File size
Uploaded videos should be 500MB or less; otherwise, Liveclicker will not be able to accept the file. In general, videos uploaded to LiveVideo are no more than 100MB. If your LiveVideo is much larger, you may experience long delays while your video uploads and encodes.
Aspect ratio
We prefer to ingest videos in full HD (1920×1080) or 720p HD (1280×720). Liveclicker will compress your videos and they can be resized using the Liveclicker tool. All uploaded videos should be encoded with a standard codec such as H.264. Uploading raw video is discouraged.
To shorten the amount of time required to upload your video, compress it beforehand using a high-quality video codec such as H.264.
Encoding Recommendations
Aspect Ratio — 16:9, 9:16, 1:1 or 4:5 are the accepted aspect ratios. All videos are actually encoded into these aspect ratios. If a 4:3 video is uploaded, Liveclicker will add white padding to match the preferred aspect ratio. You can also choose to manually modify the width and height dimensions of the LiveVideo element, allowing any needed ratio.
Preferred Codec — H.264/AAC A codec is a format in which your video will be encoded. Different codecs have different features and varying quality. For best results, we recommend using H.264 (sometimes referred to as MP4) for the video codec and AAC (short for Advanced Audio Codec) for the audio codec. If you’re on a Windows machine, WMV3 is a good choice of video codec.
Preferred Frame rate — 30 FPS Frame rate
If there is an option that says “current,” it is best to just go with that. Otherwise, this is usually 30 fps (frames per second) for the USA, Canada, and Japan, while in Europe and the rest of the world it’s usually 25 fps. If there is an option for keyframes, use the same value you used for the framerate.
Preferred Data Rate — 2000 kbits/sec (SD) / 5000 kbits/sec (HD)
This setting controls both the visual quality of the video and how big the file will be. In most video editors, this is done in terms of kilobits per second (kbits/sec or kbps). Use 2000 kbits/sec for standard definition 4:3 video, 3000 kbits/sec for widescreen DV, or 5000 kbits/sec for high definition footage.
Preferred Resolution — 640×480 (SD) / 1280×720 (HD)
640×480 for standard definition 4:3 video, 853×480 for widescreen DV, and 1280×720 or 1920×1080 for high definition. If you have the option to control the pixel aspect ratio (not display aspect ratio) make sure it’s set to “1:1″ or “1.00″, also sometimes called “square pixels.”
Deinterlacing on — YES
If you have this option, enable it. If you shoot in DV format, this is especially important. If you do not deinterlace, you will often get weird-looking horizontal lines in your video.
Audio —320 kbps / 44.100 kHz
Choose AAC for the audio codec. You’ll want to set the bit rate to 320 kbps and the sample rate to 44.100 kHz.
Format — MP4
While we like MP4 the best, we will generally accept any of the following formats: 3g2, 3gp, 3gp2, 3gpp, asf, asx, avi, divx, mts, m2t, m2ts, m2v, m4v, mkv, mov, mp4, mpe, mpeg, mpg, ogg, wmv.
LiveVideo format requirements for uploading
Of the thousands of video codecs supported by Liveclicker , you are likely to be using one of them. However, in some cases, uploads may fail because of some obscure proprietary video format. In general, Liveclicker recommends using the following guidelines:
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Do not upload huge files — Uncompressed, raw video files can easily reach a few hundred megabytes. Whenever possible, pre-compress your uploads. This will save you time when uploading your LiveVideo, it will save time for your retail partner, and it will not make a difference since Liveclicker optimizes automatically files sizes for Web viewing.
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Do not upload tiny files — Do not over-compress the videos you are uploading into Liveclicker. Try to upload at least in 640x360 with good resolution (bitrate 2Mbps and higher). Again, Liveclicker will encode and optimize the videos for Web viewing.
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Use the standard video formats — It's best to stick to the classic codecs and video formats: MP4, MOV (Quicktime), WMV, MPEG-4, H.264, FLV (Sorensen, H.264 codecs only), ETC, WebM
If you can't upload as a standard format, there might be an impact on the video or audio playback quality.
Stay away from FLV files if possible. Most FLV files are compressed using the Sorensen codec (which is a supported format), and the quality is generally poor. In addition, some FLV files will use the ON2 video codec which is licensed and is not supported by Liveclicker.
You can upload it as 16:9: here we are referring to the width/height ratio. Examples of 16:9 dimensions are 512x288, 320x180. You can also manually modify the width and height dimensions of the LiveVideo element, allowing any needed ratio. To learn how to do so, please refer to this article
How can I increase the quality of video playback?
There are three main levers you can adjust to improve the performance of the video playback: size, frame rate, and colors.
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Size — Decreasing the size of your video (constraining the pixel dimensions) will generally enable smoother playback for the same video across more of your email audience.
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Frame rate — Increasing the frame rate of the video will generally produce a smoother playback experience.
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Colors — Reducing the number of colors in the video may enable smoother playback at the same video dimensions when compared to the same video featuring more colors.
How does the size of the video impact playback performance?
As part of our video optimization process, Liveclicker encodes multiple versions of the uploaded video to improve the experience on any device or screen size. Also, our videos are stored on Liveclicker's Content Delivery Networks and are only delivered when the mail recipient opens the email message. Subscribers do not have to wait for the videos to download; they begin playing immediately. Email marketers do not have to worry about slow campaign delivery speeds because the videos are referenced through an <img> tag within the email.
