Okay.. Can Somebody Explain To Me How I Make Hosted FLVs Please?

Over the past couple of months i have seen a lot of posts on both gay and straight boards from affiliates asking for more hosted FLVs and im considering making a few for an upcoming program im gearing up to launch however, i really have no clue about 'flash' stuff at all so would it be possible for some of you folks that use or have them on your program to give me some info on how i would go about creating them?

Is there any specific software i need to get in order to create them? I have Sorenson Squeeze right now for example, do i need anything else?

How do i know what size or length to make them, is there an 'ideal' length for a hosted FLV?

Also, what if i want to put controls on the vids like YouTube movies have, that play button, pause button or volume control etc, how easy/difficult is this to do?

In addition, how do i go about working the affiliate stuff in to the FLV file so that affiliates using them are getting creditted with sales made from them etc?

Any help or advice you folks could offer would be greatly appreciated with this, i really do know nothing about flash stuff as it really isnt anything ive really been fond of in the past due to regular flash needing extra clicks.

Thanks in advance for any assistance you can offer :)

Regards,

Lee

A hosted flv is just a flv file hosted on your server. The affiliate would put the location of the flv file in their own player on their site.

I'd keep it the original resolution size but scale the bits down. A 1 minute clip will be about 3-5 mb. So its more about what kind of bandwidth will you allow out for them.

After you get the hosted flvs done, worry about the embedable flash videos where you would make your own player with controls, overlays like youtube etc. Flowplayer.org or the JW player.

Jimmy

Ah okay, i thought they were one and the same thing, so what would you say is more popular, hosted FLVs or embeddable FLVs?

Regards,

Lee

Oh yeah, for hosted flvs, some also like a thumbnail hosted to go with it.

Jimmy

Depends on the affiliate really. I think they are pretty close.

But you if you are thinking about making an embedable player and clip, you might as well do the hosted flvs first as they are just files.

Jimmy

Okay cool thanks Jimmy :)

Another quick question on the hosted flv stuff then, im guessing these start to play immediately when they are embedded or is there something i do during the encoding process that will make the surfer need to click something for them to play?

Regards,

Lee

Hosted flv and Emebeded flash video are 2 different things.

For both, when it starts to play is dependant on the flash player that is used. Not during encoding. Just worry about making it look good in squeeze, then look at one of those sites for a good player.

Jimmy

Okay great, thanks again Jimmy, going to have a play with this in a few and ill post the file once its encoded :)

Regards,

Lee