There are a number of video formats in the world of media today used to store data. Did you know a lot of the new media players will work with multiple formats? Some of the formats I list below are dinosaurs but I still thought I should include them in the list.

Information about the various video formats.

8mm, Video8, Hi8, Digital8
8mm Video refers to a group of three video formats and they are Video8, Hi8 and Digital8. Together these formats, championed by Sony, played a very important part in the early history of consumer and pro-sumer camcorders.

Beta, Betamax, Betacam, Betacam SP, Betacam SX , Digital Betacam
The Beta group of video formats includes the failed consumer-level Betamax as well as a number of very successful professional-level formats. The professional Beta formats have been leaders in the television production market, especially in the field of ENG (Electronic News Gathering).

DV, MiniDV, DVCAM, DVCPRO, DVCPRO50, DVCPRO HD, HDV
DV (Digital Video) is a video standard launched in 1996. It was created by a consortium of companies and given the official name IEC 61834. The DV standard has spawned a few variations, including DVCAM (Sony) and DVCPRO (Panasonic). Consumers know DV in it’s smaller format MiniDV. The high-definition version is HDV, which uses the same style tapes but uses MPEG-2 for compression.

DV uses intraframe compression; that is, compression within each frame rather than between consecutive frames. This makes it an ideal format for editing. It uses the Firewire (IEEE 1394) interface to transfer video files between cameras, editing equipment, etc. The tapes can be played back in both DVCAM and DVCPRO VCRs.

DVD, Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, HD-VMD, CH-DVD
DVD is an optical disc storage technology. DVD was introduced in 1997 as a replacement for several formats including CDs, VHS and laserdisc. The letters DVD are often said to stand for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc, but the official standard does not specify any particular meaning for the letters.

DVD gained acceptance more slowly than initially predicted for reasons ranging from licensing issues to consumer wariness because the VHS vs Betamax war was still fresh in everyone’s minds. However it’s advantages were significant and it became the dominant format for distributing pre-recorded content as well as computer data storage. DVD comes in a variety of flavours which can be confusing. The different physical formats determine how data is stored (e.g. DVD-ROM); application formats determine how program content is stored and played (e.g. DVD-Video).

HDTV, 1080i, 1080p
HDTV means high definition television. HDTV is a video and television standard that includes a group of formats, or modes, which all provide higher resolution than previous standards.

Flash
Flash video is a relative newcomer to the digital video scene. Up until version 6, Flash did not handle full-motion video well enough to be useful. As of version 7, true streaming video is supported by Flash and anyone with the latest player can see Flash video clips. Flash video files use the extension .flv. FLV files are usually played from within a .swf file, which is the conventional Flash file format.

The biggest advantages of Flash is for delivering video on the Internet. About 95% of browsers have Flash installed. It also works equally well on PCs, Macs and Linux computers. You can create your own interactive media content with graphics, animations, etc. You can even create your own media player with custom controls.

MPEG, MPEG-4
MPEG video is a series of video standards defined by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG). MPEG4 Scalable delivery, used in various applications including Internet, cell phones and television.

Quicktime
QuickTime is a multimedia technology developed by Apple Computer and first released in 1992 (a year before Microsoft’s Video for Windows). It has evolved to become a versatile platform, capable of handling video, audio, animation, text, music, and virtual reality (VR) panoramas.

RealMedia
RealMedia is a multimedia container format created by RealNetworks. Its extension is “.rm”. It is typically used in conjunction with RealVideo and RealAudio and is used for streaming content over the Internet.

VHS, VHS-C, S-VHS, S-VHS-C, D-VHS
VHS is a consumer-level video standard developed by JVC and launched in 1976. Originally VHS was an acronym for Vertical Helical Scan (a reference to the recording system used) but was later changed to the more consumer-friendly Video Home System.

This should help you understand the different formats better.

Blockbuster, Inc. may have seen its heyday. It is expected to file for bankruptcy protection, Chapter 11 within the next few days.

Nearly 10% of its many stores are expected to close as a result.

Read more at Blockbuster Expected To File Chapter 11.

Now might be a good time to get familiar with downloading your own movies right at home.

In theaters this weekend is Moneyball, starring Brad Pitt, Jonah Hill, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Robin Wright.

Moneyball is based upon the true story of Oakland A’s general manager, Billy Beane, and his successful attempt to stay within the smallest budget in the league, yet still put together a winning team.

Beane gets together with computer geek, Peter Brand, a Yale economics major and full time computer nerd, portrayed by Jonah Hill. They gather together statistical data on a computer where they analyze every player and place a values upon the skills and characteristics that will benefit the team.

Having lost some great players and knowing that they cannot possibly replace them for the amount of money that they have to work with, the computer generated team fits into the budget yet still allows them the opportunity to put together a winning team.

Beane was one of the first in baseball to actually embrace computer technology and how it can mix up and separate the data with algorithms to actually use the raw data to analyze the possible players.

Even though this is a movie about baseball, it seems that you don’t necessarily need to know anything about baseball to enjoy the movie and it becomes a movie more about the people, Billy Beane, Peter Brand and Art Howe, the stressed out Oakland A’s coach, who is not so sure he can handle the stress of recruiting players in the new way. It is a movie more about management of the sport than the playing of the sport. For all of you who asked, NO you CAN NOT download free movies that are copyrighted which includes this one.

So far reviews have been excellent. Rumor has it that Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill are both at the top of their game in this movie. Seems like a great movie to check out. It hits theaters on Friday, September 23, 2011.

Moneyball was based upon the 2003 book by Michael Lewis, “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game”.

Paranormal Activity 3, the third in the Paranormal Activity series and the prequel that starts where it all began broke the record for the biggest fall openings with an estimated $54 million in its debut.  It surpassed “Jackass 3D”to become the highest-grossing September/October release ever.

(Caution: Spoiler Alert)

If you remember the 1st and 2nd Paranormal Activity movies you will recall “Katie”.  Paranormal Activity 3  is set in the year 1988 and it focuses on Katie and her sister Kristi’s childhood.  In the movie Kristi talks to an imaginary friend while at the same time other very odd and unexplained phenomena are noticed around the family home.

A great advantage to the Paranormal movies is that the mythology of the premise is such that you do not have to watch the sequels in order.  Watching any one of the three can give you the idea.

Based upon the premise of a home movie that has been “found” at a later date, there are definitely boring parts followed by scary noises and sights that will get your heart pounding.

Will there be another “Paranormal Activity 4”? Or should this be the end of the series.  Judging from box office receipts from the past weekend, we may see another one.  It would seem that movie makers just have to see if they can get lightning to strike twice, or three times, or four times…..

“The Hunger Games” Arriving March 23, 2012

One of the most highly anticipated films of 2012 will arrive on March 23, 2012.  “The Hunger Games” is based on the epic young adult trilogy by Suzanne Collins.

“The Hunger Games”, the first book of the trilogy was released by Scholastic Press in September 2008.   The book was on the New York Times bestseller list for 60 weeks in a row.  It was followed by the second book in the series “Catching Fire” and the last of the trilogy “Mockingjay”  both of which were bestsellers in their own right.

Collins has said that “The Hunger Games” was inspired partially by the Greek myth of Theseus ad the Minotaur and that the idea for “The Hunger Games” came from channel surfing on television, where on one station she saw people competing on a reality show and on another she saw footage of the invasion of Iraq.  The setting for “The Hunger Games” is a dystopian society of the future known as Panem.  Panem consists of a wealthy capitol and twelve surrounding poorer districts which provide the resources for the capitol.  Panem is located on the North American continent, with the capitol being located somewhere in the Rocky Mountains and district 12, where the protagonist of the story, Katniss Everdeen, lives is located in the coal country of the Appalachian region.

The Hunger Games is an annual event that is put on by the capitol in which two teenagers, a boy and a girl between the ages of 12 and 18, from each district compete to stay alive in a televised event. The participants, or “tributes” must fight to the death in a dangerous, outdoor arena that is completely controlled by the Capitol.  The arena changes and adapts at the will of the gamekeepers in order to make it the most entertaining for the viewers from the Capitol.  “The Hunger Games” was set up as a punishment for a rebellion in the past against the Capitol in which an additional 13th district was supposedly destroyed.  Because Panem is a dystopian society, all control is with the Capitol.

The story follows young Katniss Everdeen, who volunteers to be a tribute in the games in order to save her younger sister, Primrose, from having to compete.  Peeta Mellark, the son of a baker, is the male counterpart to Katniss in the 74th Hunger Games.

If you read the trilogy “The Hunger Games” you know that the books offered edge of your seat, page-turning suspense and it will be interesting to see if the movie lives up to the excitement of the books.

Let’s hope so.