How Do I Get DSLR Video on Instagram?

November 23, 2014 10:15 AM

I just made an Instagram, and want to post some of my previously non-smartphone-shot-video on Instagram. I tried many different things and followed a bunch of guides on how to do this, but nothing worked. How do I do this? [Technical Details Inside]

My process which so far has not worked: shoot 1080p video with my DSLR, crop & resize to 640x640px, re-encode, upload to Google Drive, download onto my phone, and then use the Instagram app to select the video. Invariably I get an error about how the app cannot process the video.

I'm using a Canon DSLR, a Windows 8.1 computer, and a Nexus 5 running Lollipop.

Bonus points if you can show me how to do this with FFmpeg, but I have Adobe Premier handy.

posted by gregr to Computers & Internet (12 answers total)

What format are you trying to upload? From memory Instagram likes .mov and not windows movie formats so perhaps try that.
posted by teststrip at 10:41 AM on November 23, 2014

Response by poster: I've tried both mov & mp4 with a variety of encoding settings using both FFmpeg & Adobe Premier.
posted by gregr at 10:46 AM on November 23, 2014

Could you post a screenshot of your encoding settings (from either FFmpeg or Premiere)? Also, do the videos post-upload preview successfully in Google Drive?
posted by sidi hamet at 10:48 AM on November 23, 2014

Response by poster: My FFmpeg looks like this:
ffmpeg -i insta.mp4 -s 640x640 -t 00:00:13 -q:v 10 -ac 1 -c:v libx264 -c:alibvo_aacenc -q:a 128k test_output_6.mp4

Premiere looks like this.

The files seem to play fine on my phone from Google Drive, and on my computer before I upload to Google Drive.
posted by gregr at 10:58 AM on November 23, 2014

I wonder if Instagram's encoder requires at least 1 track of audio... I know it's asinine, but perhaps adding a single audio track to your initial export (or dramatically reducing the audio levels from the source clip) would satisfy their requirements and permit upload?
posted by sidi hamet at 11:12 AM on November 23, 2014

Response by poster: I tried that on FFmpeg by slipping in a silent wav file, but it didn't seem to make any difference.

I really wish Instagram published the requirements for uploading video.
posted by gregr at 11:16 AM on November 23, 2014

Is it possible to shoot a video within the instagram app, save that file to your phone, and then compare the settings (codec, frame rate, resolution, audio channels, etc.)? I know when I do a photo from within Instagram on my iPhone, it saves it to the camera roll, but I haven't tried it with video.
posted by primethyme at 11:54 AM on November 23, 2014

The free Handbrake app may have a preset that gets you what you need. Look at some of its mobile output options. I'm betting that the bitrate has to be very low and/or that Instagram requires a very high level of compression.
posted by mtphoto at 12:03 PM on November 23, 2014

Response by poster: primethyme, I went and shot a video with the instagram app, it saved a file to the phone, I pulled the file to my computer, and this is what FFmpeg says about the file. The videos I've generated don't match this exactly, but I'm not sure what FFmpeg options to use to get to this:

Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from 'VID_56681212_200722.mp4':
Metadata:
major_brand : mp42
minor_version : 0
compatible_brands: isommp42
creation_time : 2014-11-23 20:03:12
Duration: 00:00:11.71, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 3538 kb/s
Stream #0:0(eng): Video: h264 (Baseline) (avc1 / 0x31637661), yuv420p, 640x640, 3436 kb/s, SAR 65536:65536 DAR 1:1, 29.88 fps, 29.83 tbr, 90k tbn, 180k tbc
Metadata:
creation_time : 2014-11-23 20:03:12
handler_name : VideoHandle
Stream #0:1(eng): Audio: aac (mp4a / 0x6134706D), 48000 Hz, mono, fltp, 96 kb/s
Metadata:
creation_time : 2014-11-23 20:03:12
handler_name : SoundHandle
posted by gregr at 12:22 PM on November 23, 2014

Response by poster: mtphoto, Handbrake doesn't seem to have Instagram presets. I couldn't find any downloadable presets for Handbrake to make Instagram videos.
posted by gregr at 12:25 PM on November 23, 2014

For Nexus 5: make IG video, rename your file to that file's name, finish publishing video to IG (details at link).
posted by neda at 1:38 PM on November 23, 2014

Response by poster: Thanks everyone! I'm not sure what's going on, but selecting videos through the Instagram app does not work. Browsing to the video using ES File Explorer and sharing does work!

herrdoktor sent me a video to test with, and it did not work through the Instagram app, but did work when browsed to and shared.

Who knows what's going on; maybe a bug with Android Lollipop?!
posted by gregr at 2:02 PM on November 23, 2014