The Mux Transcoding Process is comprised of a series of steps:

  1. Receive the incoming video file either by push (upload) or pull (download from URL link)
  2. Analyze and detect the media type, including codec, size, bitrate and more
  3. Convert the video file into a common MPEG-4-based format
  4. Convert the intermediate file into the request output format, be it video, just the audio track or a thumbnail image
  5. Place the output video file onto a protected Amazon S3 bucket, ready for you to transfer back to your server, or serve directly to your user

This entire process takes place within the Amazing Web Services computing cloud, utilizing a combination of on-demand processing, infinite storage and powerful, scalable message queues and database storage systems.

Mux uses straight mime-types for determining output formats. We have also created a few extension types such as “video/mp4-ipod” for optimizing around a specific device.

Supported Mime-Types

Name Mime Type File Ext Description
3G Mobile Video video/3gpp *.3gp mobile phone video
3G2 Mobile Video video/3g2 *.3g2 3GPP2 (for CDMA-based Phones, may have filename extension .3g2)
Apple iTunes Video video/m4v *.m4v This media file can be played using Apple Quicktime, which can be downloaded at http://www.apple.com/quicktime. If you have an iPod or iTunes installed, you have Quicktime.
Apple Quicktime video/quicktime *.mov This media file can be played using Apple Quicktime, which can be downloaded at http://www.apple.com/quicktime. If you have an iPod or iTunes installed, you have Quicktime.
DIVX Encoded Video video/divx *.divx This a DIVX encoded video file that can be played using software from http://divx.com
Flash Video video/x-flv *.flv Flash video
JPEG Image image/jpg *.jpg This image file can be viewed using a compatible image viewer.
Mobile Phone Audio audio/amr *.amr mobile phone ringtone audio
MP3 Audio audio/mp3 *.mp3 This is a standard MP3 file. It can be played back using a variety of software, including Apple Quicktime.
MPEG Video video/mpeg *.mpg This is a standard MPEG file. It can be played back using a variety of software, including Apple Quicktime.
OGG Video application/ogg *.ogg Ogg is a patent-free, fully open and standardised multimedia bitstream container format designed for efficient streaming and file compression (storage) by the Xiph.Org Foundation. Download codecs and players for OGG at http://www.vorbis.com/
Windows AVI video/avi *.avi This media file can be played using Microsoft’s Windows Media Player available at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia
Windows Media Video audio/x-ms-wmv *.wmv This media file can be played using Microsoft’s Windows Media Player available at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia
MPEG-4 (H.264) video/mp4-h264 *.mp4 H.264/AAC
iPod (H.264/AAC) video/mp4-ipod *.m4v iPod optimized video
PSP MPEG-4 video/mp4-psp *.m4v PSP optimized video
MP4 Mobile video/mp4-mobile *.mp4 MPEG-4 optimized for mobile phones

At the core of the Mux services are an open API that you can use to perform transcoding operations on media files of all types. Everything that’s available through the various MUX services is available through the API. Our goal is to make this API as simple as possible, and to support as many different users as possible, so we’ll spare you the complex explanations of the internals. Assuming you have your programming language of choice, and it supports XML and HTTP, you will be able to get up and running pretty quickly.

Learn More…

Open Network Television is excited to announce that we’ve released the 2.0 version of Mux.am - the free, public interface to the Mux Cloud. This new release features a redesigned user interface, the ability to upload files directly for conversion, and an improved set of mobile video options. Behind the beta is the new version of the Mux Cloud, as well, which offers more power and fidelity for online video conversion needs.

Mux powers the video encoding on the Cruxy Digital Marketplace. Here is a sample set of videos generated on Cruxy.

Typical “Medium” Quality ~700bkps - 600×350 Flash 7
Unalbe to show flash video

More sample video coming soon…