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Knowlege Bomb

macrumors G4
Original poster
Feb 14, 2008
10,297
9,014
US
Can someone help me understand why a video shot with an iPhone received through Messages and played on an iPhone is so terrible in quality that you can barely tell what you're seeing? Being on Wifi makes zero difference.
 
If you’ve received it using iMessage then being on WiFi doesn’t matter. The video is on your device and should be off good quality of it was shot with a newer iPhone.
 
Can someone help me understand why a video shot with an iPhone received through Messages and played on an iPhone is so terrible in quality that you can barely tell what you're seeing? Being on Wifi makes zero difference.

It depends on the length of the video being sent. Even if one person is on WiFi and the other is using a cellular network, the video gets compressed before reaching the recipient. I don’t know the exact length the video needs to be so it doesn’t get compressed, but I was running into this all the time. To get around it, I just use iCloud Photo Sharing. Just create an album, upload your videos to that, and invite the other iPhone user to the album. Both you and the other iPhone user(s) must use iCloud and have iCloud Photo Sharing enabled under: Settings > Photos.

AirDrop is also another option, but both phones need to be near each other with AirDrop enabled.

You can also use something like Dropbox as a last resort.
 
It depends on the length of the video being sent. Even if one person is on WiFi and the other is using a cellular network, the video gets compressed before reaching the recipient. I don’t know the exact length the video needs to be so it doesn’t get compressed, but I was running into this all the time. To get around it, I just use iCloud Photo Sharing. Just create an album, upload your videos to that, and invite the other iPhone user to the album. Both you and the other iPhone user(s) must use iCloud and have iCloud Photo Sharing enabled under: Settings > Photos.

AirDrop is also another option, but both phones need to be near each other with AirDrop enabled.

You can also use something like Dropbox as a last resort.
Thanks. The problem with these solutions for me is that these messages are part of a group chat and not everybody has access to iCloud so Dropbox would be the only option and most people aren't going to be willing to do the extra work. The convenience of just opening the message and seeing the video is the draw for most.
 
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The file size of the original video is way too big to send via Message app. Messages app will compress it a ton if it's too big ..so it can be sent.

The best way to send video clips is to keep them under 30 seconds (15 seconds is ideal) and resize them & compress them prior to sending via messages. The messages app won't (usually) mess with it if you keep the file size below about 20 MB and the dimensions at or below 720p.

Try out this app:
Video Compress - Reduce size, shrink videos & entire albums to save memory space by Martin Brachmann
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/vid...-shrink-videos-entire-albums/id997699744?mt=8

Compress a few vids & send them to yourself and see how you like it. I've found that the default 720p setting works best. Still looks great and file size is way smaller.
 
Thanks. The problem with these solutions for me is that these messages are part of a group chat and not everybody has access to iCloud so Dropbox would be the only option and most people aren't going to be willing to do the extra work. The convenience of just opening the message and seeing the video is the draw for most.
If you save the video to iCloud, you have the option to send a link to everyone and they can view the full quality video regardless of device.
You said some of the people in the chat group don’t have access to iCloud...are you saying they don’t have an iPhone?
 
Thanks. The problem with these solutions for me is that these messages are part of a group chat and not everybody has access to iCloud so Dropbox would be the only option and most people aren't going to be willing to do the extra work. The convenience of just opening the message and seeing the video is the draw for most.

For items like that I place them in a Google Drive folder and provide a public link - that way the viewer(s) can view and/or download in original quality.
 
I recommend the same thing as the above poster. I’m in a band so we’re constantly sharing things we’ve recorded on our own to other members of the band. Things sent over iMessage get compressed but we usually require the uncompressed files (audio, album art, videos), so google drive works great for us. Plus once you set it up for the first time, everyone will be able to access it from then on and won’t require resending the link
 
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