

 

I would say 3 or 4 are the best.

[Chriselle 158]

On my wireless network clip 1 took 50 seconds to fully load...slightly faster than the playhead.

 

Clip 2 took 7 seconds and not much of a quality hit. Clip 2 or clip 3 for me as well.

[seemore 66]

Hi David

 

Clip 5 was instant no waiting at all as opposed to all others.

 

I like instant gratification so Clip 5 works well for me.

 

Seemore

[klingon 10]

Clips 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 all load smoothly for me.

Clip 1 it had to catch up with itself once or twice.

[SKI 15]

On my connection 3-6 all fast and smooth.

2 nearly there but not quite.

So on this evidence I would say 2 or 3.

 

Good improvement though.

[muikabochi 208]

Up to and including clip 2 good for me.

[Jynxx 4]

Clip 4 for me. Even on a low spec machine it works.

good compromise between loading time and smoothness

[mitchpee 10]

I would say 4 or 5 for sure, they work well.

[SnowJapan 178]

Thanks for the feedback, please keep it coming - the more we get the better decision we can make.

[ShinyDiscoBall 2]

Clip 2 still looks good, can't see much difference and it is much faster than 1.

[sanjo 2]

They all load ok here but 3 was both quick and seemed pretty good quality.

 

5 and 6 are getting a bit too blocky.

[Tubby Beaver 209]

1- Stopped half way to fully load

2- Almost made it to the end....but didn't

3- Stream kept up with the load, decent bit of grey between the 2 bars, good quality

4- No probs, quality looked the same as 3 and load was well in front of the stream

5- instant load, didn't really notice that much of a dif

6-fast load, but blocky especially when the rider runs near to the camera

 

anyone from 3,4,5 would be perfect for me

 

more importantly, where is that run?!

[nippontiger 8]

At work - only 6 played without stopping.

5 stopped once.

3 stopped twice

2 and 1 were so slow I just gave up.

5 and 6 looking a bit blocky.

I think my home computer connection is a bit faster so I'll try there later.

[JellyBelly 1]

I would go for 3 or 4.

All except 1 loaded pretty smoothly.

5 and 6 not looking too hot compared to the other ones.

Good luck!

[big-will 7]

3 or 4 I reckon would be good.

[kokodoko 67]

number 4 seems to be the best compromise for my connection imho.

[nippontiger 8]

Home - better connection.

Clip 1, 2 stops.

Clip 2, 1 stop.

Others no stops.

1 and 2 both good quality.

From 3 starts getting a bit blocky when the snowboarder comes close to the camera.

From a download POV, Im thinking maybe 3, but Im a bit concerned that videos with a lot of fast movement might look a bit blocky at a lower quality than 2. There's not a lot of movement in this clip apart from where the snowboarder gets close to the camera. Fast movement is more difficult to compress, so you lose a lot of quality there.

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

3 or 4 for me.

[Thundercat 60]

On my home computer they all loaded super fast. None of the clips stopped to load... even clip 1 was finished loading by about the half way point of the video.

[Mike Pow 52]

Clip 3

 

Might be worth using Clip 3 or 4 and providing a link for highest quality (Clip 1)

[jared 0]

I'll second MikePow's motion. Have a quick low quality version people can have a quick look at to see if its any good - and a link to the best one to view if you think it would benifit from higher quality.

As someone who makes the odd movie it is a bit sad to see the images carefully captured reduced to moving blocks. But not all the movies I make deserve high quality or need it to get the idea of whats going on, hence the low quality option.

[RobBright 35]

All clips were fine for me, but think in terms of degradation of picture quality, would say 2 or 3 due to others' opinons would be better.