Section 47. Put Your Home Movies and Downloaded Videos on Your iPod


47. Put Your Home Movies and Downloaded Videos on Your iPod

Before You Begin

See Also

Connect Your iPod for the First Time

Find and Play Videos on the iPod

Transfer Your Music and Videos to Your iPod

 


One of the biggest selling points of the modern iPod is its ability to play videosnot just TV show episodes and music videos that you might purchase for $1.99 each at the iTunes Music Store, but also all the miscellaneous video files that you have filed away on your computer after years of surfing on the Internet. Everybody has a folder full of funny movie files downloaded from this or that site, and the prospect of keeping them on your iPod so that they're always in your pocket and ready to view or show a co-worker at a moment's notice is a powerful draw. Even more so is the possibility of taking all those home movies you've been making with your digital camcorder over the years and putting them on an iPod to carry with you while you travel. Who wouldn't want to have a video of his daughter's first steps or the highlights of his son's Little League season in his pocket as he boards a plane on a business trip?

iTunes requires that your video files be in one of a limited number of QuickTime-compatible formats before you can add them to the Library. (See About Music and Video Formats.) This restriction might mean that you'll have to use one of several third-party programs to convert your files from their current format before iTunes will play them. What's more, the iPod has further format restrictions, requiring that your videos be in MPEG-4 format (using either the AVC or H.264 codec). Fortunately, iTunes provides an internal function that allows you to convert non-MPEG-4 videos that it understands into an iPod-compatible format. As the iPod gains in popularity as a ubiquitous video playback device, more and more video sources will offer content in iPod-compatible formats. However, there will always be exceptions to the broader trends, and it's good to know how to deal with them, as this task describes.

Put Your Home Movies and Downloaded Videos on Your iPod


Convert Video Files to an iTunes-Compatible Format

Suppose that you have a collection of video files on your computer. Some are in Windows Media Video (WMV) format, some are in AVI or MPEG format, some are QuickTime (.mov) files, and still others are Flash (.swf) files. You can add some of thesesuch as the QuickTime filesto iTunes right away, but you must convert otherssuch as the MPEG, AVI, and WMV filesto an iTunes-compatible format first.

Note

Flash files are fundamentally different from other kinds of videos and cannot be directly converted to an iTunes-compatible format. Thus, at this time, it's not possible to put your Flash movies on your iPod. Didn't mean to get your hopes up.


A variety of different third-party software programs are available for both Windows and the Mac that allow you to convert video files from one format to another. Some examples for Windows include the Xilisoft iPod Video Converter (http://www.xilisoft.com/ipod-video-converter.html), the Jesterware iPod Video Suite (http://www.jesterware.co.uk/ipodvs.htm), and the WinAVI Video Converter (http://winavi.com/), all of which are commercial or shareware and cost around $30. A free alternative is the Free iPod Video Converter from http://www.jodix.com/.

On the Mac, the most popular iPod video converter is iSquint, available free at http://www.isquint.org/.

Another possibility, for both Mac and Windows users, is Apple's own QuickTime Pro. For $30, it gives you the ability to convert many kinds of video files to formats that both iTunes and the iPod understand. However, it doesn't operate on WMV files without a plug-in such as the Flip4Mac WMV component, and it doesn't include functions that the Windows programs contain, such as the ability to rip DVD video to an iPod-compatible format. You can purchase QuickTime Pro as a key-based upgrade to your existing QuickTime installation at http://store.apple.com/.

Using whichever of these programs is appropriate for you, convert your video files and home movies to MPEG-4 format. If possible, use the H.264 codec, which is the most efficient and highest-quality codec available in the MPEG-4 framework.

Tip

If at all possible, download your videos in a format that's compatible with the iPod in the first place, avoiding the need to convert them using third-party programs. Many video download sites provide versions of their content in QuickTime or iPod formats. One such site is Google Video, http://video.google.com, which allows you to select Video iPod as the download format for saving the videos it makes available.


Add Video Files to iTunes

Using the method described in Add a Music or Video File to Your iTunes Library, add your video files to iTunes. You can then use the Videos source to view your videos using iTunes as your video player. This does not, however, necessarily mean that you can transfer the videos to your iPod.

Convert Video Files for the iPod

Use the List View button to view your videos in a detailed listing. Scroll right until you see the Kind column. If this column is not visible, enable it as described in Customize Which Information Columns Are Displayed.

The only kinds of video files that you can transfer to the iPod are ones whose Kind is MPEG-4 Video File or Protected MPEG-4 Video File. When you synchronize the iPod, other videos are not transferred to it; they generate a warning message telling you that they cannot be synchronized.

In many cases, iTunes can convert such videos to an iPod-compatible format. To do so, select the video in question and then choose Advanced, Convert Selection for iPod. If iTunes is capable of performing this conversion, a duplicate of the original video appears in iTunes next to the first one, but in the iPod-compatible MPEG-4/H.264 format.

Note

iTunes might fail to convert video files for any of a number of reasons. It might claim that the video is already in the correct format, or it might claim that the video does not allow saving or conversion. If this occurs, try one of the third-party programs described earlier in this task, and be sure to save the file in MPEG-4 format, using either AVC or H.264 as the codec.


Synchronize Your iPod with iTunes

Connect your iPod to your computer using the Dock or included cable as described in Transfer Your Music and Videos to Your iPod. When iTunes has finished exchanging information with the iPodtransferring newly added video files to it and downloading the changes you've made while on the goyou can view the videos you added to iTunes and take them with you wherever you go. See Find and Play Videos on the iPod for more information about playing videos on the go.




iPod + iTunes for Windows and Mac in a Snap
iPod + iTunes for Windows and Mac in a Snap (2nd Edition)
ISBN: 0672328992
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2006
Pages: 150
Authors: Brian Tiemann

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