Commons talk:Video

Ideas

Commons templates for video out of sync, video needing rotation, video needing stabilizing (or other editing). mahanga (talk) 06:09, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Firefogg

Hello, would it be interesting to add something about Commons:Firefogg ? Jean-Fred (talk) 17:35, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Added a sentence. There's a bit more on Help:Converting video. Firefogg itself needs a tutorial of its own. mahanga (talk) 18:16, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Upload failure with .ogv movie : timeout after 10 minutes - why ?

I have tried 5 times unsuccessfully to upload a 18 meg .ogv movie clip, using the Commons upload page. I have a broadband cable connection. It uploads OK for 10 minutes then the upload is disconnected and the browser displays a blank page. This happens with Firefox, IE, Opera browsers. I have successfully uploaded other .ogv movie clips, but they are a bit smaller. Is there a timeout after 10 minutes ? My internet connection is capable of highspeed uploads but the maximum upload speed to Wiki Commons is 45 kilobytes/second and the average appears to be about half that i.e. 22 kbps. At that speed the upload should take about 14 minutes - yet it always times out after 10 minutes. ??? Rcbutcher (talk) 06:45, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

I uploaded a 34mb file just a few weeks ago without a problem. I'm not sure what the problem could be... maybe try uploading at a non-peak hour? If you'd like, you can host the file elsewhere and I'll try uploading it to Commons. mahanga (talk) 14:43, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

My last upload was the 36 MB File:Bb bamboo isle.mpg.025s0to81cropl8r2q10a7livedance.ogv on 5 December. It took a long time, as my maximum upload bandwidth is only 384 Kbps and it seemed as if the Commons server was not too fast. The same day I had uploaded videos up to 22 Mb in size, using Firefox 3.5.5, with never a problem. -84user (talk) 03:01, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Did your uploads take longer than 10 minutes ? I need this information to analyse where the problem is. Rod. Rcbutcher (talk) 03:12, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

I am pretty sure it took over 10 minutes. I have now, at 04:18:30 UTC, started an upload of 10 MB File:Krazy_Kat_Bugolist_1916_silent.ogv, and it's taking 30 seconds to upload each megabyte. And it just finished as I was typing this, about 04:24 UTC. That's about 213 kbps, and my ADSL has a 352 kbps upload limit. Now I'll look for a larger file to upload. -84user (talk) 04:31, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Just starting another upload at 05:13:18, of the 15 MB File:FelixTheCat-1919-FelineFollies_silent.ogv, and completed at 05:21:50. That was just over eight minutes. Ok, not over 10 minutes, but given my upload bandwidth the 36 MB Betty Boop film I uploaded could not have completed in under 10 minutes. -84user (talk) 05:24, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

I contacted my ISP and discovered I was limited to a really low upload speed, although they give me really fast download speed... they will double my upload speed to 512 kbits/second (still slow but...) for no extra cost beginning 1 Jan, so I'll try again then. Rcbutcher (talk) 07:51, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

That's good, but speed alone seems an unlikely reason for an upload to fail. I started a 36 MB upload of File:Mud_and_Sand-silent_0to508.ogv at 00:25 UTC and it's still going over 18 minutesjust finished at 00:43 at about 1.9 megabytes per minute, so we'll see what happens. -84user (talk) 00:43, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

TimedText

Very few Commons videos have associated en:Timed Text closed captioning files. A full list of captions available is at http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:PrefixIndex&prefix=&namespace=102 . They look quite useful for users who are not so fluent in English, but most are not interlinked to each other so are hard to find. As an example I have added links to the English and German TimedText captions for File:051118-WSIS.2005-Richard.Stallman.ogg. I propose two help sections, first to show how to use existing timed text when playing existing videos, second to show how to link them and create new ones. Something like the following, only better. What needs improving is to find a user-friendly way to download the raw text from the Commons-hosted .srt files.

I agree, there should be a download link for the timed text. I've made a mention of it on the Usabilities page.

You put up a good tutorial, though I think we can simplify it a little by assuming the reader knows how to copy and paste into a notepad file. Screenshots would be a big help, especially for the VLC steps.

Also, you may be interested in this page which shows an example of timed text embedded in the video (sort of).

Question: Should we be categorizing the TimedText pages under Category:TimedText (and what would that category be categorized as)?

mahanga (talk) 15:50, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

I started Commons:Timed Text to centralize ideas about Timed Text, and categorized it under Category:Commons features and Category:Commons video resources. I also am unsure how to categorize Category:Timed Text: Category:Media types and Category:File formats seem sensible. -84user (talk) 00:04, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I wonder if it could be possible to upload a srt file and Commons would automatically add it to the TimedText namespace. That'd make uploading so much easier. mahanga (talk) 15:24, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

The Commons:mwEmbed gadget features a menu item to "add timed text", there you can inline upload subtitles for the given video Mdale (talk) 01:29, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Playing videos with closed captioning on commons

The mwEmbed gadget supports inline timed text display and uploading. If you enable the gadget you can view and upload timed text in a web video player interface on commons.

Playing videos with closed captioning on desktop players

You need to be familiar with using select, copy and paste and with creating a small text file on your computer using a text editor and not a word processor. If you have no real text editor, use Windows Write. You will also need a Subrip-format-aware media player such as VLC media player.

The Commons video page may include links to TimedText closed captioning files (also named subtitles) in various languages. For example the "other_versions" section of File:051118-WSIS.2005-Richard.Stallman.ogg has links to German and English closed caption files.

1. first download the Ogg video into a folder you have created just for this video and its subtitles (otherwise the media player may get confused with subtitles for other files).

2. From the video description page right-mouse click over the German subtitles file link and select "Save Link As", choose the folder containing the video and click Save. The file you saved does not contain the subtitles in a usable form yet.

3. From the video description page left-mouse click the German subtitles file link and the subtitles page should open. Click the edit tab and select all the text in the panel, for example with control-A right-mouse-click-Select All. Copy this text, for example with control-c, or right-mouse-click-Copy.

4. On your computer open the folder containing the video, and use a real text editor to open the subtitles file you downloaded in step 3. You should see a lot of html markup.

5. In the text editor, select all the text, and paste the text copied from step 3. On Windows you would press control-A control-V, or with a mouse press right-mouse-click-Select All and then press right-mouse-click-Copy. The file should now contain the subtitle text in the correct format. Save the file and close the editor.

6. Repeat steps 2 to 5 for each language subtitle file you want.

7. Your folder should now contain one ogg video and one or more subtitle files, and the video is now ready to play with a choice of subtitles.

8. Launch VLC, click Media, click Open File and first select the .ogg video file you downloaded. VLC will start playing with Track1 subtitles active.

9. To switch to subtitles for a different language, in VLC click Video, click Subtitles track and click and select a different "Track" number. To disable subtitles, click Video, click Subtitles track and click Disable. Tracks are numbered following the alphabetical order of the files, so Track 1 would be for "de" (German) and track 2 would be "en" (English).

Now click Video, click Subtitles track and click Open File and select the ".srt" file named "051118-WSIS.2005-Richard.Stallman.ogg.de.srt", and click Open. VLC will start to use the German subtitle track. You can open more subtitle tracks and VLC will list them as "Track 1", "Track 2" and so on. You may also drag a .srt file and drop it into the VLC application while the video is playing.

Possible problems

VLC will report "header errors" if any of the subtitle files are in an incorrect format

Reason to avoid Windows Notepad: depending on how you create a file, Notepad may prefix the text file with a multibyte code, invisible in Notepad but that you will need to remove with a "correct" editor.

To link and create closed captioning

(some advice to editors to add links to closed captions)

To make links to closed caption files appear automatically on a video page, add template

{{Closed cap}}

to the Description section of the {{Information}} template, just after all the language descriptions.

(some instructions on creating closed captions in SubRip format; explain any other formats that work)

Examples

Elephants Dream.ogv has TimedText closed captions in these languages:

• English
• Svenska
• Português

See also

• Timed Text
• SubRip, about the format, and in other languages: cs da fr nl pl sl sv
• Comparison of video player software
• Fun with Subtitles - Wikimedia Technical Blog

-84user (talk) 23:09, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Wellcome Trust (UK) making films freely available

Editors may be interested in the discussion at "Commons:Village Pump#Wellcome Trust (UK) making films freely available". — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 15:16, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

thumbtime

Is there a way to set a default thumbtime for a file?

Is there a way to set a thumbtime in a gallery?

Gonioul (talk) 23:49, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes for a file, see "More syntax for videos" at w:en:Wikipedia:Extended image syntax#Video files (Ogg), but not in a gallery (see "Thumbtime in a gallery" for a manual workaround on the same page). -84user (talk) 20:43, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

No, what I meant by "default thumbtime" is a way to set the default thumb for the file, in the file description page for example, so that the uploader can choose the best view. - Gonioul (talk) 00:22, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Gonioul, that is something I suggested at the usability issues page. The issue is being tracked on bugzilla. Unfortunately, there's no progress yet on the issue, though. mahanga (talk) 17:03, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Multimedia Usability Project Underway

Some new developments in the usability area for Commons. Blog post here: http://blog.wikimedia.org/2010/01/26/multimedia-usability-project-underway/ . mahanga (talk) 17:10, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

"If you’re online and have access to IRC you can join the multimedia usability team for ‘office hours,’ where we’ll be available live to take questions and discuss ongoing work around the usability project. The next office hours take place Thursday, February 4 at 9AM to 10AM PDT (16:00 to 17:00 UTC)."

Not ready for video

Of the browsers included in the standard Ubuntu Linux 10.04 (April 2010), Firefox 3.6.3 works, but Opera 10.10 is not video ready (Opera 10.54 is) and Chromium 5.0 still has serious bugs in the Theora decoding (Chromium 6.0 is said to be better). There is no nice fallback. Browsers give no error message that tell you what needs to be done, it's just the videos that look broken, so users are likely to blame Wikipedia rather than their browser software. If we want people to enjoy video in Wikipedia articles, it is because they want to know how an ant farm works, not because they want to install new browsers or plugins. Since only one in three browsers is ready, it's still too early for a big push for video in Wikipedia. --LA2 (talk) 00:34, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Upload error

Yikes. Can someone help me out with this?:

It's supposed to be a video, but the video page comes up with an error following uploading it. I uploaded it a second time and produced the same error.

Bob the Wikipedian (talk) 06:40, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Do you have the original video? It doesn't look like it was converted correctly. Try Miro Video Converter or if you'd like, provide a link to the original source and I can give it a try. Mahanga (Talk) 04:29, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

I assume you mean the conversion to OGV...I'll try that again, thanks for the suggestion. Bob the Wikipedian (talk) 01:45, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

That worked beautifully, thanks! Bob the Wikipedian (talk) 02:29, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Opera and OGV

Here I reverted the addition of Opera to the Playing videos section, with the summary "No, latest Opera version 10.62 ignores native ogg from websites and only downloads ogvs".

However, the problem with Opera might be due to the html markup that wikimedia passes to the browser. Can anyone check this? I tested Opera 10.62 on various wikimedia OGG and OGV files (online or direct from disk) and find:

• Opera displays a blank page on any OGG file
• Opera always pops up a download invitation on any OGV file

-84user (talk) 15:30, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Opera doesn't support Theora, but it does support WebM. Mahanga (Talk) 03:47, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

I have added a table to Commons:Video#Playing videos to better clarify to readers the capability of various web browsers. I did not test Internet Explorer. -84user (talk) 17:15, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for that. Mahanga (Talk) 03:47, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

MKV

I'd like to see the MKV format added to the list of acceptable containers. Previous discussion appears to have occurred here.   — C M B J   09:07, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

•  Support MKV and MKA. I would like to say that it's a very good idea, there are some things which can be done with MKV which can't with a standard OGG container, although i believe that we need to be stating exactly which codecs are allowed within MKV to keep them free. I do also understand the danger that a copyrighted attachment can be placed within MKV, and there would need to be an easy way to check how many streams, and what attachments does a particular file have. Software like ffinfo or mkvinfo can generate a very useful output for that, and if it would be possible to capture the output of such software and add it to the page in a similar way that the EXIF data is added to the images. However, if the file consists only of Theora+Vorbis, then for the benefit of the external player i believe that OGG should be considered superior. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 09:49, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

video and animation

Hi. What is a difference between video and animation ? Regards --Adam majewski (talk) 19:39, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Animation in this particular use of the word animation is a gif picture which changes its layers in the way similar to the video frame. Video on Commons is in Theora codec placed in Ogg container (.ogg or .ogv extension). Video may have audio stream (as well as subtitles, etc) animation is simply a moving picture. Animation displays in the browser the same way an image does, while video has it's own player with the play button. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 03:20, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Thx . --Adam majewski (talk) 16:20, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

.. but  :

• "Wikimedia uses Ogg Theora and GIF for video ..."
• "Ogg Theora animation ... "

???? --Adam majewski (talk) 18:02, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, like i said it depends on your use of the word. You can take a video (with no audio) and make it into a gif animation. Would it be still called "video"? Perhaps. Also you can very easily make an animated video... which is a video of an animation. I would suggest that you don't try to categorise things too precisely. Human language isn't made for that. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 18:37, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

There are 2 similar categories :

• animations of fractals ( ogv files)
• videos of fractals ( gif files)

I have made gif and ogv files. I didn't know to which category I shuld move them. So :

• ogv files about fractals I have moved to category videos of fractals
• gif files about fractals I have moved to category animations of fractals

Is it OK ? --Adam majewski (talk) 19:54, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Sounds right. And don't worry that much, if something like this is wrong, it can easily be changed. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 14:37, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

WebM ?

Any progress? When is webm support likely to become a reality on Wikimedia Commons? - KTucker (talk) 11:56, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Personally i dont see why would we prioritise WebM if we can get many more use cases covered with Ogg-Vorbis+Theora and Matroska-Vorbis-Theora-Kate-JPEG. Of course, it should be done eventually, but there are so many needed features that this one shouldn't be at the top. Or am i missing something? VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 03:09, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I was just wondering. One use case I had in mind was sharing cc-by/cc-by-sa video clips (perhaps adapted for some educational use on Wikiversity) between Youtube and Wikimedia Commons. With Youtube's html5 efforts it is easy to get a webm format to adapt and re-use. Anyway, if there are other more important use cases for the Commons on some prioritised list somewhere, that is great :-). - KTucker (talk) 22:01, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Stabilize

Un lien à creuser: http://bernaerts.dyndns.org/linux/214-ubuntu-stabilize-video-melt

Gonioul (talk) 23:12, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

WebM licensing and HTML5 video

I'm not often in the commons, but thought I should mention that WebM has both patents and licensing. Google admitted this month that it had made arrangements with the MPEG group. Thus OGG would be the only preferred format at this time.

Also, it's misleading to say "For a better video playback experience we recommend a [ html5 video browser]." Every browser out there has some form of HTML5 video implementation, but there is no standard codec/container, and this statement is extremely misleading. It should say something like "We recommend a browser that can play OGG files" or something like that. Araignee (talk) 03:27, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

It is “Ogg”, not “OGG”.

There has been patent trolling about JPEG, too.

From what I read, details of Google and MPEG LA’s agreement are not disclosed. What can you infer? What about en:Smartphone wars and en:Software_patents_and_free_software#Microsoft.27s_patent_deals?

--AVRS (talk) 10:19, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

Most likely Ogg Theora is also encumbered with the exact same patents. Since Theora is derived from the VP3 codec and WebM uses the VP8 codec which again is derived from VP7 and so on... --McZusatz (talk) 17:47, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

Transcoding quality

Is there any possibility to influence the transcode quality for video files?

I uploaded File:Louis Carmontelle Panorama transparent d'un paysage imaginaire 1790.webm. It's a video with a resolution of 800x600 pixels² and a duration of three minutes.

• My original WebM transcode (at full resolution) which I did with FFmpeg and the included libvpx is 10.2 MB in size and offers perfect quality.
• MediaWiki's WebM transcode (at lowest resolution of 480x360 pixels²) is 10.9 MB in size (even larger!) and offers much worse quality (heavy compression artifacts, flickering on keyframes).

Is there some possibility to tweak transcoding quality in MediaWiki? Actually I could do a much better transcode with FFmpeg at a fraction of the file size. --Patrick87 (talk) 20:18, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Of course there is. If you are sure your command line produces better transcodes for all videos rather than the above sample I would suggest to change the command line for TMH. The command line for the different resolutions is assembled in the ffmpegEncode-function of WebVideoTranscodeJob.php. Sample command lines look like this (webm480p) or that (ogg480p):

'/usr/bin/avconv' -y -i '/tmp/localcopy_c384599537bf-1.ogv' -threads 1 -skip_threshold 0 -bufsize 6000k -rc_init_occupancy 4000 -qmin 1 -qmax 51 -vb '1024000' -vcodec libvpx -g '128' -keyint_min '128' -f webm -s 854x480 -aq '2' -ar '44100' -acodec libvorbis -pass '2' -passlogfile '/tmp/transcode_480p.webmd7a58d745ed2-1.webm.log'

or

'/usr/bin/ffmpeg2theora' '/tmp/localcopy_9d2789eb04ea-1.ogv' -V '1024' -a '2' -H '44100' -c '2' --no-upscaling --keyint '128' --buf-delay '256' --width '854' --height '480' --aspect '854:480' -o '/tmp/transcode_480p.ogve985ebf43012-1.ogv'

Also keep in mind we only have limited resources on the servers. --McZusatz (talk) 14:41, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

No, my command line won't work for all files. But the default command line seems to work exceptionally poor for this particular example (actually I hope not all transcodes are that bad). The question is if there exists a way to influence the default command line or to upload transcodes manually, but I'm afraid both are not possible? --Patrick87 (talk) 15:00, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

Manually uploading transcodes is not encouraged. The main purpose of the transcodes is to serve the same video to low bandwidth users without buffering. High bandwidth users can still choose the 720p transcode or even the original. --McZusatz (talk) 17:33, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

I know what the purpose of low resolution transcodes is. But they impressively fail their purpose when their file size is larger than that of the full resolution version. Furthermore when embedding a video as thumbnail into an article (and that's what one does most often in the end) by default a transcoded version seems to be selected (is there a way to change this?).

I wasn't talking about "manually uploading" in the sense of multiple files with different filenames, but to directly upload one of the transcoded versions. But I assume MediaWiki creates those transcodes always on it's own without any possibility to modify behaviour? --Patrick87 (talk) 17:58, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

In your case it is enough to use sth. like [[File:Louis Carmontelle Panorama transparent d'un paysage imaginaire 1790.webm|720px]] to select the original upload. But I am not sure if there is a way to enforce any transcode to be chosen by default. We could file a bug request to allow this behavior?

No, manually uploading transcodes can not be controlled. Who checks if all transcodes have the same content? etc. --McZusatz (talk) 09:35, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I see that a possibility for manual uploads of transcodes wouldn't be reasonable. And letting the user choose transcoding options on his own would probably be too complex (keeping in mind that we have to trade quality for performance and would have to install severe restriction somehow).

However I like the idea of a way to preset the chosen transcode. Since simply using a larger thumbnail might be inappropriate in most articles.

Furthermore I'd like the idea of having a parameter to prohibit transcoding certain video files, something like __NOTRANSCODE__. Does this make any sense to you? --Patrick87 (talk) 09:58, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

At the current setup it would possibly make sense. However on the long run there is a discussion about supporting videoplayback on mobile devices which again is dominated by MP4. (e.g. bugzilla:39867 ). Mobile devices would need at least one transcode to mp4. Therefore I would prefer the solution "Choosing the transcode in the thumbnail parameters". --McZusatz (talk) 10:33, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

static view

Hi. I have made ogv file : Parabolic rays landing on fixed point. Why it's static view is so bad ? TIA --Adam majewski (talk) 18:07, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Bad quality

Just a complaint: I would like to upload more of my videos to commons. But compared to youtube the video function in Commons is very bad. For instance I wanted to look the today media of the day, but the video stops every few seconds. The problem continuous even after the file is completely loaded to my computer. I discovered a funny workaround: when I constantly move my cursor over the video-window (without clicking) then the video plays without stoping. The video-function is alltogether still unacceptable in Commons. I hope they will change it soon. Till then I will upload only pictures and audios. --Bin im Garten (talk) 14:00, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T59108

bugzilla:57108. --McZusatz (talk) 17:48, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

Don't understand "Subtitles and closed captioning" section

I am here because en:Wikipedia:Timed text soft redirects to Commons:Video#Subtitles and closed captioning, and I can't find anything else about it on enwiki. I don’t understand what the section here means; perhaps someone could make it clearer:

• The example given is in SubRip format: Am I correct in guessing that SubRip is the only acceptable format?
• I says the timed text goes in “a new page in the TimedText namespace that matches the filename of the video and the language code.” Am I correct in guessing that means the English timed text for File:Xxx.ogg goes in TimedText:Xxx.ogg.en.srt?
• If so, I have seen timed text with page names different from that: How does that naming work?

Thanks —teb728 t c 09:22, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

@Teb728: 1: correct, 2: correct: 3: it probably doesn't and was created by people that were confused :) —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 19:47, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

What's the "U can't touch this" standard?

I would dearly love to upload some video I shot of this quirky octogenarian, but she's singing Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire", which is copyrighted. It takes a very short clip to demonstrate this woman's "unique" style, so how long of a clip can I use (if any) without getting into copyright trouble? Montanabw (talk) 22:40, 12 March 2016 (UTC)

Repeat video?

Is there a way to make a cyclic animation repeat indefinitely? Thanks. SharkD  Talk  03:33, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

A button to enable looping would be sufficient. How do we get in contact with the people actually in charge of implementing these changes? SharkD  Talk  14:40, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

Mengerzugendlossequenz 2880p60 20200226 color CRF04

@SharkD: It did get added finally as loop keyword, see example to the right. Currently undocumented. --Nanite (talk) 17:11, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Shotcut

I don't know if this page is used to list or promote software, but I found that a FOSS program called Shotcut can be used to assemble still frames and save directly to WEBM format. That means you don't have to save the file as MP4 and then convert them lossily to WEBM using a third tool. I don't think this page talks at all about making movies by assembling still images. SharkD  Talk  21:14, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Preview

Is there a way to choose the video image preview? --Valerio Bozzolan (talk) 00:34, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

@Valerio Bozzolan: Click the "x" in the top right corner. Does that work? Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:56, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

.___. --Valerio Bozzolan (talk) 21:39, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

Video not playing well - size problem? size specs?

Check out these video thumbnails.

• Women in botany and Wikipedia
• Art and Feminism March 2017 at MoMA - Jacqueline Mabey
• BlackLifeMatters Wikipedia Edit-a-thon in Harlem
• Evan Amos and the Wikipedia Effect

I have been looking at various videos on Wikimedia projects. On computers where I check, the first one here "Women in botany" does not show a thumbnail, and when played, plays with lots of pauses. The other ones play fine. I think the problem here is video size because that is the difference that I notice. The Women in Botany one is 363mb. The others are 32mb, 27mb, and 27mb. The Women in Botany one has a resolution of 3,840 × 2,160 pixels, while the others are 1,920 × 1,080 pixels. I know that the general advice on Commons is to upload files of the highest available size, but I also want to use sizes which work on Commons. In this case, thumbnails seem to not render, and also I am not getting the playback that I want.

What resolution should I recommend for Commons videos? Is 1,920 × 1,080 pixels ideal? When higher resolution is possible, should there be multiple separate files of higher and low resolution videos? What opinions does anyone have on this?

@VGrigas (WMF): - you created some of these videos. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:51, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

yeah I'd recommend 1920x1080, it'll play on most devices well. 4k is a bit much sometimes. VGrigas (WMF) (talk) 14:53, 20 June 2017 (UTC)

Resolved

Ah, thanks. I had not realized that these were technical standard sizes. 1,920 × 1,080 is 1080p or full HD, and 3,840 × 2,160 is 4K. I was not realizing that these were standard sizes and now I see that these are different types of video. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:16, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Tracking video views?

Is it possible to see how many times a video has been viewed? T.Shafee(Evo﹠Evo)^talk 00:16, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

Screenshot of WikiMedia Video Tracking Tool

Hi T.Shafee(Evo﹠Evo), see https://tools.wmflabs.org/commons-video-clicks/ Take one of the Most used videos on commons, for example File:Wikipedia ridotto.ogv (Number of usages on wikimedia pages: 520.605) which has Video clicks between July 2016 and July 2017: Total 6750 . --Atlasowa (talk) 08:34, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

Another interesting example:

• File:Citing sources tutorial, part 1.ogv (Number of usages on wikimedia pages: 9481) Views (July 2016-2017 Total): 17670
• File:Citing sources tutorial, part 2.ogv (Number of usages on wikimedia pages: 471) Views (July 2016-2017 Total): 2688

--Atlasowa (talk) 08:46, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

@Atlasowa: Thank you! That's exactly the sort of thing I was looking for! T.Shafee(Evo﹠Evo)^talk 10:51, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

Video trimmer and cutter

A number of use our looking at having such a tool build. Any thought or concerns. Would work similar to the crop tool would be the hope. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:07, 28 February 2019 (UTC)

A very much beta version is here Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:53, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

Clarity needed

This page tells us:

Wikimedia uses VP9, VP8, and Theora for video because they are open and royalty-free, unlike more commonly used video formats such as H.264 and H.265 that are patent encumbered and may require royalty payments to use.

which doesn't tell the reader whether their MP4 video is any good to us. Is there a simple explainer that will help a lay person understand what they can and cannot upload, and how to tell the difference; and that can be included (or linked to from) here? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:34, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

It is indeed complicated. I mean, suppose someone uses his camera phone to make a half minute video showing how the multi-spindle belt drive on his drill press works. He wants to share it. So, he clicks this page and it starts by saying which containers and codecs are best, and for what reasons of policy and law. "What the heck is a container, a codec, and H.264? Do I have any of these? What I've got is an informative little video that could illustrate an article! Why have all this technical stuff when Youtube and Facebook can accept my video as is? And they don't ask me whether it's patent encumbered or demand a royalty payment!" So, it's a compound of Commons policy creating a difficult subject matter and then explaining it poorly. Jim.henderson (talk) 13:54, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

I could not agree more with User:Jim.henderson. These pages are so laden with technical-speak that they offer virtually no practical help whatsoever. As so often happens here on Commons (but never on en.wiki) I've floundered around for ages, seeking answers to blindingly simple questions, and couldn't even find any pointers to as to where to ask those questions. By way of example, I've just made a short Wikipedia training video on referencing. Here are the questions I'd expect to easily find help on:

• Why users aren't permitted to upload MP4, and what they need to do next.
• Aspects of Licensing to consider within videos (logos, screenshots, music, stills)
• Choosing the thumb frame that previews here on Commons (is there an equivalent command to thumbtime=)
• How to use thumbtime= parameter on other Wikis
• List of free on- and off-wiki tools for basic video creation and format conversion
• Alternative to https://tools.wmflabs.org/videoconvert/index.php when that fails to convert
• How to count video views.
• Is it possible to remove the option of low resolution versions of videos containing fine detail, as they're patently useless in certain circumstances.
• Can I change the default resolution that a user sees when they click a video file?
• Can a user create subtitles after uploading a video? (The page at Commons:Timed Text is another wonderful example of how users are bombarded with technical information before being provided with simple clarity on a topic. I gave up trying to find out if I could easily create my own subtitles, having decided that life is too short)
• Where are the key links to help me navigate to other practical and useful help pages. (I'm not an idiot, but Wikimedia Commons clearly doesn't want to help anyone unless they already fully understand most of the technicalities of the subject!)

Many of Commons' advice pages, like this one, desperately need a really good shake to sort them out! Nick Moyes (talk) 09:45, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

Query: take this to the simplest issue for users who have never uploaded a movie before - how can we even determine what video format is suitable to upload on Commons? I've tried 3 formats so far and it says "There was an error in your submission This wiki does not accept filenames that end in the extension ..." I've spent 2 hours going around in circles here, doing useless searches that bring up everything but what I want to know, or taking me back to pages I've already seen. Why doesn't commons actually tell you, right at the submission page, what formats are accepted? Tzali — Preceding undated comment was added at 12:37, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

@Tzali: Did you read COM:VID#Video formats and COM:V2C yet?   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 13:13, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

Preview for mpeg video not working

no preview?

I recently uploaded File:Water rocket liftoff slow motion.mpg and placed it in {{Motd/2020-07-17 (en)}}. But this file has no preview. Is this a bug? Is there a possibility to specify a jpg-file as preview image? --— Preceding unsigned comment added by Xorx (talk • contribs) 16:14, 12 July 2020‎ (UTC)

@Xorx: Sorry, all requests for such previews appear to be met with "Error: 429, Too Many Requests". See also COM:SIGN.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 08:18, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

When I am loggin the loading of this discussion page, I get an "Error 500" with the result below. But when clicking on the link of the preview image I receive a page stating error 429.

GET
	https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bb/Water_rocket_liftoff_slow_motion.mpg/400px--Water_rocket_liftoff_slow_motion.mpg.jpg
Status
500
Internal Server Error
Version HTTP/2
Übertragen2,55 KB (1,80 KB Größe)
Referrer Policyorigin-when-cross-origin

content-length
	1848
content-type 
	text/html; charset=utf-8
date 
	Sun, 19 Dec 2021 14:56:59 GMT
nel
	{ "report_to": "wm_nel", "max_age": 86400, "failure_fraction": 0.05, "success_fraction": 0.0}
permissions-policy 
	interest-cohort=()
report-to 
	{ "group": "wm_nel", "max_age": 86400, "endpoints": [{ "url": "https://intake-logging.wikimedia.org/v1/events?stream=w3c.reportingapi.network_error&schema_uri=/w3c/reportingapi/network_error/1.0.0" }] }
server
	Varnish
server-timing
	cache;desc="int-front", host;desc="cp3059"
strict-transport-security
	max-age=106384710; includeSubDomains; preload
x-cache
	cp3059 int
x-cache-status 
	int-front
x-client-ip 
	2a0a:a540:9345:0:5490:5cc3:44d5:a58b
X-Firefox-Spdy
	h2
	
Accept
	image/avif,image/webp,*/*
Accept-Encoding
	gzip, deflate, br

-- Dr. Schorsch (talk) 15:04, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

ResolvedDr. Schorsch (talk) 10:22, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Transcode status

Can you please add information about Transcode status section in this project page? I uploaded this file File:Annual orbital launches of USA counter.webm and it has a section "Transcode status" - what is the purpose of that section? Can you add info about it in the FAQ? Can I show in Wikipedia pages a lower resolution version of the video? For example the "WebM 240P" version. Is there any way to show that video in Wikipedia article where I am using it? -- Barecode (talk) 13:07, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

Answered at Commons:Help desk#What is Transcode status?.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 17:12, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

Jeff G. - Sorry the answer in incomplete. And what is wrong with adding information about "Transcode status" in the page Commons:Video ? -- Barecode (talk) 18:18, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

@Barecode: I will look into a concrete answer in the nest few hours.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 23:23, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

Jeff G. - Thanks! And take your time, there is no rush. -- Barecode (talk) 23:27, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

@Barecode: You're welcome. Please see these edits. We have no way to "show in Wikipedia pages a lower resolution version of the video", as that would prevent browsers from getting the optimal resolutions for their connections. Do you really want to force a 56 KB WebM 240P 18 kbps video on a browser that can handle the WebM 360P 36 kbps version, or on a browser that can only handle the VP9 120P 5 kbps version because the constraining window is only 120 pixels high? You realize that some less fortunate users pay for their data by the KB (or MB or GB), right? Your current usage, constrained to a 320 pixel width by your parameter "320px", is in a 320 × 180 pixel window, and would at most use the VP9 180P 7 kbps transcode inside that window.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 07:17, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

Jeff G. - Sorry I did not understand what you mean. Can you please break it into smaller steps? You mean some browsers support only VP9 and other browsers support only VP8? My question was: Can I show the video in a page in a certain resolution and a certain code? Say for example I want to show the video at it's half resolution (320 x 180) - and to make sure when I click on it, it plays there instead of opening a pop-up window and show the video at full resolution. Since it is already converted to half resolution (Annual_orbital_launches_of_USA_counter.webm.180p.vp9.webm) - can I do that? Check the two videos - the second one opens a pop-up window. Another question is: why the webm lowest resolution is 160 instead of 180 (half)? -- Barecode (talk) 15:12, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

Mobile browser support

@TheDJ: You removed the sentence about mobile browsers not being consistently supported, but you didn’t add any new information, so currently the paragraph only states that desktop browsers are supported, and doesn’t say anything about mobile ones. Please mention which mobile browsers are supported—I suppose IE Mobile and other archaic browsers/versions aren’t, but for example I’m not sure about Safari on iOS (I recall some issues, but those may have been with Kaltura, not Video.js). If all browsers supported by MediaWiki (grade A) are supported by Video.js, just remove “desktop” from the sentence. —Tacsipacsi (talk) 23:50, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Good point, i'll make sure it gets added again ! —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 06:13, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

@TheDJ: When can you get around it? I’d like to mark the page for translation, and while I want to do it as quickly as possible, I also don’t want to create double work for the translators. —Tacsipacsi (talk) 00:29, 7 May 2022 (UTC)

More examples

I would like to add some more Good examples of videos:

• People at work (like road workers, school teachers, truck drivers, people in offices and in hospitals)
• Production processes inside a factory or farm (from raw material to product, from egg to poulterer), examples: File:Oogstdag Rogge maaien.ogv, File:Achter de schermen van de 'warme' en 'koude' bakker Weeknummer 73-39 - Open Beelden - 15448.ogv, File:Export kuikens-524092.ogv

Can I just add them or is there a procedure? JopkeB (talk) 09:30, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

How to upload a video on YouTube

How to upload a video to your Mayandamart (talk) 08:21, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

@Mayandamart: We can't give you any advice about uploading videos to YT. However if you want to upload a video here, you can use video2commons, but first please be sure than there is no copyright issues. It is usually fine if you recorded the video with your own camera or phone. Do not copy videos from the Internet without a permission from the author for a free license. Yann (talk) 16:57, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

Problem with embedding videos outside wiki?

Hi, when embedding videos on other websites, you can hear the sound but video is not displayed. I have tried Firefox and Chromium based browsers, same result. Example here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grey%20squirrel%20eating%20from%20bird%20feeder.webm?embedplayer=yes Cheers, Dr-Mx (talk) 22:07, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

@Dr-Mx: Created phab:T348913 to track the bug. —Tacsipacsi (talk) 20:11, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

@Dr-Mx: It has been fixed, thanks for the report! —Tacsipacsi (talk) 13:07, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

Great, thanks for opening the issue! Dr-Mx (talk) 00:29, 30 October 2023 (UTC)