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QuickTime Poster Movies


The QuickTime Plug-in has the ability to reload a movie in the same space as the original. In this way, many small movies called Poster Movies can be posted on a single page, and the user can then select which of the audio or video files to download later. This allows the initial page to load faster and keeps the users happy by not causing long wait times for files that they don't want to listen to or watch.

 

To Create a Poster Movie

  1. A Poster Movie is simply a still image that links to the actual QuickTime audio or video file. To create a Poster Movie you can create an image in Photoshop or Fireworks, or you can save a frame from the movie you want to embed in your web page using iMovie. Either way, your first step is to decide what graphic element you want to represent your poster movie, create it and save the file. Your image must be saved with a file format QuickTime Player Pro can import such as a .gif or .jpg file.

    • If you are creating a Poster Movie for an audio file, the movie should be 240 pixels wide by 16 pixels high (the height of the QuickTime controller.)


    • If you are creating a Poster movie for a video file, the width will be the same as the width of the video file and the height will be the height of the video file plus 16 pixels (to allow for the QuickTime Controller.)

  2. Once you have created your image, open QuickTime Player Pro and open your Poster Movie graphic.
  3. From the File menu, choose the Export.
  4. Name the file poster.mov
  5. From the Export pull-down menu choose Movie to QuickTime Movie. Exporting your file in this manner will automatically make your movie self-contained.

 

To Insert the Poster Movie into your Web Page:

  1. Make sure that the Poster Movie is in the same folder as your QuickTime audio or video files.

    If you are using Poster Movies you MUST have the html file containing the movie, the poster movie and the audio or video QuickTime movie in the same directory. If you do not have all three of these files in the same directory, your movies may not play on the web.
  2. From the Dreamweaver Insert menu, choose Quicktime Movie.
  3. In the Source field, browse to find the poster movie file.
  4. Check the Poster Movie checkbox.
  5. Enter the width and height of the poster movie. (For an audio only file your poster movie should be 240x16)
  6. Verify that autoplay is checked and that controller and loop are not checked.
  7. In the Link box, browse to the QuickTime audio or video file.
  8. Click OK.