Movie Formats Selecting Guide

BB FlashBack stores its movies in FlashBack (FBR) format. If you want non-FlashBack users to be able to watch your movie, you'll need to export it to a standard format. BB FlashBack exports to QuickTime, Flash, MPEG4, AVI, Windows Media Video (WMV), and Executable (EXE).

The best format to choose depends on the end purpose and audience of your movie. Here is a quick guide:

It needs to include 'interactive' objects like buttons and 'click to continue' textboxes:
Then you'll need to export to Flash (SWF) or EXE formats. Only these formats are capable of interactivity. QuickTime, AVI and WMV are not interactive - they just contain movies.

It will be embedded on a webpage
You'll need to export to QuickTime, WMV or Flash formats. All of these can be embedded in webpages.

It needs to play on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux
Flash is probably the best choice. If you only require Windows and Mac OS X, then Flash, MPEG4 and QuickTime are the best choices.

It needs to play back on mobile devices like an iPhone
MPEG4 format can be played back on iDevices and Android phones.

I need as small a file as I can get without reducing quality to an unacceptable level
There's no one format that will give the smallest file for all movies. If the movie is mainly of 'normal' applications like MS Office, EXE may give good results. If there is more motion in your movie, experiment with QuickTime and WMV. Exporting to AVI with codecs like XDiv and DivX can give good results, but these need to be installed on the PC that is playing the movie back also.

I'll be producing a DVD from it
BB FlashBack can't export it in the MPEG2 format which is used by DVDs. You will need to use 3rd party software to produce the DVD, so exporting to AVI may be best. Virtually all movie editing and creation software will work with AVI format.
From bbsoftware