Operation Manual

• Add a musical soundtrack to a video.
• Add sound effects to a video.
• Get millisecond accurate syncing of video to sound.
• Export your project to video for burning DVDs or uploading to the Internet.
Learn more about the Video Track
Learn more about video clips
Saving Your Video
Mixcraft supports saving video to AVI or WMV. AVI is uncompressed and will be larger than WMV. If you are
uploading to Google's YouTube, you should choose "WMV" as it will be compressed automatically on YouTube's
servers.
To save your project as a video, click the File menu, followed by Mix Down To, followed by AVI or WMV. To set the
quality and other details, click Edit Details...
If you are saving to WMV, you can choose a preset or you can click Specify Settings followed by clicking Settings... to
choose more detailed options. See more on the WMV Compression Settings dialog.
WMV Compression Settings Dialog
This dialog lets you choose specific compression settings when you're rendering a video project to a WMV video. If
you're using this dialog instead of the Video File Properties generic quality slider, you'll probably want to dig in and
read all the details, but here are a few quick answers to help you with some common goals:
How do I get the highest quality video?
Choosing the "Variable Bit Rate with quality setting" encoding option and then setting its quality slider to the highest
setting (by sliding it all the way to the right) will almost always produce the highest quality results, but it will also
produce files about three times larger than any other methods. If that's too big, try reducing the quality slider a bit or
choosing one of the other encoding methods (except the "Constant Bit Rate (1 pass)" method, which usually produces
low-quality results). Which encoding method works best will generally differ depending on your video content, and you
might have to try multiple methods and compare them.
Bit rate also has a big impact on video quality. Higher bit rates will result in higher video quality (albeit with larger file
sizes). There will usually be a point at which a higher bit rate won't help any, but raising the rate won't hurt video
quality.
How do I get the smallest video files?
Video dimensions and bit rate will usually have the biggest impact on file size, with smaller dimensions and lower bit
rates producing the smallest files. Encoding method can also be important - don't choose the "Variable Bit Rate
(unconstrained)" method, and if you choose the "Variable Bit Rate with quality setting" method, don't set the quality
slider to its highest setting.
What settings should I use for videos I'm planning to upload to YouTube?
YouTube recommends using the same resolution and frame rate as the original video. Unless your file size exceeds
YouTube's limits, it's best to use bit rates that err on the side of quality
rather than file size (in other words, higher bit rates), since YouTube can compress video to produce smaller file sizes
but can't re-add quality that you removed by using low bit rates. You can see YouTube's guidelines here.
To see what a video clip's original resolution and frame rate are, right-click on the clip and then select "Properties"
from the menu that pops up.
The Dialog Controls
Dimensions:
This area lets you specify the height and width of your video. By default, it'll be set to the same resolution as the
smallest video in your project. The dimensions combo box holds a variety of standard settings, and you can check the