A client asked me recently about the settings I use to export web ready MP4 videos from Final Cut Pro so I made a quick Screenflow video for her and thought I would share it here as well.
In the video I step you through the export process in Final Cut Pro so you can apply the same settings and get the best results when exporting MP4′s from Final Cut Pro for use on the web.
We’re here in Final Cut Pro and I’m just going to show you quickly the export settings that I use for exporting movies in MP4 from Final Cut Pro.
We go to the File Menu, Export, Using Quicktime Conversion then I come in the Format box and choose MPEG-4 and then come in to the Options. Now the Default Options will give you a small video with not very good quality. So we need to change the file format to MP4, change video format to H264. The data rate if we’re playing our videos for the web, for uploading to our website we want to set it to 650. If we’re going to the DVD or something like that you’ll have to make it higher, probably 1300 to 1500 region but the web videos, 650 is fine. Image size is the next box and I’ll choose Current which will give you the same size as your source footage so if it’s full HD 1280 x 720 or 1920 x 1080. If you want to make videos smaller you can go to Custom and it will give you a size here so just calculate so that the ratio stays the same and that your videos will come out in the right shape. For Frame Rate you can choose Current and in Key Frame you choose Automatic.
That’s the settings that you need to make your videos export in mp4 from Final Cut Pro.
