Q. Where
do I get Real Producer Basic?
A. From
the following URL:
http://www.realnetworks.com/products/producer/basic.html
Q. Are
there any cautions I should be aware of?
A. No.
Real Networks will make every effort to sell you the Real Producer Plus,
in the process of downloading the Basic product, but for our purposes it
is not necessary.
Q. How do
I encode a WAV file I have already recorded to Real Media format?
A. The
simplest way is to use the Real Producer Wizard. It is the screen
that loads the first time you start the program:
If you have pre-recorded
the file you want to encode as a WAV format
file, be sure the "Record From File" option is selected.
Note that the Wizard also allows directly recording your media into Real
Producer. This will result in an encoded Real Media file, not a
file that can then be used for Windows media also. If you intend
only to use Real Media, then this is probably the simplest option for
capturing your media. If, however, you want to support both
Windows and Real media--or even QuickTime--then you must use another
program, such as MusicMatch JukeBox to do the original recording.
Click OK. You
will see the following:
Click the Browse...
button to find the file you wish to encode. When you do, the
Windows "Select File" dialog box will open up. Navigate your file
system until you find the folder that contains your pre-recorded WAV
file, click on it once to select it, then click "Open:"
The path to the
file will appear in the File Name box:
Click Next. You
will then see the following Clip Info box:
Fill in at least the
Title, Author and Copyright fields. This information will appear
in the media player Clip Info bar when the clip plays. Click Next.
You will be given the opportunity to describe which type of file
encoding you want. Since we at Palomar have access to true,
streaming servers, select "Multi-rate SureStream" as the file type.
Click Next. You
will see the following "Target Audience" selection screen:
Since you want to
encode an audio file, selecting 28K and 56K modem speeds is very
appropriate. Note that you can select no more than two
simultaneous speeds using the Basic version of this program.
Click Next. You
may now select the audio format you wish to use:
Voice only is appropriate for our
example. Click Next.
Saving the .rm
formatted output file in the same folder where the .wav input file is
located is a good idea. Click Next. You will see a summary of the
choices you have made:
If all is well, click
Finish. You will see the main encoder screen. To encode,
click Start:
If all goes well, you will see the file
encoded, with the audio level displayed in the audio monitor bar
(between the Input and Output windows). When complete, you sill
see the following:
Q. How
different is encoding video than audio?
A. Video
files are much larger, and will take larger to encode.
Encoding video is basically the same as
audio, except that you have picture quality and target audience
decisions to make which are somewhat different.
The next step is to transfer the encoded
file to a Real Server.
