Better visuals hoped for!

July 21, 2007 12:23 PM

Is there a video sharing site that offers better visual quality than YouTube?

In my opinion, the average YouTube video is somewhat handicapped by it's small screen size and frequently "smeary" visual quality, I suppose due to compression artifacts. There are several websites with instructions to make the videos clearer prior to uploading, but I can't see much difference in the final appearance after it shows up at YouTube.

So, can you suggest a site for video uploads and sharing that that creates a better viewing experience?

posted by bbranden1 to computers & internet (12 comments total)

Check this out.
posted by nitsuj at 12:36 PM on July 21, 2007

It's all about stage6.divx.com I would have thought....
posted by eb98jdb at 12:41 PM on July 21, 2007

From a brief look, it looks like soapbox has the best quality.

stage6.divx.com requires a separate plugin.. no thanks.
posted by mphuie at 1:01 PM on July 21, 2007

Stage6 does not require a plugin (it may prompt, but not necessary, I've never installed one), you can download the files straight off (the little down arrow in the center of the preview) and play it as a local file.. it's just a Divx/avi file. Stage6 is by far the best quality (HD, DVD rip quality).
posted by vanoakenfold at 1:31 PM on July 21, 2007

Thanks nitsuj, this looks like a great comparison site.
posted by bbranden1 at 2:38 PM on July 21, 2007

Brightcove
posted by peace_love_hope at 2:50 PM on July 21, 2007

My friend Clintus SWEARS by blip.tv.
posted by damnjezebel at 4:31 PM on July 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

Vimeo
posted by ThFullEffect at 4:47 PM on July 21, 2007

I second blip.tv, it offers far better quality video than Youtube, it actually pays content creators (more than any other video site according to this poll) and if you care about these things, it won the most recent Webby award for best broadband website.
posted by jeremias at 8:09 PM on July 21, 2007

Thirding Blip.TV. Even after transcoding your video into a lightweight, fast-loading flash video (a la YouTube), you can still make available the original, huge, high-resolution video file. You can link directly to it, in fact, allowing you to use the service for a videoblog.
posted by pzarquon at 10:15 PM on July 21, 2007

Blip.tv is a clear winner w/ much sharper visuals. Thanks so much. I'll also go thru nitsuj's page suggestion in detail.
posted by bbranden1 at 9:44 AM on July 22, 2007

A video quality shortlist:

Nitsuj pointed to a lifegoggles.com review of video sharing sites. That site also has a free ebook that details their conclusions about the 51 sites tested, broken down into categories such as account creation, uploading, interface, and video quality:
http://www.lifegoggles.com/video_ebook/Life_Goggles_video_ebook.pdf

I've summarized their conclusions about which sites have relatively higher video quality:

brightcove.com very nice quality, on par with soapbox;

ifilm.com pretty good, decent;

jaycut.com top ten percent (and has editing tools);

livevideo.com much better than average;

metacafe quality almost same as the source;

myspacetv.com muted colors but close to original source quality, good-ish quality;

revver.com pretty decent quality although compression obvious at times;

sevenload.com great video quality, nearly up to the 5 star mark;

soapbox.msn.com superb quality, marginally different from the source file, the best quality out of them all;

vodpod.com great quality when compared to the source, one of the best;

ziddio.com great video quality
posted by bbranden1 at 12:17 PM on July 22, 2007