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Watermarking
I have figured out how to mark video with a logo or any other identifying device you like, using Quicktime Pro, and thought I should share with the class.
First, make an image with your logo in the corner or wherever you want it to appear.
Second, open the image you just created in quicktime. You should also have a high-quality version of your vid open in quicktime.
To make the background transparent so that the logo can be layed over your video:
On your image time track, select all [Apple + A] and copy [Apple + C].
On your vid time track, select all [Apple + A], then go the Edit menu and choose "Add scaled." This stretches the image duration (one frame) to play over the entire movie clip.
Export the video with your final codec, dimensions, and quality.
And there you have it.
First, make an image with your logo in the corner or wherever you want it to appear.
This image should be the size of the video you're going to lay it on. For instance, my Kryptonite vid is 352x208 pixels, so that's the size I made my image.
You should choose a color that does not appear in your logo for the background of the picture, and it helps if the background color is easy to find on a hex color chooser, because that's how you'll need to find it on quicktime. I had a white logo on a black background.
Save the image in a high quality format such as BMP. I originally tried JPEG but got lousy results when I did the rest of this process in quicktime.
Second, open the image you just created in quicktime. You should also have a high-quality version of your vid open in quicktime.
To make the background transparent so that the logo can be layed over your video:
With the image as the frontmost window, go to the Movie menu and select "Get movie properties," or use the key command [Apple + J].
The window that pops up will have two pull-down menus. On the left, select "Video track." Then, on the right, select "Graphics mode."
This will bring up another list of options in the main body of the window. Highlight "transparent," which should be the fourth option.
The click on the "Color" button at the bottom of the window. Pick the background color of your image, and hit "Okay." Your background will appear to turn gray; this is Quicktime's way of showing transparency when there is no image underneath a transparent layer.
Close the movie properties box.
On your image time track, select all [Apple + A] and copy [Apple + C].
On your vid time track, select all [Apple + A], then go the Edit menu and choose "Add scaled." This stretches the image duration (one frame) to play over the entire movie clip.
Export the video with your final codec, dimensions, and quality.
This is done by either selecting "Export" on the File menu, or using the key command [Apple + E].
Then choose your video options on the save window that comes up:
The bottom two pull-down menus are "Export:" and "Use:"; on the Export menu select "Movie to quicktime movie."
On the Use menu, select whatever option you prefer. These are not terribly specific, and you can get more control over the encoding by hitting the "Options" button on the right side of the Save window and selecting your encoding options there.
The reason you want to export your movie (and not just save as a self-contained movie) is twofold: Firstly, quicktime plays layered movies choppily. Exporting produces a single layer of video which plays smoothly. Secondly, for the purposes of marking video, you would prefer to distribute a flattened, single-layer version rather than a dual-layer version, because anyone else with QT Pro can peel the logo layer off of a dual-layer version.
And there you have it.