SilverKottage Tip: Converting Quicktime mov files to WMV

A couple of days ago, a client of mine asked me to make a Microsoft Powerpoint presentation for them that would play videos that I have edited.

Steve Jobs does not use this… but everyone else does.

Using a Mac, my workflow was edit in Final Cut Pro and out put as the project’s setting. Then recode it to H.264 in MPEG Streamclip for playing.

MPEG Streamclip, the video convertor of choice

Everything was good, my Powerpoint presentation was done and I inserted the videos into the presentation. Tested the presentation out and the videos played.

I then transfered presentation and the video files to a USB key and gave it to my client…

That’s when the problem occurred. My client’s computers uses Windows as it’s OS… and with Microsoft being anti Apple, Powerpoint in Windows OS does not play .mov files! The player that Powerpoint uses is Windows Media Player.

So, I had to figure out what format to use. I used MPEG Streamclip to convert the video files to AVI. But the quality was so bad and there was no sound for some reason. Also, converting a short clip would take AGES.

I then saw an option to convert to WMV, Windows Media Video. Surely, this would work on a Windows OS Powerpoint! But because Apple is anti Microsoft, I had to purchase a 3rd party plug in, Flip4Mac to allow me to re-encode .mov to .wmv for clips over 30 seconds.

Something that should be FREE!

So, if you want to convert .MOV to .WMV on a Mac, you will need to buy Flip4Mac Studio (AUS $58) and then use either MPEG Streamclip (free) or Quicktime Pro ($$) to convert to a preset WMV file.

In the end, I got the embedded video playing on my client’s computer. But at $58 just to make a Quicktime file into a Windows Media Video file? Seriously… that just shouldn’t be. Please love each other, Apple and Microsoft.

Love is in the air.